"Ah!" repeated Juan--
"El Dorado
Yo hé trovado."
But what they have to do with the matter I see not yet."
"You see not? Surely the knowledge of God in Christ, the kingdom of heaven opened up to us, is the true El Dorado, the golden country, which enriches those who find it for ever more."
"That is all very good," said Juan, with the air of a man not quite satisfied.
"I doubt not that was our father's meaning," Carlos continued.
"I doubt it, though. Up to that point I follow you, Carlos; but there we part. Something in the New World, I think, my father must have found."
A lengthened debate followed, in which Carlos discovered, rather to his surprise, that Juan still clung to his early faith in a literal land of gold. The more thoughtful and speculative brother sought in vain to reason him out of that belief. Nor was he much more successful when he came to state his own settled conviction that they should never see their father's face on earth. Not the slightest doubt remained on his own mind that, on account of his attachment to the Reformed faith, the Conde de Nuera had been, in the phraseology of the time, quietly "put out of the way." But whether this had been done during the voyage, or on the wild unknown shores of the New World, he believed his children would never know.
On this point, however, no argument availed with Juan. He seemed determined not to believe in his father's death. He confessed, indeed, that his heart bounded at the thought that he had been a sufferer "in the cause of truth and freedom." "He has suffered exile," he said, "and the loss of all things. But I see not wherefore he may not after all be living still, somewhere in that vast wonderful New World."
"I am content to think," Carlos replied, "that all these years he has been at rest with the dead in Christ. And that we shall see his face first with Christ when he appears in glory."