But Josè could not share in the merriment. The awful consequences of the innkeeper’s coarse joke upon the childish minds of these poor, impressionable people pressed heavily upon his heart. Bitter tears welled to his eyes. He sprang to his feet.
“Come, Rosendo!” he cried. “We must go down and tell these people the truth!”
Don Jorge joined them, and they all hastened down into the town. Ramona Chaves met them in the plaza, her eyes streaming.
“Padre,” she wailed, “my man Pedro has the sickness! He is dying!”
“Nothing of the kind, Ramona!” loudly cried Josè; “there is no cholera here!” He hastened to the bedside of the writhing Pedro.
“Up, man!” he shouted, seizing his hand. “Up! You are not sick! There is no cholera in Simití! There is none in Bodega Central! Feliz did not bring it! He and Amado had only a touch of the flux, and they died of fear!”
The priest’s ringing words acted upon the man like magic. He roused up from his lethargy and stared at the assemblage. Don Jorge repeated the priest’s words, and added his own laughing and boisterous comments. Pedro rose from his bed, and stood staring.
Together, their little band augmented at every corner by the startled people, they hurried to the homes of all who lay upon beds of sickness, spreading the glad tidings, until the little town was in a state of uproar. Like black shadows before 187 the light, the plague fled into the realm of imagination from which it had come. By night, all but Mateo Gil were up and about their usual affairs. But even Mateo had revived wonderfully; and Josè was confident that the good news would be the leaven of health that would work a complete restoration within him in time. The exiles left the hilltop and the old church, and returned again to their homes. Don Jorge took up his abode with Josè.
“Bien,” he said, as they sat at the rear door of the priest’s house, looking through the late afternoon haze out over the lake, “you have had a strange experience––Caramba! most strange!––and yet one from which you should gather an excellent lesson. You are dealing with children here––children who have always been rocked in the cradle of the Church. But––” looking archly at Josè, “do I offend? For, as I told you on the boat a year ago, I do not think you are a good priest.” He laughed softly. “Bien,” he added, “I will correct that. You are good––but not a priest, is it not so?”
“I have some views, Don Jorge, which differ radically from those of the faith,” Josè said cautiously.