“Righteousness!” murmured Josè, sitting with head buried in his hands. “Aye, the whole scheme of salvation is held in that one word! And the wreck of my life has been caused by my blind ignorance of its tremendous meaning! For righteousness is salvation. But Carmen, wise little soul, divined it instinctively; for, if there is one thing that is patent, it is that if a thing is evil it does not exist for her. Righteousness! Of course it means thinking no evil! Jesus lived his thorough understanding of it. And so does Carmen. And so would the world, but for the withering influence of priestly authority!”
At that moment Carmen reappeared to summon him to lunch.
“Come here, little girl,” said Josè, drawing her to him. “You asked me to tell you about Jesus. He was the greatest and best man that ever lived. And it was because he never had a bad thought.”
“Did he know that God was everywhere?” The little face turned lovingly up to his.
“He did, sweet child. And so do I––now; for I have found Him even in desolate Simití.”
CHAPTER 7
Carmen’s studies began in earnest that afternoon. In the quiet of his humble cottage Josè, now “a prisoner of the Lord,” opened the door of his mental storehouse and carefully selected those first bits of knowledge for the foundation stones on which to rear for her, little by little, a broad education.
He found her a facile learner; her thorough ease in the rudiments of arithmetic and in the handling of her own language delighted him. His plan of tutelage, although the result of long contemplation, and involving many radical ideas regarding the training of children, ideas which had been slowly developing in his mind for years, he nevertheless felt in her case to be tentative. For he was dealing with no ordinary child; and so the usual methods of instruction were here wholly out of the question.