Nuflo cried out after them that they had seen a saint and that
some horrible thing would befall them if they allowed any evil

thought to enter their hearts; but they scoffed at his words, and
were soon far down out of hearing, while he, trembling with fear,

remained praying to the woman that had appeared to them and had
looked with such strange eyes at him, not to punish him for the

sins of the others.
Before long the men returned, disappointed and sullen, for they

had failed in their search for the woman; and perhaps Nuflo's
warning words had made them give up the chase too soon. At all

events, they seemed ill at ease, and made up their minds to
abandon the cave; in a short time they left the place to camp

that night at a considerable distance from the mountain. But
they were not satisfied: they had now recovered from their fear,

but not from the excitement of an evil passion; and finally,
after comparing notes, they came to the conclusion that they had

missed a great prize through Nuflo's cowardice; and when he
reproved them they blasphemed all the saints in the calendar and

even threatened him with violence. Fearing to remain longer in
the company of such godless men, he only waited until they slept,

then rose up cautiously, helped himself to most of the
provisions, and made his escape, devoutly hoping that after

losing their guide they would all speedily perish.
Finding himself alone now and master of his own actions, Nuflo

was in terrible distress, for while his heart was in the utmost
fear, it yet urged him imperiously to go back to the mountain, to

seek again for that sacred being who had appeared to him and had
been driven away by his brutalcompanions. If he obeyed that

inner voice, he would be saved; if he resisted it, then there
would be no hope for him, and along with those who had cast the

woman to the alligators he would be lost eternally. Finally, on
the following day, he went back, although not without fear and

trembling, and sat down on a stone just where he had sat toasting
his tapir meat on the previous day. But he waited in vain, and

at length that voice within him, which he had so far obeyed,
began urging him to descend into the valley-like chasm down which

the woman had escaped from his comrades, and to seek for her
there. Accordingly he rose and began cautiously and slowly

climbing down over the broken jagged rocks and through a dense
mass of thorny bushes and creepers. At the bottom of the chasm a

clear, swift stream of water rushed with foam and noise along its
rocky bed; but before reaching it, and when it was still twenty

yards lower down, he was startled by hearing a low moan among the
bushes, and looking about for the cause, he found the wonderful

woman--his saviour, as he expressed it. She was not now standing
nor able to stand, but half reclining among the rough stones, one

foot, which she had sprained in that headlongflight down the
ragged slope, wedged immovably between the rocks; and in this

painful position she had remained a prisoner since noon on the
previous day. She now gazed on her visitor in silent

consternation; while he, casting himself prostrate on the ground,
implored her forgiveness and begged to know her will. But she

made no reply; and at length, finding that she was powerless to
move, he concluded that, though a saint and one of the beings

that men worship, she was also flesh and liable to accidents
while sojourning on earth; and perhaps, he thought, that accident

which had befallen her had been specially designed by the powers
above to prove him. With great labour, and not without causing

her much pain, he succeeded in extricating her from her position;
and then finding that the injured foot was half crushed and blue

and swollen, he took her up in his arms and carried her to the
stream. There, making a cup of a broad green leaf, he offered

her water, which she drank eagerly; and he also raved her injured
foot in the cold stream and bandaged it with fresh aquatic

leaves; finally he made her a soft bed of moss and dry grass and
placed her on it. That night he spent keeping watch over her, at

intervals applying fresh wet leaves to her foot as the old ones
became dry and wilted from the heat of the inflammation.

The effect of all he did was that the terror with which she
regarded him gradually wore off; and next day, when she seemed to

be recovering her strength, he proposed by signs to remove her to
the cave higher up, where she would be sheltered in case of rain.

She appeared to understand him, and allowed herself to be taken
up in his arms and carried with much labour to the top of the

chasm. In the cave he made her a second couch, and tended her
assiduously. He made a fire on the floor and kept it burning

night and day, and supplied her with water to drink and fresh
leaves for her foot. There was little more that he could do.

From the choicest and fattest bits of toasted tapir flesh he
offered her she turned away with disgust. A little cassava bread

soaked in water she would take, but seemed not to like it. After
a time, fearing that she would starve, he took to hunting after

wild fruits, edible bulbs and gums, and on these small things she
subsisted during the whole time of their sojourn together in the

desert.
The woman, although lamed for life, was now so far recovered as

to be able to limp about without assistance, and she spent a
portion of each day out among the rocks and trees on the

mountains. Nuflo at first feared that she would now leave him,
but before long he became convinced that she had no such

intentions. And yet she was profoundlyunhappy. He was
accustomed to see her seated on a rock, as if brooding over some

secret grief, her head bowed, and great tears falling from
half-closed eyes.

From the first he had conceived the idea that she was in the way
of becoming a mother at no distant date--an idea which seemed to

accord badly with the suppositions as to the nature of this
heavenly being he was privileged to minister to and so win

salvation; but he was now convinced of its truth, and he imagined
that in her condition he had discovered the cause of that sorrow

and anxiety which preyed continually on her. By means of that
dumb language of signs which enabled them to converse together a

little, he made it known to her that at a great distance from the
mountains there existed a place where there were beings like

herself, women, and mothers of children, who would comfort and
tenderly care for her. When she had understood, she seemed

pleased and willing to accompany him to that distant place; and
so it came to pass that they left their rocky shelter and the

mountains of Riolama far behind. But for several days, as they
slowly journeyed over the plain, she would pause at intervals in

her limping walk to gaze back on those blue summits, shedding
abundant tears.

Fortunately the village Voa, on the river of the same name, which
was the nearest Christian settlement to Riolama, whither his

course was directed, was well known to him; he had lived there in
former years, and, what was of great advantage, the inhabitants

were ignorant of his worst crimes, or, to put it in his own
subtle way, of the crimes committed by the men he had acted with.

Great was the astonishment and curiosity of the people of Voa
when, after many weeks' travelling, Nuflo arrived at last with

his companion. But he was not going to tell the truth, nor even
the least particle of the truth, to a gaping crowd of inferior

persons. For these, ingenious lies; only to the priest he told
the whole story, dwelling minutely on all he had done to rescue

and protect her; all of which was approved by the holy man, whose
first act was to baptize the woman for fear that she was not a

Christian. Let it be said to Nuflo's credit that he objected to
this ceremony, arguing that she could not be a saint, with an

aureole in token of her sainthood, yet stand in need of being
baptized by a priest. A priest--he added, with a little chuckle

of malicious pleasure--who was often seen drunk, who cheated at
cards, and was sometimes suspected of putting poison on his

fighting-cock's spur to make sure of the victory! Doubtless the
priest had his faults; but he was not without humanity, and for

the whole seven years of that unhappy stranger's sojourn at Voa