Carmen Ariza by Charles Francis Stocking

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Title: Carmen Ariza

Author: Charles Francis Stocking

Release Date: October 24, 2009 [EBook #30312]

Language: English

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In the name of the Church he would serve these humble people.

––Book 2, Page 77.

CARMEN ARIZA

BY

CHARLES FRANCIS STOCKING, E. M.

Author of THE DIARY OF JEAN EVARTS,

THE MAYOR OF FILBERT, Etc.

CHICAGO

THE MAESTRO CO.

1921

Copyright 1915

BY

CHARLES FRANCIS STOCKING

ISSUED JANUARY 1916

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

TWENTY-FIFTH EDITION

PRINTED IN U. S. A.

CARMEN ARIZA

BOOK 1

Doth this offend you?––the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.

––Jesus.

CARMEN ARIZA

CHAPTER 1

The tropical sun mounted the rim of the golden Caribbean, quivered for a moment like a fledgeling preening its wings
for flight, then launched forth boldly into the vault of heaven, shattering the lowering vapors of night into a myriad
fleecy clouds of every form and color, and driving them before it into the abysmal blue above. Leaping the sullen walls
of old Cartagena, the morning beams began to glow in roseate hues on the red-tiled roofs of this ancient metropolis of
New Granada, and glance in shafts of fire from her glittering domes and towers. Swiftly they climbed the moss-grown
sides of church and convent, and glided over the dull white walls of prison and monastery alike. Pouring through half-
turned shutters, they plashed upon floors in floods of gold. Tapping noiselessly on closed portals, they seemed to bid
tardy sleepers arise, lest the hurrying midday siesta overtake them with tasks unfinished. The dormitory of the
ecclesiastical college, just within the east wall of the city, glowed brilliantly in the clear light which it was reflecting to
the mirror of waters without. Its huge bulk had caught the first rays of the rising sun, most of which had rebounded
from its drab, incrusted walls and sped out again over the dancing sea. A few, however, escaped reflection by stealing
through the slanting shutters of a window close under the roof of the building. Within, they fell upon a man kneeling on
the tiled floor beside a rude cot bed.
In appearance the man was not more than twenty-five years of age. His black, close-curling hair, oval face, and skin
of deep olive tint indicated a Latin origin. His clerical garb proclaimed him a son of the Church. The room was a small,
whitewashed cell of stone, musty with the dampness which had swept in from the sea during the night. It was furnished
with Spartan simplicity. Neither image, crucifix, nor painting adorned its walls––the occupant’s dress alone suggested
his calling. A hanging shelf held a few books, all evidently used as texts in the adjoining college. A table, much littered;
a wooden dressing stand, with a small mirror; and an old-fashioned, haircloth trunk, bearing numerous foreign labels,
eked out the paucity of furnishings.
If the man prayed, there was only his reverent attitude to indicate it, for no words escaped his lips. But the frequent
straining of his tense body, and the fierce clenching of his thin hands, as he threw his arms out over the unopened bed,
were abundant evidence of a soul tugging violently at its moorings. His was the attitude of one who has ceased to
inveigh against fate, who kneels dumbly before the cup of Destiny, knowing that it must be drained.
With the break of day the bells awoke in the church towers throughout the old city, and began to peal forth their noisy
reminder of the virility of the Holy Catholic faith. Then the man raised his head, seemingly startled into awareness of his
material environment. For a few moments he listened confusedly to the insistent clatter––but he made no sign of the
cross, nor did his head bend with the weight of a hollow Ave on his bloodless lips while the clamoring muezzins filled

