"Ah, Carlos, at last you have emerged from your seclusion. I welcome you amongst us, we men of experience need the help of younger men like you. We will work together and between us raise up a new Spain in America, with laws and customs fitted to a new world, now that the old Spain is tottering to her fall." Then Evaña, looking upon the smiling face, listening to the cordial words of Don Roderigo, felt for the first time doubt of the practicability of his own schemes, fear for the success of his darling object, a Republic of Argentines. "A new Spain in America, with laws and customs fitted to a new world!" said he to himself, "what is this? Can Spaniards be freemen? Can Spaniards and Argentines live together as equals under the free laws of a new Spain?" His heart was troubled; he walked away by himself under the trees, turning this matter over and over in his mind, and finding no solution to this fresh problem which was based upon the, to him, new idea, that tyranny and injustice were not essential ingredients in the character of a Spaniard. As he walked to and fro in the dim twilight a small hand was laid upon his arm, and a voice he loved to hear, spoke to him in words soft and low. "Don Carlos, what are you doing here all alone? You have not been inside even to speak to us, and I have so much to say, so much to thank you for, and mamma too, she has been asking for you. How nobly you have kept your promise. We have heard all about it now, Don Fausto and the Señor Belgrano have told us what you did yesterday." To all that she said Evaña answered not one word, but he took her hand in his and side by side they walked together under the trees in the dim twilight, she talking on, telling of her joy at seeing her brother once more free, and of her certainty that now all would go well, and that there would be no more talk of quarrels between Spaniards and Creoles. Had not her father said so? And to Dolores that which her father said was truth unquestioned. As Evaña listened to her, her voice was to him as the rippling of waters, a music soothing the trouble of his soul, yet of what she said he knew nothing, for his thoughts were far away peering into the dark future which seemed darker than ever from the veil which had been thrown over it by the words of Don Roderigo. As Evaña walked away Don Roderigo took his son by the hand and led him inside, where his mother embraced him, chiding him tenderly for having left her, and the others crowded round, overwhelming him with congratulations.