Silently I handed him the basket with the thorn-covered cord, the obsidian knives, the golden bowl for sacrificial blood-letting. In the crimson light of the dying sun he looked, like a fiend incarnate. But the eyes of the people were upon him. I stood beside him, stern, threatening. Above him towered the giant idol. With trembling hands he pierced his ears with the lancet, with sweat pouring from his brow he drew the sharp thorns of the cord across his tongue. In the golden salver he caught the dripping blood and, groaning with pain, he placed the offering at the feet of the great image. “And now, O, Kinchi Haman,” I shouted, “that thy repentance may be complete, remain here at the feet of Kukulcan until Kinich Ahau, Lord of Day, smiles upon Mictolan.” A thunderous cheer arose from the crowds below, and without glancing back at the disgraced, humiliated priest, I descended the steps, marched with the Virgins and acolytes to the temple door, removed my priestly garments and descended to the plaza to where Itza eagerly awaited me. My triumph was complete. If any member of the community had doubted my status before, all such doubts were dispelled. The very strangeness of my actions, the unexpected, unintelligible words I had spoken, and finally my treatment of their feared and hated priest, had served to convince them that I was the son of Kukulcan. They were Indians, they reasoned in accordance with Indian psychology. Anything they did not understand must be supernatural, divine. My words in English were meaningless to them, therefore they must be understood only by the gods and their chosen priests. My ceremony of the setting sun was unlike any they had ever witnessed, therefore it must be the right one, and Kinchi Haman had been deceiving them. The priest had obeyed my orders, therefore I was the mightier, and he bowed to my superior wisdom and power. And of all the people, perhaps the prince was the most amazed, the most impressed. As we walked towards the palace--for I had dismissed the litter-bearers--he was unusually silent and stared at me, a puzzled, incredulous expression on his face. But once we were alone with Itza in my quarters, he spoke. “Itzimin,” he exclaimed, “I cannot understand it. When I told you of the secret prophecy of my House and frankly said I knew you to be but a mortal and no son of the gods, you told me it was so. And now, Itzimin, you appear upon the temple, you speak the tongue of the sacred ceremonies, and Kinchi Haman humbles himself before you.” Itza, too, seemed greatly troubled and declared she was filled with sorrow at the thought that I might be other than an ordinary man.