"The American. He is just about finishing his third bottle of refino, and is shouting in a loud voice what he calls his war-song. He is a ferocious Indian, with a white man's skin. He is recounting all the hair he has raised, all the murders he has committed. And, would you believe it, he claims my scalp as an addition to his treasures. I tell you again, he is a devil."
"What a saint you have become all at once!" said the licentiate, who again began to fling his sarcasms at the Mexican. "How long is it since you began to hate the smell of blood?"
The gayety of Don Tadeo was terrible to behold. This question of the licentiate's raised a hatred in his mind, fierce and implacable as the tiger's. Don Tadeo did not seem to take any notice of the impression he was producing, but, on the contrary, to delight in irritating the wretch, who foamed with anger under his cold, biting sarcasm. An allusion to the criminal attempt on the Paseo suddenly enlightened me as to this keen, bitter irony. Before me stood the man on whom the licentiate could take vengeance if he chose, at whose mercy he lived, and who had treacherously attempted the life of the unhappy female for whom the passing-bell was perhaps tolling at this very moment. "Does the peal of the Bernardines remind you of nothing?" said Don Tadeo; but this last sally deprived the Mexican of all patience, and, instead of replying, he bounded forward to snatch the licentiate's rapier, but with a vigorous thrust of the arm he was hurled violently to the ground.
"Come, now," cried the licentiate, "you forget the crime you committed. I forgive you, miscreant; but out of this, instantly."
