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“The dream, Ignatio? Perhaps you name it well, yet few have such noble dreams. And now, who goes with you on this journey?”

“Who goes with me? Molas, so far as the temple where the Indian is. After that, if I proceed, no one. Who would accompany a man grown old in failure, whom even those that love him deem a visionary, on such a desperate quest? Why, if I should dare to tell my projects even, men would mock me as children mock an idiot in the street. I go alone, señor, perhaps to die.”

“As regards the dying, Ignatio, of course I can say nothing, since all men must die sooner or later, and the moment and manner of their end is in the hand of Providence. But for the rest you shall not make this journey alone, that is, if you care to have me for a companion, for I will accompany you.”

“You, señor, you. Think what it means: the certainty of every sort of danger, the risk of every kind of death, and at the end, the probability of failure. It is folly, señor.”

“Ignatio,” he answered, “I will be frank with you. Notwithstanding all the prophecies about the wonders that are to follow the reuniting of the Heart, and the messages from the old man in the temple, I think your scheme of building up an Indian empire greater than that which Cortez destroyed, as impracticable as it is grand, since the time has gone by when it could have been done, or perhaps it has not yet returned.