“As I said, we were mad with blood; and none more mad than I. Surely it is no fable that men are possessed, even in this latter age, by devils.  Why else did I rejoice in slaying?  Why else was I, the son of a noble and truthful cavalier of Castile, among the foremost to urge upon my general the murder of the Inca?  Why did I rejoice over his dying agonies?  Why, when Don Ferdinando de Soto returned, and upbraided us with our villainy, did I, instead of confessing the sin which that noble cavalier set before us, withstand him to his face, ay, and would have drawn the sword on him, but that he refused to fight a liar, as he said that I was?”

“Then Don de Soto was against the murder?  So his own grandson told me.  But I had heard of him only as a tyrant and a butcher.”

“Senor, he was compact of good and evil, as are other men:  he has paid dearly for his sin; let us hope that he has been paid in turn for his righteousness.”

John Brimblecombe shook his head at this doctrine, but did not speak.

“So you know his grandson?  I trust he is a noble cavalier?”

Amyas was silent; the old gentleman saw that he had touched some sore point, and continued: 

“And why, again, senors, did I after that day give myself up to cruelty as to a sport; yea, thought that I did God service by destroying the creatures whom He had made; I who now dare not destroy a gnat, lest I harm a being more righteous than myself?  Was I mad?  If I was, how then was I all that while as prudent as I am this day?  But I am not here to argue, senors, but to confess.  In a word, there was no deed of blood done for the next few years in which I had not my share, if it were but within my reach.  When Challcuchima was burned, I was consenting; when that fair girl, the wife of Inca Manco, was tortured to death, I smiled at the agonies at which she too smiled, and taunted on the soldiers, to try if I could wring one groan from her before she died.  You know what followed, the pillage, the violence, the indignities offered to the virgins of the Sun.  Senors, I will not pollute your chaste ears with what was done.  But, senors, I had a brother.”

And the old man paused awhile.

“A brother—­whether better or worse than me, God knows, before whom he has appeared ere now.  At least he did not, as I did, end as a rebel to his king!  There was a maiden in one of those convents, senors, more beautiful than day:  and (I blush to tell it) the two brothers of whom I spoke quarrelled for the possession of her.  They struck each other, senors!  Who struck first I know not; but swords were drawn, and—­The cavaliers round parted them, crying shame.  And one of those two brothers—­the one who speaks to you now—­crying, ’If I cannot have her, no man shall!’ turned the sword which was aimed at his brother, against that hapless maiden—­and—­hear me out, senors, before you flee from my presence as from that of a monster!—­stabbed her to the heart.  And as she died—­one moment more, senors, that I may confess all!—­she looked up in my face with a smile as of heaven, and thanked me for having rid her once and for all from Christians and their villainy.”