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the warm, tropical air with their jangling appeal. Rising with an air of weary indifference, he slowly crossed the room
and threw wide the shutters of the solitary window, admitting a torrent of sunlight. As he did this, the door of the cell
softly opened, and a young novitiate entered.
“With your permission, Padre,” said the boy, bowing low. “His Grace summons you to the Cathedral.”
The man made a languid gesture of dismissal, and turned from the lad to the rare view which greeted him through the
open window. The dusty road below was beginning to manifest the city’s awakening. Barefooted, brown-skinned
women, scantily clad in cheap calico gowns, were swinging along with shallow baskets under their arms to the plaza
for the day’s marketing. Some carried naked babes astride their hips; some smoked long, slender cigars of their own
rolling. Half-clad children of all ages, mixtures of mestizo, Spaniard, and Jamaican negro, trotted along beside them;
and at intervals a blustering cochero rattled around the corner in a rickety, obsolete type of trap behind a brace of
emaciated horses.
The lively gossip of the passing groups preluded the noisy chaffering to follow their arrival at the market place.
“Caramba, little pig!” shrilled a buxom matron, snatching her naked offspring away from a passing vehicle. “Think you
I have money to waste on Masses for your naughty soul?”
“Na, señora,” bantered another, “it will cost less now than later to get him out of purgatory.”
“But, comadre, do you stop at the Cathedral to say a Pater-noster?”
“To be sure, amiga, and an Ave, too. And let us return by way of the Hotel España, for, quien sabe? we may catch a
glimpse of the famous matador.”
“Señor Varilla?”
“Yes. He arrived from Barranquilla last night––so my Pedro tells me––and will fight in the arena this Sunday. I have
saved fifty pesos to see him. Madre de Dios! but I would sell my soul to see him slay but a single bull. And do you
go?”
“God willing!”
The soft air, tempered by the languid ocean breeze, bore aloft the laughter and friendly bantering of the marketers,
mingled with the awakening street sounds and the morning greetings which issued from opening doors and windows.
The scent of roses and the heavier sweetness of orchids and tropical blooms drifted over the ancient city from its
innumerable patios and public gardens. The age-incrusted buildings fused in the mounting sun into squares of dazzling
white, over which the tiled roofs flowed in cinctures of crimson. Far off at sea the smoke of an approaching vessel
wove fantastic designs against the tinted sky. Behind the city the convent of Santa Candelaria, crowning the hill of La
Popa, glowed like a diamond; and stretching far to the south, and merging at the foot of the Cordilleras into the
gloom-shrouded, menacing jungle, the steaming llanos offered fleeting glimpses of their rich emerald color as the
morning breeze stirred the heavy clouds of vapor which hung sullenly above them.
To all this the man, looking vacantly out across the city walls to where the sea birds dipped on the rippling waves, was
apparently oblivious. Nor did he manifest the slightest interest in the animated scene before him until a tall, heavy-set
young priest emerged from the entrance of the dormitory below and stopped for a moment in the middle of the road to
bask in the brilliant sunlight and fill his lungs with the invigorating ocean breeze. Turning his eyes suddenly upward, the
latter caught sight of the man at the window.
“Ah, amigo Josè!” he called in friendly greeting, his handsome face aglow with a cordial smile. “Our good Saint
Claver has not lobbied for us in vain! We shall yet have a good day for the bulls, no?”
“An excellent one, I think, Wenceslas,” quickly replied the man addressed, who then turned abruptly away as if he
wished to avoid further conversation. The priest below regarded the empty window for a moment. Then, with a short,
dry laugh and a cynical shrug of his broad shoulders, he passed on.
As the man above turned back into the room his face, wearing the look of one far gone in despair, was contorted with
passion. Fear, confusion, and undefined soul-longing seemed to move rapidly across it, each leaving its momentary
impression, and all mingling at times in a surging flood that swelled the veins of his temples to the point of rupture.
Mechanically he paced his narrow cell, throwing frequent furtive glances at the closed door, as if he suspected himself
watched. Often he stopped abruptly, and with head bowed and brows furrowed, seemed to surrender his soul to the
forces with which it was wrestling. Often he clasped his head wildly in his hands and turned his beseeching eyes
upward, as if he would call upon an invisible power above to aid him, yet restrained by the deadening conviction of
experience that such appeal would meet with no response, and that he must stand in his own strength, however feeble.
Hours passed thus. The sun gained the zenith and the streets were ablaze. Belated marketers, with laden baskets atop
their heads, were hurrying homeward, hugging the scanty shade of the glaring buildings. Shopkeepers were drawing
their shutters and closing their heavy doors, leaving the hot noon hour asleep on the scorching portals. The midday
Angelus called from the Cathedral tower. Then, as if shaken into remembrance of the message which the boy had
brought him at daybreak, the man hurriedly took his black felt hat from the table, and without further preparation left
the room.
The stone pavements and narrow brick walks, above which the intense heat hung in tremulous waves, were almost
deserted as he hastened toward the Cathedral. The business of the morning was finished; trade was suspended until

