Don Felipe insisted that I sleep in his house, in his bed. This bed consisted of an iron frame with loose wooden slats stretched across it. Over these was laid one tattered blanket. My clothing covered me. Don Felipe, his wife, his grown son and daughter, his two small infants, all of whom had been accustomed to use the bed, lay down upon the soft floor. There were also two sick persons in the room—a very old man covered with red spots, too far gone to speak, and a boy with extraordinarily swollen tonsils. Occasionally a centenarian hag entered and ministered unto the patients. Her method of treatment was simple. With the old man she merely heated a piece of iron at the candle and touched the spots. For the boy’s case she made a paste of corn-meal and lard, and gently rubbed his elbows with it, loudly saying prayers. This went on at intervals all night. Between treatments the babies would wake up at intervals and insist upon being nursed.... The door was shut early in the evening, and windows there were none. Now all this hospitality meant a real sacrifice to Don Felipe, especially the meals, at which he unlocked a tin trunk and brought me with all reverence his precious sugar and coffee. He was, like all peons, incredibly poor and lavishly hospitable. The giving up of his bed was a mark of the highest honor, too. But when I tried to pay him in the morning he wouldn’t hear of it. "My house is yours," he repeated. "’A stranger might be God,’ as we say." Finally I told him that I wanted him to buy me some tobacco, and he took the money. I knew then that it would go to the right place, for a Mexican can be trusted never to carry out a commission. He is delightfully irresponsible. At six o’clock in the morning I set out for Santo Domingo in a two-wheeled cart driven by an old peon named Froilan Mendarez. We avoided the main road, jolting along by a mere track that led behind a range of hills. After we’d traveled for about an hour, I had an unpleasant thought. "What if the _compañeros_ fled beyond Santo Domingo and the _colorados_ are there?" "What indeed?" murmured Froilan, chirruping to the mule. "But if they are, what’ll we do?" Froilan thought a minute. "We might say we were cousins to President Huerta," he suggested, without a smile. Froilan was a barefooted peon, his face and hands incredibly damaged by age and dirt; I was a ragged Gringo.... We jogged on for several hours. At one place an armed man started out of the brush and hailed us. His lips were split and leathery with thirst. The _espadas_ had slashed his legs terribly. He had escaped over the Sierra, climbing and slipping all night. We gave him all the water and food we had, and he went on toward the Pelayo.