me in confidence that he intended preparing a quantity of
smoke-dried meat and packing it in a bag, with a layer of cassava

bread, dried pumpkin slips, and such innocent trifles to conceal
it from Rima's keen sight and delicate nostrils. Finally he made

a long rambling statement which, I vainly imagined, was intended
to lead up to an account of Rima's origin, with something about

her people at Riolama; but it led to nothing except an expression
of opinion that the girl was afflicted with a maggot in the

brain, but that as she had interest with the powers above,
especially with her mother, who was now a very important person

among the celestials, it was good policy to submit to her wishes.
Turning to me, doubtless to wink (only I missed the sign owing to

the darkness), he added that it was a fine thing to have a friend
at court. With a little gratulatory chuckle he went on to say

that for others it was necessary to obey all the ordinances of
the Church, to contribute to its support, hear mass, confess from

time to time, and receive absolution; consequently those who went
out into the wilderness, where there were no churches and no

priests to absolve them, did so at the risk of losing their
souls. But with him it was different: he expected in the end to

escape the fires of purgatory and go directly in all his
uncleanness to heaven--a thing, he remarked, which happened to

very few; and he, Nuflo, was no saint, and had first become a
dweller in the desert, as a very young man, in order to escape

the penalty of his misdeeds.
I could not resist the temptation of remarking here that to an

unregenerate man the celestial country might turn out a somewhat
uncongenial place for a residence. He replied airily that he had

considered the point and had no fear about the future; that he
was old, and from all he had observed of the methods of

government followed by those who ruled over earthly affairs from
the sky, he had formed a clear idea of that place, and believed

that even among so many glorified beings he would be able to meet
with those who would prove companionable enough and would think

no worse of him on account of his little blemishes.
How he had first got this idea into his brain about Rima's

ability to make things smooth for him after death I cannot say;
probably it was the effect of the girl's powerful personality and

vivid faith acting on an ignorant and extremely;superstitious
mind. While she was making that petition to her mother in

heaven, it did not seem in the least ridiculous to me: I had felt
no inclination to smile, even when hearing all that about the old

man's wings being singed to prevent his escape by flying. Her
rapt look; the intenseconviction that vibrated in her ringing,

passionate tones; the brilliant scorn with which she, a hater of
bloodshed, one so tender towards all living things, even the

meanest, bade him kill himself, and only hear first how her
vengeance would pursue his deceitful soul into other worlds; the

clearness with which she had related the facts of the case,
disclosing the inmost secrets of her heart--all this had had a

strange, convincing effect on me. Listening to her I was no
longer the enlightened, the creedless man. She herself was so

near to the supernatural that it seemed brought near me;
indefinable feelings, which had been latent in me, stirred into

life, and following the direction of her divine, lustrous eyes,
fixed on the blue sky above, I seemed to see there another being

like herself, a Rima glorified, leaning her pale, spiritual face
to catch the winged words uttered by her child on earth. And

even now, while hearing the old man's talk, showing as it did a
mind darkened with such gross delusions, I was not yet altogether

free from the strange effect of that prayer. Doubtless it was a
delusion; her mother was not really there above listening to the

girl's voice. Still, in some mysterious way, Rima had become to
me, even as to superstitious old Nuflo, a being apart and sacred,

and this feeling seemed to mix with my passion, to purify and
exalt it and make it infinitely sweet and precious.

After we had been silent for some time, I said: "Old man, the
result of the grand discussion you have had with Rima is that you

have agreed to take her to Riolama, but about my accompanying you
not one word has been spoken by either of you."

He stopped short to stare at me, and although it was too dark to
see his face, I felt his astonishment. "Senor!" he exclaimed,

"we cannot go without you. Have you not heard my granddaughter's
words--that it is only because of you that she is about to

undertake this crazy journey? If you are not with us in this
thing, then, senor, here we must remain. But what will Rima say

to that?"
"Very well, I will go, but only on one condition."

"What is it?" he asked, with a sudden change of tone, which
warned me that he was becoming cautious again.

"That you tell me the whole story of Rima's origin, and how you
came to be now living with her in this solitary place, and who

these people are she wishes to visit at Riolama."
"Ah, senor, it is a long story, and sad. But you shall hear it

all. You must hear it, senor, since you are now one of us; and
when I am no longer here to protect her, then she will be yours.

And although you will never be able to do more than old Nuflo for
her, perhaps she will be better pleased; and you, senor, better

able to exist innocently by her side, without eating flesh, since
you will always have that rare flower to delight you. But the

story would take long to tell. You shall hear it all as we
journey to Riolama. What else will there be to talk about when

we are walking that long distance, and when we sit at night by
the fire?"

"No, no, old man, I am not to be put off in that way. I must
hear it before I start."

But he was determined to reserve the narrative until the journey,
and after some further argument I yielded the point.

CHAPTER XIII
That evening by the fire old Nuflo, lately so miserable, now

happy in his delusions, was more than usually gay and loquacious.
He was like a child who by timelysubmission has escaped a

threatened severepunishment. But his lightness of heart was
exceeded by mine; and, with the exception of one other yet to

come, that evening now shines in memory as the happiest my life
has known. For Rima's sweet secret was known to me; and her very

ignorance of the meaning of the feeling she experienced, which
caused her to fly from me as from an enemy, only served to make

the thought of it more purely delightful.
On this occasion she did not steal away like a timid mouse to her

own apartment, as her custom was, but remained to give that one
evening a special grace, seated well away from the fire in that

same shadowy corner where I had first seen her indoors, when I
had marvelled at her altered appearance. From that corner she

could see my face, with the firelight full upon it, she herself
in shadow, her eyes veiled by their drooping lashes. Sitting

there, the vivid consciousness of my happiness was like draughts
of strong, delicious wine, and its effect was like wine,

imparting such freedom to fancy, such fluency, that again and
again old Nuflo applauded, crying out that I was a poet, and

begging me to put it all into rhyme. I could not do that to
please him, never having acquired the art of improvisation--that

idle trick of making words jingle which men of Nuflo's class in
my country so greatly admire; yet it seemed to me on that evening

that my feelings could be adequately expressed only in that
sublimated language used by the finest minds in their inspired

moments; and, accordingly, I fell to reciting. But not from any
modern, nor from the poets of the last century, nor even from the

greater seventeenth century. I kept to the more ancient romances
and ballads, the sweet old verse that, whether glad or sorrowful,