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the sun, now dropping its fiery shafts straight as plummets, should have sunk behind La Popa. As he turned into the
Calle Lozano an elderly woman, descending the winding brick stairway visible through the open door of one of the
numerous old colonial houses in the lower end of this thoroughfare, called timidly to him.
“Marcelena,” the priest returned, stopping. “The girl––is she––?”
“She is dying,” interrupted the woman in a voice broken with sobs.
“Dying! Then the child––?”
“Yes, Padre, born an hour ago––a boy. It lives. Ah, Santa Virgen, such suffering! Pray for us, Mother of God!”
murmured the weeping woman, bending her head and repeatedly making the sign of the cross.
“Who is with her now?” the priest continued hurriedly.
“Only Catalina. The doctor said he would return. He is good to the blessed child. And Padre Lorenzo came––but he
would not shrive her little white soul––”
“And the father––?”
“He does not know,” the woman sobbed. “Who would dare to tell him! Think you he would come? That he would
own the babe? He would not give one blessed candle to set beside the little mother’s poor sweet body! Ah, Santa
Maria! who will buy Masses for her little soul? Who––?”
“But he shall know!” cried the priest, his face livid. “And he shall acknowledge his child and care for it! Dios––! But
wait, Marcelena. I can do nothing now. But I will return.” Leaving the woman sobbing prayers to the Virgin Mother,
the priest hurried on.
Within the Cathedral the cool atmosphere met him with a sweet calm, which flowed over his perturbed soul like a
benediction. He drew a chair from a pile in a corner and sat down for a moment near one of the little side chapels, to
recover from the stifling heat without and prepare his thought for the impending interview with the Bishop. A dim
twilight enveloped the interior of the building, affording a grateful relief from the blinding glare of the streets. It brought
him a transient sense of peace––the peace which his wearied soul had never fully known. Peace brooded over the
great nave, and hovered in the soft air that drifted slowly through the deserted aisle up to the High Altar, where lay the
Sacred Host. A few votive candles were struggling to send their feeble glow through the darkness. The great images
of the suffering Christ, of the Saints and the Virgin Mother had merged their outlines into the heavy shadows which lay
upon them.
The haunting memory of years of soul-struggle with doubt and fear, of passionate longing for the light of truth in the
gloom of superstition and man-made creeds, for guidance among the devious paths of human conjecture which lead
nowhither––or to madness––seemed to fade into the darkness which wrapped him in that holy calm. After all, what
had he won in his lifelong warfare with human beliefs? What had he gained by his mad opposition to Holy Church?
There she stood, calm, majestic, undisturbed. Had not the Christ himself declared that the gates of hell should not
prevail against her? Was not the unfoldment of truth a matter, not of years, but of ages? And were the minds of men
to-day prepared for higher verities than those she offered? Did not the Church plant the seed as rapidly as the barren
soil of the human mind was tilled and made fallow? True, her sons, whom he had so obstinately opposed, were blindly
zealous. But were they wholly without wisdom? Had not his own zeal been as unreasoningly directed to the forcing of
events? And still, through it all, she had held her indulgent arms extended to him, as to all erring mankind. Why not
now, like a tired child, weary of futile resistance, yield to her motherly embrace and be at last at peace? Again the
temptation which he had stubbornly resisted for a lifetime urged upon him with all its mesmeric insistence.
He looked up, and his glance fell upon a small, glass-covered case, dimly visible in the uncertain light at one side of the
little altar. The case was filled with tiny images of gold––milagros. Each had received priestly blessing, and each was
believed to have worked a miraculous cure. The relaxed lines of the priest’s care-worn face instantly drew into an
expression of hard austerity. Like the ebb of the ocean, his recalcitrant thought surged back again in a towering flood.
“What a spectacle!” he murmured. “Holy Church, assuming spiritual leadership of the world, sunken in idolatry, and
publicly parading her fetishism in these lingering echoes of primitive demon-worship!”
Ah, the Master taught the omnipotence of God, whose ways he declared as high above the blind grovelings of man as
the dome of heaven swings above earth. But how long, gentle Master, shall such as this be declared thy Father’s
ways? How long shall superstition and idolatry retain the power to fetter the souls of men? Is there no end to the black
curse of ignorance of Truth, which, after untold centuries, still makes men sink with vain toil and consume with
disease? And––are those who sit about Peter’s gorgeous tomb and approve these things unerring guides to a right
knowledge of God, to know whom, the Christ has said, is life eternal?
A step behind him broke the flow of his dark revery.
“Our good Josè dreams below, while His Grace bites his nails above,” said a soft, mellifluous voice. “Qué chiste! It
is––”
The priest sprang to his feet and faced the speaker. For a moment the men regarded each other, the one uncertain as
to the impending event, but supremely confident of his ability to meet it; the other sick in soul and torn with mental
struggle, but for the moment fired anew with the righteous wrath which his recent brief interview with the woman,
Marcelena, had kindled.

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“Wenceslas––” The priest spoke in a strained, uncertain tone, striving to hold his emotions in leash. “I have learned to-
day––The girl, Maria––”
“Caro amigo,” interrupted Wenceslas smoothly, “what you have learned to-day, or any other day, of the girl, Maria,
is a lie.”
“Hombre!” The priest turned livid. Stepping closer to Wenceslas––
“Do you think, inhuman! that I have not long known of your relations with this girl? Who has not! And, further, I
know––and Cartagena shall know––that to-day she lies dying beside your child!”
Wenceslas recoiled. His face flushed, and the veins of his forehead swelled with a purple flood. Then a pallor spread
over his features, and beads of perspiration started from his pores.
It was but momentary. Recovering himself, he laid a large hand on the priest’s shoulder, and, his face assuming its
wonted smile, said in his usual low tone, “Amigo, it seems that you have a penchant for spreading gossip. Think you I
am ignorant of the fact that because of it Rome spewed you out for a meddlesome pest? Do you deceive yourself that
Cartagena will open her ears to your garbled reports? The hag, Marcelena, lies! She has long hoped to gain some
advantage from me, I have told you–– But go now above and learn from His Grace, whom you have had the
impudence to keep waiting all morning, how tongues that wag too freely can be silenced.” He checked himself
suddenly, as if he feared he had said too much. Then, turning on his heel, he quickly left the Cathedral.
The priest’s head sank upon his breast, and he stood, infirm of purpose and choking with words which he could not
voice. The whirl in which his confused brain had revolved for months––nay, years––had made the determination of
conduct with him a matter of hours, of days, of weeks. Spontaneity of action had long since ceased within his fettered
mind, where doubt had laid its detaining hand upon his judgment. Uncertainty of his steps, fear of their consequence,
and dread lest he precipitate the calamity which he felt hung always just above him, had sapped the courage and
strength of will which his soul needed for a determined stand, and left him incapable of decisive action, even in the face
of grossest evil. The mordant reply of Wenceslas only strengthened his conviction of the futility of massing his own
feeble forces against those of one so thoroughly entrenched as this man, who had the ear of the Bishop––nay, whose
resourceful mind was now said to be actually directing the policies of the feeble old ecclesiastic who held the bishopric
of Cartagena.
As if groping through the blackness of midnight, he moved slowly down the deserted nave of the Cathedral and
mounted the winding stairs to the ambulatory above. Pausing at the door of the sanctum for a moment to gather up his
remnant of moral strength, he entered and stood hesitant before the waiting Bishop.

