At first I thought I was alone
in the cavern, but then I saw Guarin where he lay asleep.
That day I strengthened, and the next day and the next.
But I had lain long at the very feet of death, and full
strength was a tortoise in returning. So good to Juan Lepe
was Guarin!
Now he was with me, and now he went away to that
village where was Guacanagari. He had done this from
the first coming here, nursing me, then going down through
the forest to see that all was well with his wounded cacique
and the folk whose butio he was. They knew his ways and
did not try to keep him when he would return to the mountain,
to "make medicine." So none knew of the cavern or
that there was one Spaniard left alive in all Hayti.
I strengthened. At last I could draw myself out of cave
and lie, in the now so pleasant weather, upon the ledge
before it. All the vast heat and moisture was gone by;
now again was weather of last year when we found San
Salvador.
I could see ocean. No sail, and were he returning, surely
it should have been before this! He might never return.
When Guarin was away I sat or lay or moved about a
small demesne and still prospered. There were clean rock,
the water, the marvelous forest. He brought cassava cake,
fruit, fish from the sea. He brought me for entertainment
a talking parrot, and there lived in a seam of the rock a
beautiful lizard with whom I made friends.
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