n which Jerez
and Luis Torres and I had harbored in Cuba. But this had fine sand for
floor, and a row of calabashes, and wood laid for fire.

Here Juan Lepe dropped, for all his head was swimming with weariness.

The sun was up, the place glistered. Guarin showed how it was hidden. "I
found it when I was a boy, and none but Guarin hath ever come here
until you come, Juan Lepe!" He had no fear, it was evident, of Caonabo's
coming. "They will think your idol helped you away. If they look for
you, it will be in the cloud. They will say, 'See that dark mark moving
round edge of cloud mountain! That is he!'" I asked him, "Where are
Guacanagari and the rest?"

"Guacanagari had an arrow through his thigh and a deep cut upon the
head. He was bleeding and in a swoon. His brother and the Guarico men
and I with them took him, and the women took the children, and we went
away, save a few that were killed, upon the path that we used when in my
father's time, the Caribs came in canoes. After a while we will go down
to Guacanagari. But now rest!"

He looked at me, and then from a little trickling spring he took water
in a calabash no larger than an orange and from another vessel a white
dust which he stirred into it, and made me drink. I did not know what it
was, but I went to sleep.

But that sleep did not refresh. It was filled with heavy and dreadful
dreams, and I woke with an aching head and a burning skin. Juan Lepe who
had nursed the sick down there in La Navidad knew feebly what it was. He
saw in a mist the naked priest, his friend and rescuer, seated upon the
sandy floor regarding him with a wrinkled brow and compressed lips, and
then he sank into fever visions uncouth and dreadful, or mirage-pleasing
with a mirage-ecstasy.

Juan Lepe did not die, but he lay ill and like to die for two months.
It was deep in October, that day at dawn when I came quietly, evenly,
to myself again, and lay most weak, but with seeing eyes. At first I
thought I was alone in the cavern, but then I saw Guarin where he lay
asleep.

That day I strengthened, and the next day and the next. But I had lain
long at the very feet of death, and full strength was a tortoise in
returning. So good to Juan Lepe was Guarin!

Now he was with me, and now he went away to that village where was
Guacanagari. He had done this from the first coming here, nursing me,
then going down through the forest to see that all was well with his
wounded cacique and the fol