CHAPTER 2

The long War of Independence which destroyed the last vestige of Spanish control over the Peruvian colonies of
South America was virtually brought to a close by the terrific battle of Ayacucho, fought on the plains between
Pizarro’s city of Lima and the ancient Inca seat of Cuzco in the fall of 1824. The result of this battle had been eagerly
awaited in the city of Cartagena, capital of the newly formed federation of Colombia. It was known there that the
Royalist army was concentrating for a final stand. It was known, too, that its veterans greatly outnumbered the
nondescript band of patriots, many of whom were provided only with the arma blanca, the indispensable machete of
tropical America. This fact lent a shred of encouragement to the few proud Tory families still remaining in the city and
clinging forlornly to their broken fortunes, while vainly hoping for a reëstablishment of the imperial regimen, as they
pinned their fate to this last desperate conflict. Among these, none had been prouder, none more loyal to the Spanish
Sovereign, and none more liberal in dispensing its great wealth to bolster up a hopeless cause than the ancient and
aristocratic family at whose head stood Don Ignacio Josè Marquez de Rincón, distinguished member of the Cabildo,
and most loyal subject of his imperial majesty, King Ferdinand VII. of Spain.
The house of Rincón traced its lineage back to the ferocious adventurer, Juan de Rincón, favorite lieutenant of the
renowned Conquistador, Pedro de Heredia. When the latter, in the year 1533, obtained from Charles V. the
concession of New Andalusia, the whole territory comprised between the mouths of the Magdalena and Atrato rivers
in what is now the Republic of Colombia, and undertook the conquest of this enormously rich district, the fire-eating
Juan, whom the chroniclers of that romantic period quaintly described as “causing the same effects as lightning and
quicksilver,” was his most dependable support. Together they landed at the Indian village of Calamari, and, after
putting the pacific inhabitants to the sword––a manner of disposal most satisfactory to the practical Juan––laid the
foundations of the present city of Cartagena, later destined to become the “Queen of the Indies,” the pride, as it was
the despair, of the haughty monarchs of Spain.
For his eminent services in this exploit Juan received a large tract of land in the most fertile part of the Magdalena
valley––which he immediately staked and lost at the gaming-table. As a measure of consolation, and doubtless with

