ose to him. He had not the heart nor the
courage to send her away. He put out his arm and drew her to him.

"Padre dear," the child murmured, "it is nice out here under the
stars--and I want to be with you--I love you--love you--" The whisper
died away, and the child slept on his arm.

"Perfect love casteth out fear."

CHAPTER 20

Dawn brought Juan Mendoza and Pedro Cardenas again to the hill, and
with them came others. "Mateo Gil, Pablo Polo, and Juanita Gomez are
sick, Padre," announced Mendoza, the spokesman. "They ask for the last
sacrament. You could come down and give it to them, and then return to
the hill, is it not so?"

"Yes," assented Jose, "I will come."

"And, Padre," continued Mendoza, "we talked it over last night, after
Amado Sanchez died, and we think it would help if you said a Mass for
us in the church to-day."

"I will do so this afternoon, after I have visited the sick," he
replied pityingly.

Mendoza hesitated. Then--

"We think, too, Padre, that if we held a procession--in honor of Santa
Barbara--perhaps she would pray for us, and might stop the sickness.
We could march through the town this evening, while you stood here and
prayed as we passed around the hill. What say you, Padre?"

Jose was about to express a vehement protest. But the anxious faces
directed toward him melted his heart.

"Yes, children," he replied gently, "do as you wish. Keep your houses
this afternoon while I visit the sick and offer the Mass. I will leave
the _hostia_ on the altar. You need not fear to touch it. Carry it
with you in your rogation to Santa Barbara this evening, and I will
stand here and pray for you."

The people departed, sorrowing, but grateful. Hope revived in the
breasts of some. But most of them awaited in trembling the icy touch
of the plague.

"Padre," said Rosendo, when the people had gone. "I have been thinking
about the sickness, and I remember what my father told me he learned
from a Jesuit missionary. It was that the fat from a human body would
cure rheumatism. And then the missionary laughed and said that the fat
from a plump woman would cure all diseases of mind and body. If that
is so, Padre, and Juanita Gomez dies--she is very plump, Padre--could
we not take some of the fat from her body and rub it on the sick--"

"God above, Rosendo! what are you saying!" cried Jose recoiling in
horror.

_"Caramba!"_ retorted the honest man. "Would you not try everything
that might