“Well, my son?” said Fray Fernando kindly, looking up from his book. “Patre,” said José, “it is Christmas-day; you have told me that in the country beyond the sea men give gifts to each other.” “Ah! so you want a gift, José. Speak out, my boy; what is it?” José hesitated; a rather unusual thing with him. He had few ways of expressing feeling, and seldom did express it at all. Fray Fernando closed the volume he had been reading, and surveyed the youth attentively, and with much satisfaction. José was dear to him as his own son; he was yet more fond of him than he was proud of him, and that is much to say. “You make a very good hidalgo, José,” he remarked with a smile. “Is anything wanting to complete your equipment? Have you set your heart upon a cloak like Diego’s, or even upon a sword?” “No, patre; I thank you. That which I desire is a thing of another kind. I desire—your leave to visit mine own people down yonder in the valley. Let the patre be good to me, his son and servant.” José spoke, according to his wont, very quietly. And having spoken, he stood perfectly motionless, awaiting an answer. But the white man started, as if he had received a sudden blow. “What is this, José?” he asked. “Why do you want to leave me?” “I do not want to leave the patre. I want to go to my own people.” “But wherefore should you go, and to whom? You have no friends among your own people. Your father and mother are dead long ago. Besides, you are a Christian.” “The patre speaks truth; I am a Christian.” “Then wherefore forsake Christian instruction and communion? No, José; it is a vain, idle fancy. Give it up, and stay with me; for I love you, José.” José’s slight fingers trembled, letting go their hold on the montero, which fell to the ground. But, after a moment’s pause, he drew nearer, and knelt before the monk. “The patre has been always good to me,” he said. “Let him be good to me now, and send me away, that I may go to my own people.” “Stand up!” said Fray Fernando, with some displeasure in his tone. “Christian men should kneel to God alone. Wait a while; for I must think. You have troubled me, José.” José stood up, and waited. Had the padre’s meditation lasted for hours, he would not have disturbed him by the motion of a limb or a muscle. But he had not to wait so long. The padre spoke. “José,” he asked, “if I give you leave to go, will you come back to me again?” “I will surely come back to you, patre.” “You intend it. But your mind may change. I fear, if I let you go now, I shall see your face no more.” “Patre,” said José, with deeper earnestness of voice, “I must needs come back. Do I not belong to you?” “My son, we both belong to God.” “I belong to you, patre. You bought me, and with something you were loath to part with, for I saw you kiss it ere you gave it into Don Ramon’s hand.”—A slight circumstance that Fray Fernando himself had forgotten—“Certainly I will return to you, patre.”