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the view of checking Juan’s gambling propensities, Pedro de Heredia then bestowed upon him a strip of bleak and
unexplored mountain country adjacent to the river Atrato. Stung by his sense of loss, as well as by the taunts of his
boisterous companions, and harassed by the practical conclusion that life’s brevity would not permit of wiping out their
innumerable insults singly by the sword, the raging Juan gathered together a few blood-drinking companions of that ilk
and set out to find diversion of mind on his possessions.
Years passed. One day Juan again appeared on the streets of Cartagena, and this time with gold enough to buy the
city. The discovery of rich auriferous sands on his estates adjoining the Atrato, which were worked extensively for him
by the natives whom he and his companions had forced into subjection, had yielded him enormous wealth. He settled
in Cartagena, determined to make it his future home, and at once set about buying great blocks of houses and erecting
a palace for himself. He began to acquire lands and mines in all directions. He erected a sumptuous summer residence
in what is now the suburb of Turbaco. He built an arena, and bred bulls for it from famous stock which he imported
from the mother-country. He gave fêtes and public entertainments on the most lavish scale imaginable. In short, he
quickly became Cartagena’s most influential and distinguished citizen, as he was easily her richest.
But far more important to mention than all these dry details was the undoubted change of character which had come
over the man himself. Perhaps it was the awful heat of the steaming Atrato valley that drew the fire from his livid soul.
Perhaps it was a dawning appreciation of the opportunities made possible by his rapid acquisition of wealth that had
softened his character. Some said he had seen a vision of the Virgin Mary. Others laid it to a terrible fever, in which
for days he had lain delirious in the shadow of death. Be that as it may, the bloodthirsty Conquistador, who a few
years before angrily shook the dust of Cartagena from his feet, had now returned a changed man.
At once Juan began to manifest in an ever increasing degree an interest in matters religious. In this respect his former
character suffered a complete reversal. He assiduously cultivated the clergy, and gave large sums for the support of
the Cathedral and the religious orders of the city. The Bishop became a frequent guest at his sumptuous table; and as
often he in turn sought the Bishop for consultation anent his benefactions and, in particular, for consolation when
haunted by sad memories of his devilish exploits in early life. When the great-hearted Padre Bartolomé de las Casas,
infirm but still indefatigable in his work for the protection and uplift of the Indians, arrived one memorable day in his
little canoe which his devoted native servants had paddled through the dique from the great river beyond, Juan was
the first to greet him and insist that he make his home with him while in the city. And on the night of the Padre’s arrival
it is said that Juan, with tears streaming down his scarred and wrinkled face, begged to be allowed to confess to him
the awful atrocities which he had committed upon the innocent and harmless aborigines when, as was his wont, his
breath hot with the lust of blood, he had fallen upon them without provocation and hewed them limb from limb.
In his old age the now gentle Juan, his former self almost obliterated, expressed a desire to renounce the world,
bestow his great wealth upon the Church, and enter a monastery to pass his remaining years. Despite the protestations
of his numerous family, for whom his religious zeal would permit him to leave but scanty provision, he was already
formulating plans toward this end when death overtook him, and his vast estates descended intact to the family which
he had founded.
So complete had been the transformation of Juan de Rincón during the many years that he lived after his return to
Cartagena that the characteristics which he transmitted to his posterity were, in general, quite the reverse of those
which he himself had manifested so abundantly in early life. Whereas, he had formerly been atrociously cruel,
boastingly impious, and a scoffer at matters religious, his later descendants were generally tender of heart, soft of
manner, and of great piety. Whereas, in early manhood he had been fiery and impulsive, quick of decision and
immovable of opinion, his progeny were increasingly inclined to be deliberate in judgment and vacillating of purpose.
So many of his descendants entered the priesthood that the family was threatened with extinction, for in the course of
time it had become a sacred custom in the Rincón family to consecrate the first-born son to the Church. This custom
at length became fixed, and was rigidly observed, even to the point of bigotry, despite the obliteration of those
branches where there was but a single son.
The family, so auspiciously launched, waxed increasingly rich and influential; and when the smoldering fires of
revolution burst into flame among the oppressed South American colonies, late in the year 1812, the house of Rincón,
under royal and papal patronage, was found occupying the first position of eminence and prestige in the proud old city
of Cartagena. Its wealth had become proverbial. Its sons, educated by preceptors brought from Paris and Madrid,
were prominent at home and abroad. Its honor was unimpeachable. Its fair name was one of the most resplendent
jewels in the Spanish crown. And Don Ignacio epitomized loyalty to Sovereign and Pope.
With the inauguration of hostilities no fears were felt by the Rincón family for the ultimate success of the royalist arms,
and Don Ignacio immediately despatched word to his Sovereign in Madrid that the wealth and services of his house
were at the royal disposal. Of this offer Ferdinand quickly availed himself. The Rincón funds were drawn upon
immediately and without stint to furnish men and muniments for the long and disastrous struggle. Of the family
resources there was no lack while its members held their vast possessions of lands and mines. But when, after the first
successes of the patriots, reprisals began to be visited upon the Tories of Cartagena, and their possessions fell, one
after another, into the hands of the successful revolutionists, or were seized by former slaves, Don Ignacio found it
difficult to meet his royal master’s demands. The fickle King, already childish to the verge of imbecility, gave scant
thanks in return for the Rincón loyalty, and when at last, stripped of his fortune, deserted by all but the few Tory
families who had the courage to remain in Cartagena until the close of the war, Don Ignacio received with sinking heart
the news of the battle of Ayacucho, he knew full well that any future appeal to Ferdinand for recognition of his great

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sacrifices would fall upon unhearing ears.
But to remain in republican Cartagena after the final success of the revolutionists was to the royalist Don Ignacio quite
impossible. Even if permitted the attempt, he was so attached to the ancient order of things that he could not adjust
himself to the radically changed conditions. So, gathering about him the sorrowing remnant of his family, and
converting into a pitifully small sum his few remaining possessions, he took passage on an English trader and sailed for
the mother-country, to begin life anew among those whose speech and customs were most familiar to him.
He settled in Seville, where the elder of his two sons, Rafaél de Rincón, a lad of fifteen, was studying for the
priesthood, under the patronage of the Archbishop. There he established himself in the wine business, associating with
him his second son, Carlos, only a year the junior of his brother. But, broken in spirit as well as in fortune, he made
little headway, and two years later died pitiably in poverty and obscurity.
Through the influence of the Archbishop, the business, which Carlos was far too young and immature to conduct, was
absorbed by larger interests, and the young lad retained as an employe. As the years passed the boy developed
sufficient commercial ability to enable him to retain his position and to extract from it enough to provide for the needs
of himself and his dependents. He married, late in life, a woman whose family had fled from Cartagena with his own
and settled in Seville. She was but a babe in arms at the time of the exodus, and many years his junior. A year after the
marriage a child was born to them, a son. The babe’s birth was premature, following a fright which the mother
received when attacked by a beggar. But the child lived. And, according to the honored family custom, which the
father insisted on observing as rigidly in Spain as it had been formerly in Cartagena, this son, Josè Francisco Enrique
de Rincón, was at birth consecrated to the service of God in the Holy Catholic Church.

