"I do. Your son found things too difficult at the Naval Academy. You'd like him to get training that will enable him to help his people. That's a worthy ambition and we certainly shall do all we can for him."

The speaker was a handsome man in his late fifties, of medium height, with a full face that had acquired a leathery tan. His mouth was large and resourceful, his deep brown eyes full of warmth and his gray hair plentiful.

It was thirty years since Bishop John Cagliero had left his native Italy to lead a band of missionaries. From the moment he had leaded he had made his mark. Fearlessly penetrating into the deep pampas he had established his first base. His resourcefulness and courage had enabled him to carry out an extraordinary program of expansion, particularly in Patagonia. His frankness and good humor had won the hearts of both Indian and white. But neither great honors nor heavy responsibility could suppress his high spirits and enthusiasm. He now turned to the others accompanying him. "Meet the famous cacique I have so often told you about."

First to advance was a tall smiling padre who shook Manuel's hand. "May I remind you," he said quietly, "that the cacique and I are old friends."

"True, true!" exclaimed the cacique. "The padre helped me make peace in the pampas with the soldiers. He is a good man."

Aware that the youngster's eyes had been fixed on him, Cagliero's attention now turned to the boy at the cacique's side. Cagliero's name was not entirely unknown to Zepherin. He had heard his father mention it many times. Because of his work in Patagonia he had become something of a legend among the Indians. Zepherin felt immediately drawn to his warm personality, but quickly checked himself. It was not safe to trust a huinca.

Manuel next bade Zepherin greet the others. "Padre Milanesio you have met," he said. "He baptized you."

Zepherin had only a dim recollection of the tall figure in dark robes who baptized him, for that happened a long time ago. He had been given the name Zepherin, because on that day they were honoring a great chief of all the Christians. Zepherin had understood very little of what the man had said for he had mixed the native Mapudungo with Spanish words and phrases. On that occasion the padre had persuaded his father to take down the crossed spears planted in front of the toldo to ward off evil spirits, and had made him promise not to practice any more pagan customs. But once the padre had left, his father had carried on just as before, not even bother to remove the totem in front of the witch's toldo.

In a remarkably short time, word of Manuel's arrival flashed round the school. The boys had to study the campaigns which the nation had conducted against the Indians, and they know of Manuel as the cacique whom it took the military genius of President Roca and the resources of his government to defeat.

When word went out that the bishop was brining this famous Indian cacique and his son to the school, excitement ran high. As soon as the door of the classroom opened they craned their necks to catch a glimpse of the visitors

They had hope to see Manuel dressed in the panoply of a gran cacique. For the occasion, however, Manuel had again donned his colonel's uniform. He presented a sight that was at once both strange and impressive. The high tricolored kepi almost hid his corrugated brow whose creases had been deepened by the setbacks of recent years; his face had been baked and bronzed by the pampa sun, then creviced by the ceaseless abrasions of wind and rain; and the eyes were still full of vigor. A heavy blue jacket with gold braid covered a stocky figure as yet unbent by hears of warring against men and fate. The hands which had slain countless enemies, now sheathed in fashionable yellow gloves, grasped the handle of a dress sword. The showy red pants of the colonel's uniform, however, did little to straighten out two legs bandied from a lifetime in the saddle.

While Cagliero introduced them, Zepherin stood back a little, his questioning gaze wandered over those young faces. Would they be as hostile as the boys at the academy? Or, since they had been trained by the padres, would they be different? True, he already sensed a difference in the atmosphere. But he was still distrustful. Meanwhile, he was glad to receive a second chance to make his dream come true.

When the short tour of the school's few buildings was over, the bishop led them to the dining room.

"I'm sure the boys would love to have you eat with us."

During the meal, Zepherin listened proudly while the cacique kept his audience enthralled with stories of the fierce and bloody struggles between the whites and the Indians for possession of the pampas. Manuel made no attempt to exaggerate or to build himself up in their eyes. His audience was well aware that they were listening to grim history being told by one who had helped to make it.

Before the cacique bade good-bye he had concluded arrangements for his son's stay at San Carlos. "I feel very happy," he said, "for I know that the padres love my people and, unlike other huincas, have no desire to see us crushed or even kept in subjection. They have already a reputation even of standing up against the huincas on our behalf!"

"My son," he said to Zepherin, "you have been given a second chance to do the things we planned. More difficulties will come; face them like a Cura. You will have to suffer; do it for your people. You will meet enemies; conquer them. Your people expect much from you.

When his father had gone, Zepherin feared that he would be left alone the way he had been at the Naval Academy. After supper, the boys at the academy would go off in groups, and since they looked on him as an intruder, had never invited him to join them. Zepherin would then retreat to some corner to brood by himself until it was time to go to bed.

As soon as he had bade his father good-bye, however, Cagliero himself came up and took him by the hand. "Let's go for a little walk, he said. "Talk to me about the reservation, about your family, about everything." He led him to the playground where the boys were engrossed in a game which kept them racing madly from one end to the other. The din reminded Zepherin of the noise which had always accompanied the games he had played at the tolderia.

