“Señores,” he said, rolling his syllables sonorously, “the time has come at last! For years I have waited, waited, knowing that some day the great gift which the good God put into my hands for the little Carmen would be needed. Señores, my parents were slaves. The cruel Spaniards drove them to and from their heavy labors with the lash; and when the great war ended, they sank exhausted into their graves. My parents––I have not told you this, Padre––were the slaves of Don Ignacio de Rincón!”
An exclamation burst from the astonished priest’s lips. What, then, had this man been concealing all these years? Little wonder that he had hesitated when he learned that a Rincón had come to the parish of Simití!
The old man quickly resumed. As he continued, his recital became dramatic. As they listened, his auditors sat spellbound.
“Don Ignacio de Rincón himself was kind of heart. But his overseers––ah, Dios arriba! they were cruel! cruel! Many a time the great lash wound itself about my poor father’s shrinking body, and hurled him shrieking to the ground––and why? Because his blistered hands could not hold the batea with which he washed gold for your grandfather, Padre, your grandfather!”
Josè’s head sank upon his breast. A groan escaped him, and tears trickled slowly down his sunken cheeks.
“I bear you no malice, Padre,” continued Rosendo. “It was hard those first days to accept you here. But when, during your fever, I learned from your own lips what you had suffered, I knew that you needed a friend, and I took you to my bosom. And now I am glad––ah, very glad, that I did so. But, though my confidence in you increased day by day, I could never bring myself to tell you my great secret––the secret that now I reveal for the sake of the little Carmen. Padre––señores––I––I am the owner of the great mine, La Libertad!”
Had the heavens collapsed the astonishment of Don Jorge and the priest could not have been greater. The coming of the 334 soldiers, the terrific strain of the past few days, culminating in the loss of Ana––all was for the moment obliterated.
Josè started up and tried to speak. But the words would not come. Rosendo paused a moment for the effect which he knew his revelation would produce, and then went on rapidly:
“Padre, the mine belonged to your grandfather. It produced untold wealth. The gold taken from it was brought down the Guamocó trail to Simití, and from here shipped to Cartagena, where he lived in great elegance. I make no doubt the gold which you and the little Carmen discovered in the old church that day came from this same wonderful mine. But the ore was quartz, and arrastras were required to grind it, and much skill was needed, too. He had men from old Spain, deeply versed in such knowledge. Ah, the tales my poor father told of that mine!
“Bien, the war broke out. The Guamocó region became depopulated, and sank back into the jungle. The location of the mine had been recorded in Cartagena; but, as you know, when Don Ignacio fled from this country he destroyed the record. He did the same with the records in Simití, on that last flying trip here, when he hid the gold in the altar of the old church. And then the jungle grew up around the mine during those thirteen long years of warfare––the people who knew of it died off––and the mine was lost, utterly lost!”