CHAPTER 3

If, as Thoreau said, “God is on the side of the most sensitive,” then He should have been very close to the timid,
irresolute lad in Seville, in whom the softer traits of character, so unexpectedly developed in the adventurous founder
of the Rincón family, now stood forth so prominently. Somber, moody, and retiring; delicately sensitive and shrinking;
acutely honest, even to the point of morbidity; deeply religious and passionately studious, with a consuming zeal for
knowledge, and an unsatisfied yearning for truth, the little Josè early in life presented a strange medley of
characteristics, which bespoke a need of the utmost care and wisdom on the part of those who should have the
directing of his career. Forced into the world before his time, and strongly marked by his mother’s fear; afflicted with
precarious health, and subjected to long and desperate illnesses in childhood, his little soul early took on a gloom and
asceticism wholly unnatural to youth. Fear was constantly instilled into his acutely receptive mind by his solicitous,
doting parents; and his life was thereby stunted, warped, and starved. He was reared under the constant reminder of
the baleful effects of food, of air, of conduct, of this and that invisible force inimical to health; and terror and anxiety
followed him like a ghost and turned about all his boyish memories. Under these repressing influences his mind could
not but develop with a lack of stamina for self-support. Hesitancy and vacillation became pronounced. In time, the
weight of any important decision gave him acute, unendurable agony of mind. Called upon to decide for himself a
matter of import, his thought would become confused, his brain torpid, and in tears and perplexity the tormented lad
would throw himself into the arms of his anxious parents and beg to be told what course to pursue.
Thus his nature grew to depend upon something stronger than itself to twine about. He sought it in his schoolmates; but
they misread him. The little acts which were due to his keen sensitiveness or to his exaggerated reticence of disposition
were frequently interpreted by them as affronts, and he was generally left out of their games, or avoided entirely. His
playmates consequently became fewer and more transient as the years gained upon him, until at length, trodden upon,
but unable to turn, he withdrew his love from the world and bestowed it all upon his anxious mother. She became his
only intimate, and from her alone he sought the affection for which he yearned with an intensity that he could not
express. Shunning the boisterous, frolicking children at the close of the school day, he would seek her, and, nestling at
her side, her hand clasped in his, would beg her to talk to him of the things with which his childish thought was
struggling. These were many, but they revolved about a common center––religion.
The salient characteristics already mentioned were associated with others, equally prominent, and no less influential in
the shaping of his subsequent career. With the development of his deep, inward earnestness there had appeared
indications of latent powers of mind that were more than ordinary. These took the form of childish precocity in his
studies, clearness of spiritual vision, and maturity in his conduct and mode of life. The stunting of his physical nature
threw into greater prominence his exaggerated soul-qualities, his tenderness, his morbid conscientiousness, and a
profound emotionalism which, at the sight of a great painting, or the roll of the Cathedral organ, would flood his eyes
and fill his throat with sobs. When the reckless founder of the family experienced a reversal of his own dark traits of
soul, nearly three centuries before, it was as if the pendulum had swung too far in the opposite direction, and at the
extreme point of its arc had left the little Josè, with the sterner qualities of the old Conquistador wholly neutralized by
self-condemnation, fear, infirmity of purpose, a high degree of intellectuality, and a soul-permeating religious fervor.