He could not understand why the bishop should ask so many questions about his family and his people, but since it was not his nature to conceal things or to deceive, he answered them without hesitation. He discovered to his surprise that the bishop knew a great deal about the Indians.

After a time, a bell rang somewhere and all at once the games stopped. Zepherin began to wonder what he would do when another boy took his arm, brought him to a dormitory and pointed out a bed in a corner. He told Zepherin that he would take care of everything for him in the morning. Zepherin soon slid beneath the blankets, the lights went out and he waited for sleep. But because of his many new experiences, sleep did not come. Instead, he found his eyes following the boys who went around extinguishing the lamps on the wall. He closed his eyes . . .

A horse-skin bag full of his belongings hung beside him. Above his head dangled a dusty forest of dried onions, peppers, garlic, corn, herbs, slices of dried meat, udders and calves' heads; in between hung a medley of cooking pots, baskets, jars, boleadoras, lassos, bows and arrows, and one solitary aged rifle -- a souvenir of the War of the Desert. The floor was littered with piles of squash, mandioc, ashes, more baskets and pottery. Inside the toldo it was as if the whole world were ready to fall on him. Outside he could look up and see the limitless heavens, the hunting grounds of those Indians who had passed from this world and gone to live among the stars.

When he opened his eyes again, he saw nothing but a bare, gray ceiling; and when he looked about him he saw, not the sleeping bodies of his brothers and sisters coiled up for warmth on the floor of the toldo, but rows of beds with figures stretched out like so many corpses. Even the smells were unfamiliar. Stale things, clothes, damp wood . . . not the smell of horses, of cooking, of bodies.

He closed his eyes again. What would they be doing at this moment in the toldo? How long would he be separated from his family and his people? Would he be able to stay away from them perhaps for years? Would he have to face difficulties and individuals like the ones he had faced at the academy? How cruel others could be! What was he trying to do, after all, but help his people? What was wrong with that? Then why did the huincas look upon him as an enemy? Because he looked upon them as enemies? If you looked upon others as friends would they look upon you as a friend? Oh! All this was too much for his poor head!

Was there no one he could turn to in his new surroundings? He could not, he felt, turn to his father any more. His father might consider him too weak and unworthy to be called his favorite son. He could not seek the help of the great spirit Gneche for, unlike his father, he no longer believed in the Indian gods.

The padre had talked to him about praying in his difficulties but as usual Zepherin had understood little of what he had said. His eyes were now drawn to the lamp which cast flitting lights and shadows on the statue of a woman. He remembered that a woman always stood be the side of Gneche to intercede for those who were in trouble.

He shifted about for some time longer, but he could not sleep for his body was sinking into the bed in the most unusual places. Finally, he raised his head and peered to the right and to the left. Everybody was fast asleep. Quietly he climbed out, gathered up the bedclothes in a large bundle and just as quietly laid them don the floor. Although his father used a low wooden frame to sleep on, he preferred a rug, for he was afraid of falling off the frame whenever he had nightmares. Wriggling his body in between the covers he sighed contentedly as he felt the firmness of the floor beneath him.

All noise had ceased in the dormitory when a figure entered and made his way between the long rows of beds. As he turned down the second row he came to the bed in the corner and straightened up in surprise at the sight of the boy sleeping on the floor! He bent over and listened long enough to assume himself that the boy with the flat nose and bronzed face was really asleep. Then he stepped back for a moment and pulled at his chin. Finally, in a mild gesture of resignation, he shrugged his shoulders and made his way out of the dormitory.

"Father Milanesio, you have met the boy before. What are your impressions?"

"Well, Bishop, I met him for the first time when I visited the cacique. The Namuncuras were so numerous Zepherin didn't have to go outside the family circle to find playmates! I can't say exactly why, but he struck me at once as being rather different from the rest of his brothers and sisters. Perhaps it was his quality of leadership, his respect for me, and his willingness to listen. The other boys were too much interested in other things to listen. I noticed too, that the cacique seemed to have a particular regard for him. Clarisa, about the same age as the boy, seemed to be his favorite daughter, Zepherin his favorite son."

"What you say confirms my own impressions. They are nothing more. I, too, feel there's something special about the boy. The mere fact that he is fired by such an ideal is an excellent indication. His people certainly need help if they are to survive in the world of change."

"This is the first time, Bishop, that he has been subjected to discipline. More important still, it will be the first time he has left his people and his native surroundings to live in a completely strange world. It's sure to mean rough going for him."

"Exactly. I think we should treat him with a little extra sympathy. His previous experience at the academy seems to have made him withdraw within himself, shy away from everybody. That plus the fact that his whole outlook must be so different from ours . . . "

"You're right. The change is violent. Perhaps all the discipline, the timetables and whatnot of San Carlos may prove too much even for the son of a cacique!"

"Con el andar del tiempo, se verra," quoted Cagliero; "time alone will tell."