"Of course," said Manuel; "I never meant to do what I pretended I
would."

"Of course not!" said his mother.

"But--"

"But what?"

"I don't see the necessity of having a mock execution. It's not nice to
have a lot of blank cartridges go off in your face."

"Nice!" The old woman sprang to her feet. She shook her finger in his
face. "Nice! Haven't you any shred of courage in your great, hulking
body? I don't believe you'll even face blank cartridges like a man--I
believe you'll scream and blubber and be a shame to us all. You disgust
me!" She spat on the floor. "Here I come to tell you that you are to be
spared, and you're afraid to death of the means by which you are to go
free. Why, I'd stand up to blank cartridges all day without turning a
hair--or to bullets, for that matter--at two hundred metres, where I
knew none of those Spanish idiots could hit me except by accident. I
wouldn't expect you to play the man at a real execution or at anything
real, but surely you can pull yourself together enough to play the man
at a mock execution. What a chance! You can leave a reputation as great
as your brother's--greater, even; you could crack jokes and burst out
laughing just when they go to fire--"

Then, as suddenly as she had flown into a passion, she burst into tears
and flung her arms about her boy and clung to him and mothered him until
in the depths of his surly, craven heart he was touched and