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At the mention of religion the timid lad at once became passionate, engrossed––nay, obsessed. In his boyhood years,
before the pall of somber reticence had settled over him, he had been impressed with the majesty of the Church and
the gorgeousness of her material fabric. The religious ideals taught him by his good mother took deep root. But the
day arrived when the expansion of his intellect reached such a point as to enable him to detect a flaw in her reasoning.
It was but a little rift, yet the sharp edge of doubt slipped in. Alas! from that hour he ceased to drift with the current of
popular theological belief; his frail bark turned, and launched out upon the storm-tossed sea, where only the
outstretched hand of the Master, treading the heaving billows through the thick gloom, saved it at length from
destruction.
The hungry lad began to question his parents incessantly regarding the things of the spirit. His teachers in the parochial
school he plied with queries which they could not meet. Day after day, while other boys of his tender age romped in
the street, he would steal into the great Cathedral and stand, pathetically solitary, before the statues of the Christ and
the Virgin Mary, yearning over the problems with which his childish thought was struggling, and the questions to which
no one could return satisfying replies.
Here again the boy seemed to manifest in exaggerated form the reversed characteristics of the old Conquistador. But,
unlike that of the pious Juan, the mind of the little Josè was not so simple as to permit it to accept without
remonstrance the tenets of his family’s faith. Blind acceptance of any teaching, religious or secular, early became quite
impossible to him. This entailed many an hour of suffering to the lad, and brought down upon his little head severe
punishments from his preceptors and parents. But in vain they admonished and threatened. The child demanded
proofs; and if proofs were not at hand, his acceptance of the mooted teaching was but tentative, generally only an
outward yielding to his beloved mother’s inexorable insistence. Many the test papers he returned to his teachers
whereon he had written in answer to the questions set, “I am taught to reply thus; but in my heart I do not believe it.”
Vainly the teachers appealed to his parents. Futilely the latter pleaded and punished. The placid receptiveness of the
Rincón mind, which for more than three hundred years had normally performed its absorptive functions and imbibed
the doctrines of its accepted and established human authorities, without a trace of the heresy of suspecting their
genuineness, had at last experienced a reversal. True, the boy had been born in the early hours of nineteenth century
doubt and religious skepticism. The so-called scientific spirit, buried for ages beneath the débris of human conjecture,
was painfully emerging and preening its wings for flight. The “higher criticism” was nascent, and ancient traditions were
already beginning to totter on the foundations which the Fathers had set. But Spain, close wrapped in mediaeval
dreams, had suffered no taint of “modernism.” The portals of her mind were well guarded against the entrance of
radical thought, and her dreamers were yet lulled into lethargic adherence to outworn beliefs and musty creeds by the
mesmerism of priestly tradition. The peculiar cast of mind of the boy Josè was not the product of influences from
without, but was rather an exemplification of the human mind’s reversion to type, wherein the narrow and bigoted
mentality of many generations had expanded once more into the breadth of scope and untrammeled freedom of an
ancient progenitor.
As the boy grew older his ability to absorb learning increased astonishingly. His power of analysis, his keen perception
and retentive memory soon advanced him beyond the youths of his own age, and forced him to seek outside the pale
of the schoolroom for the means to satisfy his hunger for knowledge. He early began to haunt the bookstalls of Seville,
and day after day would stand for hours searching the treasures which he found there, and mulling over books which
all too frequently were anathema to the orthodox. Often the owner of one of these shops, who knew the lad’s
parents, and whose interest had been stirred by his passion for reading, would let him take one or more of the coveted
volumes home over night, for the slender family purse would not permit him to purchase what his heart craved. Then
came feasts for his famished little soul which often lasted until daybreak.
It happened one evening that, when he crept off to his little room to peer into one of these borrowed treasures, his
father followed him. Pushing the chamber door softly open the parent found the boy propped against his pillow in bed,
absorbed in a much-thumbed volume which he was reading by the pale light of the single candle.
“Is it thus that you deceive your poor parents?” the fond father began, in a tone of mock severity.
The startled lad stifled a cry and hastily thrust the book beneath his pillow. The father’s interest now became genuine.
Leaning over the terrified boy he drew forth the volume.
“Voltaire!”
The doting father stood petrified. Voltaire, Antichrist, Archfiend of impiety––and in the hands of his beloved son!
Sleep fled the little household that night. In his father’s arms, while the distressed mother hung over them, the boy
sobbed out his confession. He had not intended to deceive. He had picked up this book in the stall without knowing
its nature. He had become so interested in what it said about the Virgin Mary that he forgot all else. The shopkeeper
had found him reading it, and had laughed and winked at his clerk when he bade the boy take it home for the night.
The book had fascinated him. He himself––did not his father know?––had so often asked how the Virgin could be the
mother of God, and why men prayed to her. Yes, he knew it mocked their faith––and the sacred Scriptures. He
knew, too, that his father would not approve of it. That was why he had tried to hide it beneath his pillow. He had
been wicked, desperately wicked, to deceive his dear parents––But the book––It made him forget––It said so many
things that seemed to be true––And––and––
“Oh, padre mío, forgive me, forgive me! I want to know the truth about God and the world!” The delicate frame of
the young lad shook in paroxysms of grief.

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Alas! it was but the anguished soul-cry which has echoed through the halls of space since time began. What a
mockery to meet it with empty creed and human dogma! Alas! what a crime against innocence to stifle the honest
questionings of a budding mind with the musty cloak of undemonstrable beliefs.
“But, my son, have I not often told you? The Holy Church gives us the truth,” replied the father, frightened by the
storm which raged within the childish soul, yet more alarmed at the turn which the mind of his cherished son was
apparently taking––his only son, dedicated to the service of God from the cradle, and in whom the shattered hopes of
this once proud family were now centered.
“But this book laughs at us because we pray to a woman!” sobbed the boy.
“True. But does not its author need the prayers of so pure a woman as the Virgin? Do we not all need them? And is it
not likely that one so good as she would have great influence with God––much greater than we ourselves, or even the
best of men, could have?”
“But how can she be the mother of God? The Bible does not teach that!”
“How do you know that the Bible does not teach it, my son?”
“I––I––have read––the Bible,” faltered the lad.
“You have read the Bible!” cried the astonished father. “And where have you done that, you wicked boy?”
“At the bookstore of Mariano,” confessed the trembling child.
“Madre de Dios!” burst from the father, as he started to his feet. “Mariano is a wicked infidel! The Bishop shall hear
of this! Ah, well may the Holy Father in Rome grieve to see his innocent babes led astray by these servants of hell!
But, my son,” returning to the boy and clasping him again in his arms, “it is not too late. The Virgin Mother has
protected you. You meant no harm. Satan covets your pure little soul––But he shall not have it!” The father’s
tremulous voice mounted high, “No, by the Saints in heaven, he shall not have it!”
The boy’s assurance slowly returned under the influence of his father’s tender solicitude, even though he remained
dimly conscious of the rift widening little by little between his parents’ settled convictions and his own groping thought.
With the assuaging of his grief came again those insistent questions which throughout his life had tormented his peace
and driven him even to the doors of infidels in search of truth.
“Father,” he began timidly, “why was I wicked to read the Bible?”
“Because, my son, in doing so you yielded to the temptations of Satan. The Bible is a great and mysterious book,
written by God himself. He meant it to be explained to us by the Holy Father, who is the head of the Church which the
good Saint Peter founded. We are not great enough nor good enough to understand it. The Holy Father, who cares
for God’s Church on earth, he is good enough, and he alone can interpret it to us. Satan tries to do with all men just
what he did with you, my child. He seeks to make them read the Bible so that he can confuse them and rob them of
their faith. Then when he gets possession of their souls he drags them down with him to hell, where they are lost
forever.”
“And does the Holy Father really believe that Mary is the mother of God?” persisted the boy, raising his tear-stained
face.
“Yes––is she not? The blessed Saviour said that he and God were one. And, as Mary is the mother of Christ, she is
also the mother of God––is she not? Let us read what the good Saint John Chrysostom says.” He rose and went into
another room, returning in a few minutes with a little volume. Taking the boy again on his knee, he continued, “The
blessed Saint tells us that the Virgin Mary was made the mother of God in order that she might obtain salvation for
many who, on account of their wicked lives, could not be saved, because they had so offended divine justice, but yet,
by the help of her sweet mercy and mighty intercession, might be cleansed and rendered fit for heaven. My little son,
you have always been taught that Mary is heaven’s Queen. And so she is ours, and reigns in heaven for us. Jesus
loves to have her close to him, and he can never refuse her requests. He always grants what she asks. And that is the
reason why we pray to her. She never forgets us––never!”
A troubled look crossed the boy’s face. Then he began anew. “Father dear, God made everything, did He not? The
Bible says that, anyway.”
“Yes, child.”
“Did He make Satan?”
The father hesitated. The child hurried on under the lash of his holy inquisitiveness. “Father, how did evil come into the
world? Is God both good and bad? And how can a good God punish us forever for sins committed here in only a few
short years?”
“Ah, queridito!” cried the harassed father. “Such questions should not have entered your little head for years to
come! Why can you not run and play as do other children? Why are you not happy as they are? Why must you spend
your days thinking of things that are far too deep for you? Can you not wait? Some day you shall know all. Some day,
when you have entered the service of God, perhaps you may even learn these things from the Holy Father himself.
Then you will understand how the good God lets evil tempt us in order that our faith in Him may be exercised and
grow strong––”

