But when I was neither sleeping nor eating I watched at my window, hoping, though in vain, to catch some sight of Otomie or of Guatemoc. If I might not see my friends, however, at least I saw my foe, for one evening de Garcia came and stared at my prison. He could not see me, but I saw him, and the devilish smile that flickered on his face as he went away like a wolf, made me shiver with a presage of woes to come. For ten minutes or more he stood gazing at my window hungrily, as a cat gazes at a caged bird, and I felt that he was waiting for the door to be opened, and _knew_ that it would soon be opened. This happened on the eve of the day upon which I was put to torture. Meanwhile, as time went on, I noticed that a change came over the temper of the camp. The soldiers ceased to gamble for untold wealth, they even ceased from drinking to excess and from their riotous joy, but took to hanging together in knots discussing fiercely I could not learn of what. On the day when de Garcia came to look at my prison there was a great gathering in the square opposite my prison, to which I saw Cortes ride up on a white horse and richly dressed. The meeting was too far away for me to overhear what passed, but I noted that several officers addressed Cortes angrily, and that their speeches were loudly cheered by the soldiers. At length the great captain answered them at some length, and they broke up in silence. Next morning after I had breakfasted, four soldiers came into my prison and ordered me to accompany them. “Whither?” I asked. “To the captain, traitor,” their leader answered. “It has come at last,” I thought to myself, but I said only: “It is well. Any change from this hole is one for the better.” “Certainly,” he replied; “and it is your last shift.” Then I knew that the man believed that I was going to my death. In five minutes I was standing before Cortes in his private house. At his side was Marina and around him were several of his companions in arms. The great man looked at me for a while, then spoke. “Your name is Wingfield; you are of mixed blood, half English and half Spanish. You were cast away in the Tobasco River and taken to Tenoctitlan. There you were doomed to personate the Aztec god Tezcat, and were rescued by us when we captured the great _teocalli_. Subsequently you joined the Aztecs and took part in the attack and slaughter of the _noche triste_. You were afterwards the friend and counsellor of Guatemoc, and assisted him in his defence of Tenoctitlan. Is this true, prisoner?” “It is all true, general,” I answered.