With jaws set, lips compressed, and oblivious of the pedestrians, Spaniards and Indios, who barely escaped being run down, Cristoval careered madly up the narrow street and across the plaza to the palace. Reining up so sharply that his horse went back upon his haunches, he threw himself from the saddle, and ordering a soldier to look after the animal, strode into the building. He had an indistinct impression of passing Mendoza, of an expression of surprise on the soldiers of the guard in the great hall, of a hurried salute from the sentinel in front of Pizarro’s office as he crossed the anteroom, and he jerked open the door and stood before the commander. Pizarro in half-armor was seated at his table, facing the entrance. At the end of the table on his left was his sergeant-major, Dominguez. Both looked up in astonishment at Cristoval’s precipitate intrusion, the surprise on Pizarro’s face followed quickly by a scowl of displeasure. Surveying Cristoval coldly for a moment, he asked:— "Well, what dost thou here, Peralta? I thought thee at Guamachucho. Where is thy troop?" Ignoring the question, Cristoval advanced to the table and leaned forward. "Is this report true that I have heard?" he demanded in a tense voice. "Hast slain the Inca?" Pizarro’s scowl deepened at the bluntness, but after a moment, in which he seemed to hesitate whether or not to resent it, he answered shortly, "The Inca hath expiated his crimes." Cristoval was fully prepared for the reply, but it came, nevertheless, with a shock. His face paled, then flushed hotly. Unconsciously he hitched the hilt of his sword a trifle forward. The motion was not unnoted by Pizarro, who now watched him with the vigilance of a hawk. Cristoval’s voice shook as he returned, with suppressed vehemence:— "Hath expiated his crimes! Then it is true!—and thou hast put upon the arms of Spain a blot which a hundred years will not efface. Great God! Was not the atrocity of the plaza enough to glut thee? I tell thee, Pizarro, thou hast done foul murder!—Hath expiated his crimes, sayst thou!—Hath received the penalty of trusting a thing so scant and beggarly as thine honor, which, by Saint Michael, did underfit thee, thou perjured and lying miscreant, when thou wast a swineherd!"