in the fear that they might set up a babble on hearing him pass, and make it necessary for him to ride again for his life.
"It is the quiescence of a covered fire," Padre Ignacio said, reading Juan's doubtful thoughts. "Our poor Indians have thrown off all authority, except alone their spiritual allegiance. This morning they refused to go to the fields, standing under Don Geronimo's lashes sullenly. The cattle and sheep are straying tonight in the hills and vegas without herdsmen or shepherds; the fields are thirsty; the threshed grain lies unwinnowed on the ground."
"I am amazed!" said Juan, truly so. "Has there been any violence?"
"No. Brother Mateo and I have succeeded in holding them; they seem like children, indeed, so gentle, so obedient, in our hands. Only they refuse, stubbornly, with such a determination that it is almost valiant, poor little fools! to work in the fields under Don Geronimo. They say he was to blame for your betrayal to the soldiers, and your flight from San Fernando. They mourn you as a friend lost to them. I do not know how the belief took hold of them, where it started or how it spread, this thing that you were to be mayordomo in place of Don Geronimo."
"Poor devils!" said Juan, his heart strained with pity for their vain hope.
"We must call on the soldiers again, I fear," Padre Ignacio sighed, "and force them to the fields
