"What a woman I have become!" he muttered, chidingly, to himself. "This will not do. To allow the scream of a bird to affect me thus is cowardice." Bracing himself against further weakness, he resumed his cautious movement toward the foot of the mountain. When he reached it, he attempted to ascend, but now, that he was in a measure safe, the nervous rigor and force of will, which had sustained him, relaxed, and he was compelled to sit down until his exhausted powers were restored. While he lingered thus, his thoughts reverted to his palace home; to old Itzalmo, his faithful friend and counselor; to Euetzin, his companion and confidante, and to Zelmonco villa, the home of Itlza. Thoughts of her awakened a pleasurable thrill in his soul, and his features softened under the touch of a sentiment which, if not love, was something very nearly akin to it. To himself he said: "Am I, indeed, in love with my friend's sweet sister? Yes, it must be so; for I feel that I could sacrifice the man who would dare to come between us!" When he felt himself sufficiently recovered to ascend the mountain, he arose and proceeded slowly up its side, and on toward his retreat. As he approached his hiding-place he became more wary. What if, in his absence, his retreat had been discovered by his enemy? The thought impressed itself upon him so forcibly that he paused frequently to listen for unusual sounds; but nothing reached his ear save the low and familiar murmur of the night winds, lulling, with their monotonical song, nature's wearied hosts to rest. When near enough to give it, he sounded the signal, so like the real that the shrewdest woodsman might have been deceived. Again it pierced the silent woods, and quickly came back the echo in Oza's answer. Hualcoyotl, now relieved of his apprehensions, went boldly forward, and was gladly welcomed back by his anxious attendant. They could not risk a fire in the nighttime, and were compelled to make a supper on uncooked maize and fruit. Very soon sleep, "Nature's sweet restorer," claimed her own, and they were lost to the dangers about them. The next morning, before the sun was up, a fire was built, and a breakfast of roasted maize duly prepared. They had no salt with which to season it, but that was of little consequence to them; hunger furnished the added relish, and gave it a flavor that all the condiments required by necessity and art, for man's gratification and need, could not have given. It was a delicious feast to the half-starved fugitives, and was repeated several times during the day.