An exact account
will be kept of our expenses, that each may share the profits of
the discovery in proportion to the amount of his contribution
towards the outfit. You have connected yourself with us in the
adventure, and, from the terms of our contract, have no right to
waste our time and involve us in ruin. But if you no longer wish
to be a member of the partnership, pay down your share of what
has already been advanced, and leave the affair to us."
To this proposal Pedrarias replied with indignation: - "One would
really think, from the lofty tone you take, that my power was at
an end; but if I have not been degraded from my office, you shall
be punished for your insolence. You shall be made to answer for
the lives of the Christians who have perished through Pizarro's
obstinacy and your own. A day of reckoning will come for all
these disturbances and murders, as you shall see, and that before
you leave Panama."
"I grant," returned Almagro, "that, as there is an almighty
Judge, before whose tribunal we must appear, it is proper that
all should render account of the living as well as the dead.
And, Sir, I shall not shrink from doing so, when I have received
an account from you, to be immediately sent to Pizarro, of the
gratitude which our sovereign, the emperor, has been pleased to
express for our services. Pay, - if you wish to enjoy the fruits
of this enterprise; for you neither sweat nor toil for them, and
have not contributed even a third of the sum you promised when
the contract was drawn up, - your whole expenditure not exceeding
two or three paltry pesos.
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