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“And He lets Satan harm us purposely?” The boy’s innocent dark eyes looked up appealingly into his father’s face.
“It is only for a short time, little son. And only those who are never fit for heaven go down with Satan. But you are not
one of those,” he hastily added, straining the boy to him. “And the Masses which the good priests say for us will lift us
out of purgatory and into heaven, where the streets are pure gold and the gates are pearl. And there we will all live
together for––”
“Father,” interrupted the boy, “I have thought of these things for a long, long time. I do not believe them. And I do not
wish to become a priest.”
The father fell silent. It was one of those tense moments which every man experiences when he sees a withering frost
slowly gathering over the fondest hopes of a lifetime. The family of Rincón, aristocratic, intensely loyal to Church and
State, had willingly laid itself upon the sacrificial altar in deference to its honored traditions. Custom had become law.
Obedience of son to parent and parent to Sovereign, spiritual or temporal, had been the guiding star of the family’s
destinies. To think was lawful; but to hold opinions at variance with tradition was unspeakable heresy. Spontaneity of
action was commendable; but conduct not prescribed by King or Pope was unpardonable crime. Loss of fortune, of
worldly power and prestige, were as nothing; deviation from the narrow path trodden by the illustrious scions of the
great Juan was everything. That this lad, to whom had descended the undying memories of a long line of glorious
defenders of kingly and papal power, should presume to shatter the sacred Rincón traditions, was unbelievable. It was
none other than the work of Satan. The boy had fallen an innocent victim to the devil’s wiles.
But the house of Rincón had withstood the assaults of the son of perdition for more than three centuries. It would not
yield now! The all-powerful Church of Rome stood behind it––and the gates of hell could not prevail against her! The
Church would save her own. Yes, the father silently argued, through his brother’s influence the case should be laid
before His Eminence, the Archbishop. And, if need be, the Holy Father himself should be called upon to cast the devil
out of this tormented child. To argue with the boy now were futile, even dangerous. The lad had grown up with full
knowledge of his parents’ fond hopes for his future. He had never openly opposed them, although at times the worried
mother would voice her fears to the father when her little son brought his perplexing questions to her and failed to find
satisfaction. But until this night the father had felt no alarm. Indeed, he had looked upon the child’s inquisitiveness as
but a logical consequence of his precocity and unusual mental powers, in which he himself felt a father’s swelling pride.
To his thought it augured rapid promotion in the Church; it meant in time a Cardinal’s hat. Ah, what glorious
possibilities! How the prestige of the now sunken family would soar! Happily he had been aroused to an appreciation
of the boy’s really desperate state in time. The case should go before the Archbishop to-morrow, and the Church
should hear his call to hasten to the rescue of this wandering lamb.

CHAPTER 4

Seville is called the heart of Spain. In a deeper sense it is her soul. Within it, extremes touch, but only to blend into a
harmonious unit which manifests the Spanish temperament and character more truly there than in any other part of the
world. In its Andalusian atmosphere the religious instinct of the Spaniard reaches its fullest embodiment. True, its bull-
fights are gory spectacles; but they are also gorgeous and solemn ceremonies. Its ferias are tremendously worldly; but
they are none the less stupendous religious fêtes. Its picturesque Easter processions, when colossal images of the
Virgin are carried among bareheaded and kneeling crowds, smack of paganism; but we cannot question the
genuineness of the religious fervor thus displayed. Its Cathedral touches the arena; and its Archbishop washes the feet
of its old men...