“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?”
Josè 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 Josè recoiling in horror.
“Caramba!” retorted the honest man. “Would you not try everything that might possibly save these people? What the missionary said may be true.”
“No, my faithful ally,” replied Josè. “You did not get the sense in which he said it. Neither human fat nor medicine of any kind will help these people. Nothing will be accomplished for them until their fear has been removed. For, I––well, the symptoms manifested by poor Feliz may have been those of Asiatic cholera. But––I begin to doubt. And as for Sanchez––Bien, we do not know––not for certain.” He stopped and pondered the question.
“Padre,” pursued Rosendo, “I have used the liver of a lizard for toothache, and it was very good.”