ty at the vast white peaks of
Popocatepetl and Ixtaccihuatl silent and immutable, forever guarding the
sky-line. Yet they seemed to call to him at this moment and tell him of
freedom. The words of the man had touched a spring within him and he
wanted to go. He could not conceal from himself the fact that he longed
for liberty with every pulse and fiber. But he resolved, nevertheless,
to stay. He would not desert the one whom he had come to serve.

Stephen Austin, the real founder of Texas, had now been in prison in
Mexico more than a year. Coming to Saltillo to secure for the Texans
better treatment from the Mexicans, their rulers, he had been seized and
held as a criminal. The boy, Edward Fulton, was not really his nephew,
but an orphan, the son of a cousin. He owed much to Austin and coming to
the capital to help him he was sharing his imprisonment.

"They say that Santa Anna now has the power," said Ned, breaking the
somber silence.

"It is true," said Stephen Austin, "and it is a new and strong reason
why I fear for our people. Of all the cunning and ambitious men in
Mexico, Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna is the most cunning and ambitious. I
know, too, that he is the most able, and I believe that he is the most
dangerous to those of us who have settled in Texas. What a country is
this Mexico! Revolution after revolution! You make a treaty with one
president to-day and to-morrow another disclaims it! More than one of
them has a touch of genius, and yet it is obscured by childishness and
cruelty!"

He sighed heavily. Ned, full of sympathy, glanced at him but said
nothing. Then his gaze turned back to the mighty peaks which stood so
sharp and clear against the blue. Truth and honesty were the most marked
qualities of Stephen Austin and he could not understand the vast web of
intrigue in which the Mexican capital was continually involved. And to
the young mind of the boy, cast in the same mold, it was yet more
baffling and repellent.

Ned still stared at the guardian peaks, but his thoughts floated away
from them. His head had been full of old romance when he entered the
vale of Tenochtitlan. He had almost seen Cortez and the conquistadores
in their visible forms with their armor clanking about them as they
stalked before him. He had gazed eagerly upon the lakes, the mighty
mountains, the low houses and the strange people. Here, deeds of which
the world still talked had been done centuries ago and his thrill was
stro