"These people must be rich," he said to me so soon as the keeper of the place had gone, "if they fashion the utensils of their rest–houses of silver. Till now this story of the Sacred City of which Zibalbay was cacique, and Maya heiress apparent, has always sounded like a fairy tale to me, but it seems that it is true after all, for the man's manner shows that Zibalbay is a very important person."
Then we put on the robes that had been provided for our use, not without difficulty, since their make was strange to us, and returned to the eating–room. Presently the curtain was drawn, and the Lady Maya joined us—the Lady Maya, but so changed that we started in astonishment.
Different, indeed, was she to the ill–clad and travel–stained girl who had been our companion for so many weeks. Now she was dressed in a robe of snowy white, bordered with embroidery of the royal green, and having the image of the Heart traced in gold thread upon the breast. On her feet were sandals, also worked in green, while round her throat, wrists, waist, and ankles shone circlets of dead gold. Her dark hair no longer fell loose about her, but was twisted into a simple knot and confined in a little golden net, and from her shoulders hung a cloak of pure white feathers, relieved here and there by the delicate yellow plumes of the greater egret.
"Like you I have changed my garments," she said in explanation. "Is the dress ugly, that you look astonished?"
"Ugly!" answered the señor, "I think it is the most beautiful that I ever saw."
"This is the most beautiful dress that you ever saw! Why, friend, it is the simplest that I have. Wait till you see me in my royal robes, wearing the great emeralds of the Heart; what will you say then, I wonder?"
"I cannot tell, but I say now that I don't know which is the most lovely, you or your dress."
"Hush!" she said, laughing, yet with a note of earnestness in her voice. "You must not speak thus freely to me. Yonder in the pass, friend, I was the Indian girl your fellow–traveller; here I am the Lady of the Heart."
"Then I wish that you had remained the Indian girl in the pass," he answered, after a pause, "but perhaps you jest."
"I was not altogether jesting," she answered, with a sigh, "you must be careful now, or it might be ill for you or me, or both of us, since by rank I am the greatest lady in this land, and doubtless my cousin, Tikal, will watch me closely. See! here comes my father."
As she spoke Zibalbay entered, followed by the two Indians bearing food. He was simply dressed in a white toga–like robe similar to that which had been given to the señor and myself. A cloak of black feathers covered his shoulders, and round his neck was hung a massive gold chain to which was attached the emblem of the Heart, also fashioned in plain gold.
We noticed that, as he came, his daughter, Maya, made a courtesy to him, which he acknowledged with a nod, and that whenever they passed him the two Indians crouched almost to the ground.
Evidently the friendship of our desert journeying was done with, and the person of whom we had hitherto thought and spoken as an equal must henceforth be treated with respect. Indeed the proud–faced, white–bearded chief seemed so royal in his changed surroundings that we were almost moved to follow the example of the others, and bow whenever he looked at us.
"The food is ready," said Zibalbay, "such as it is. Be seated, I beg of you. Nay, daughter, you need not stand before me. We are still fellow–wanderers, all of us, and ceremony can stay till we are come to the City of the Heart."
Then we sat down and the Indians waited on us. What the dishes consisted of we did not know, but after our long privations it seemed to us that we had never eaten so excellent a meal, or drunk anything so good as the native wine which was served with it. Still, notwithstanding our present comfort, I think the señor's heart misgave him, and that he had presentiments of evil. Maya and he still loved one another, but he felt that things were utterly changed, as she herself had shown him. While they wandered, in some sense he had been the head of the party, as, to speak truth, among companions of a coloured race a white man is always acknowledged to be by right of blood. Now things were changed, and he must take his place as an alien wanderer, admitted to the country upon sufferance, and already this difference could be seen in Zibalbay's manner and mode of address. Formerly he had called him "señor," or even "friend;" to–night, when speaking to him, he used a word which meant "foreigner," or "unknown one," and even myself he addressed by name without adding any title of respect.
One good thing, however, we found in this place, who had lacked tobacco for six weeks and more, for presently the Indian entered bearing cigarettes made by rolling the herb in the thin sheath that grows about the cobs of Indian corn.
"Come hither, you," said Zibalbay to the Indian, when he had handed us the cigarettes. "Start now to the borders of the lake and advise the captain of the village of the corn–growers that his lord is returned again, commanding him in my name to furnish four travelling litters to be here within five hours after sunrise. Warn him also to have canoes in readiness to bear us across the lake, but, as he values his life, to send no word of our coming to the city. Go now and swiftly."
The man bowed, and, snatching a spear and a feather cloak from a peg near the door, vanished into the night, heedless of the howling wind and the sleet that thrashed upon the roof.
"How far is it to the village?" asked the señor.
"Ten leagues or more," Zibalbay answered, "and the road is not good, still if he does not fall from a precipice or lose his life in a snow–drift, he will be there within six hours. Come, daughter, it is time for us to rest, our journey has been long, and you must be weary. Good–night to you, my guests, to–morrow I shall hope to house you better." Then, bowing to us, he left the room.
Maya rose to follow his example, and, going to the señor, gave him her hand, which he touched with his lips.
"How good it is to taste tobacco again," he said as Maya went. "No, don't go to bed yet, Ignatio, take a cigarette and another glass of this agua ardiente, and let us talk. Do you know, friend, it seems to me that Zibalbay has changed. I never was a great admirer of his character, but perhaps I do not understand it."
"Do you not, señor? I think that I do. Like some Christian priests the man is a fanatic, and like myself, a dreamer. Also he is full of ambition and tyrannical, one who will spare neither himself nor others where he has an end to gain, or thinks that he can promote the welfare of his country and the glory of his gods. Think how brave and earnest the man must have been who, at the bidding of a voice or a vision, dared in his old age, unaccompanied save by his only child, to lay down his state and travel almost without food through hundreds of leagues of bush and desert, that none of his race had crossed for generations. Think what it must have been to him who for many years has been treated almost as divine, to play the part of a medicine–man in the forests of Yucatan, and to suffer, in his own person and in that of his daughter, insults and torment at the hands of low white thieves. Yet all this and more Zibalbay has borne without a murmur because, as he believes, the object of his mission is attained."
"But, Ignatio, what is the object of his mission, and what have we to do with it? To this hour I do not quite know."
"The object of his mission, and indeed of his life, is to build up the fallen empire of the City of the Heart. In short, señor, though I do not believe in his gods, in Zibalbay's visions I do believe, seeing that they have led him to me, whose aim is his aim, and that neither of us can succeed without the other."