I did not weep, for my tears were done, and as I have said, whatever I might feel nothing could break my calm any more.
And as I gazed a great tenderness and sorrow took hold of me, and I loved Otomie better now that she was dead before me than ever I had done in her life days, and this is saying much.

I remembered her in the glory of her youth as she was in the court of her royal father, I remembered the look which she had given me when she stepped to my side upon the stone of sacrifice, and that other look when she defied Cuitlahua the emperor, who would have slain me.

Once more I seemed to hear her cry of bitter sorrow as she uncovered the body of the dead babe our firstborn, and to see her sword in hand standing over the Tlascalan.
Many things came back to me in that sad hour of dawn while I watched by the corpse of Otomie.

There was truth in her words, I had never forgotten my first love and often I desired to see her face.

But it was not true to say that I had no love for Otomie.