This is divined in the expression of his face.
"You would not hesitate," repeated Itchoua, scrutinizing Ramuntcho this time in a special manner; "you would not hesitate, either, I suppose, if you were caught, would you ?" "Surely," replied Ramuntcho, submissively.

"Oh, no, surely--" But his look, like that of Florentino, has turned from Itchoua.

A terror comes to him of this man, of this imperious and cold influence, so completely felt already; an entire soft and refined side of his nature is awakened, made disquiet and in revolt.
Silence has followed the tale, and Itchoua, discontented with the effect of it, proposes a song in order to change the course of ideas.
The purely material well-being which comes after dinner, the cider which has been drunk, the cigarettes which are lighted and the songs that begin, bring back quickly confident joy in these children's heads.
And then, there are in the band the two brothers Iragola, Marcos and Joachim, young men of the mountain above Mendiazpi, who are renowned extemporary speakers in the surrounding country and it is a pleasure to hear them, on any subject, compose and sing verses which are so pretty.
"Let us see," says Itchoua, "you, Marcos, are a sailor who wishes to pass his life on the ocean and seek fortune in America; you, Joachim, are a farm hand who prefers not to quit his village and his soil here.
Each of you will discuss alternately, in couplets of equal length, the pleasures of his trade to the tune--to the tune of the 'Iru Damacho'.

Go on." They looked at each other, the two brothers, half turned toward each other on the oak bench where they sit; an instant of reflection, during which an imperceptible agitation of the eyelids alone betrays the working of their minds; then, brusquely Marcos, the elder, begins, and they will never stop.

With their shaven cheeks, their handsome profiles, their chins which advance somewhat imperiously above the powerful muscles of the neck, they recall, in their grave immobility, the figures engraved on the Roman medals.