's door for His clemency," he called.

From within came a deep-voiced chorus, the first sound he had heard from
the house, seeming weirdly to be the voice of the house itself.

"Penance, penance, which seeks salvation!" it chanted.

"Saint Peter will open to me the gate, bathing me with the light, in the
name of Mary, with the seal of Jesus," Ramon went on, repeating as he had
learned. "I ask this confraternity. Who gives this house light?"

"Jesus," answered the chorus within.

"Who fills it with joy?"

"Mary."

"Who preserves it with faith?"

"Joseph!"

The door opened and Ramon entered the chapel room of the _Morada_. It was
lighted by a single candle, which revealed dimly the rough earthen walls,
the low roof raftered with round pine logs, the wooden benches and the
altar, covered with black cloth. This was decorated with figures of the
skull and cross-bones cut from white cloth. A human skull stood on either
side of it, and a small wooden crucifix hung on the wall above it. The
solitary candle--an ordinary tallow one in a tin holder--stood before this.

The men were merely dark human shapes. The light did not reveal their
faces. They said nothing to Ramon. He could scarcely believe that these
were the same good-natured _pelados_ he had known by day. Indeed they were
not the same, but were now merely units of this organization which held
them in bondage of fear and awe.

One of them took Ramon silently by the arm and led him through a low door
into the other room which was the _Morada_ proper. This room was supposed
never to be entered except by a member of the order or by a candidate. It
was small and low as the other, furnished only with a few benches about
the wall, and lighted by a couple of candles on a small table. A very old
and tarnished oil painting of Mary with the Babe hung at one end of it.
All the way around the room, hanging from pegs driven into the wall, was a
row of the broad heavy braided lashes of _amole_ weed, called
_disciplinas_, used in Holy Week, and of the blood-stained drawers worn on
that occasion by the flagellants.

Still in complete silence Ramon was forced to his knees by two of the men,
who quickly stripped him to the waist. Beside him stood a tall
powerfully-built Mexican with his right arm bared. In his hand he held a
triangular bit of white quartz, cleverly chipped to a cutting edge. This
man was the _sangredor_, whose duty it was to place the seal of the order
upon t