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 pitcher of water and a cloth to lay over my eyes, I'll be very comfortable until my turn arrives."

"I have a doubt between you, Juan," Padre Mateo hesitated.

"My injuries are not mortal, nor in any danger of turning out half that bad," Juan replied, pushing Padre Mateo's shoulder gently to hasten him on his duty. "Don Geronimo's life is wasting in a hundred streams; the blood must be stopped, the poison checked in his wounds."

"Yes, it is a grave condition," Padre Mateo admitted, "a sight that wrings the heart. But I may be an hour, or longer, over Don Geronimo."

"Take the rest of the day if you need it. Put me out of your thoughts—only for the water and the cloth."

"A little longer does not matter so greatly with a burn," Padre Mateo said, yielding against his desire. For his sympathy lay with his affection, and there was not a warm spot in his heart for Don Geronimo.

Padre Ignacio returned before his coadjutor had completed his plastering and piecing of Don Geronimo's stripes. The sound of his voice in the door was as comforting to Juan as a mother's to a fevered child. New hope came with the gentle old man, tumultuous and eager in Juan's breast as a mewed flock that hears the hand of its liberator at the gate. Still he suffered an oppression of fear that his excuse for returning to San Fernando might not suf-