the same
response, but nearer. A glow began to suffuse the blackness about him.
Nearer, ever nearer drew the gleam. The darkness lifted. The rocks
began to bud. Trees and vines sprang from the waste sand. As if in a
tremendous explosion, a dazzling light burst full upon him, shattering
the darkness, fusing the stones about him, and blinding his sight. A
great presence stood before him. He struggled to his feet; and as he
did so a loud voice cried, "Behold, I come _quickly_!"

"_Senor Padre_, you have been dreaming!"

The priest, sitting upright and clutching at the rough sides of his
bed, stared with wooden obliviousness into the face of the little
Carmen.

CHAPTER 3

"You are well now, aren't you, Padre?"

It was not so much an interrogation as an affirmation, an assumption
of fact.

"Now you must come and see my garden--and Cucumbra, too. And
Cantar-las-horas; have you heard him? I scolded him lots; and I know
he wants to mind; but he just thinks he can't stop singing the
Vespers--the old stupid!"

While the child prattled she drew a chair to the bedside and arranged
the bowl of broth and the two wheat rolls she had brought.

"You are real hungry, and you are going to eat all of this and get
strong again. Right away!" she added, emphatically expressing her
confidence in the assumption.

Jose made no reply. He seemed again to be trying to sound the
unfathomable depths of the child's brown eyes. Mechanically he took
the spoon she handed him.

"See!" she exclaimed, while her eyes danced. "A silver spoon! Madre
Ariza borrowed it from Dona Maria Alcozer. They have lots of silver.
Now eat."

From his own great egoism, his years of heart-ache, sorrows, and
shames, the priest's heavy thought slowly lifted and centered upon the
child's beautiful face. The animated little figure before him radiated
such abundant life that he himself caught the infection; and with it
his sense of weakness passed like an illusion.

"And look, Padre! The broth--isn't it good?"

Jose tasted, and declared it delicious.

"Well, you know"--the enthusiastic little maid clambered up on the
bed--"yesterday it was Manuela--she was my hen. I told her a week ago
that you would need her--"

"And you gave up your hen for me, little one?" he interrupted.

"Why--yes, Padre. It was all right. I told her how it was. And she
clucked so hard, I knew she was glad to help the good _Cura_. And she
was so happy about it! I told her she re