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Updated: September 23, 2025
The object of his adoration was little Rosa Varona, the daughter of his one-time friend Esteban. At thought of her the planter glowed with ardor at any rate he took it to be ardor, although it might have been the fever from that summer rash which so afflicted him and his heart fluttered in a way dangerous to one of his apoplectic tendencies.
He had adjusted himself serenely to his surroundings when Rosa Varona returned from school, but with her coming, away went all his complacency. His contentment vanished; he experienced a total change in his opinions, his hopes, and his ambitions.
It was as if the money were accursed, for certainly the seekers often came to evil. Of such a character was the Varona treasure. Don Esteban himself was neither better nor worse than other men of his time, and although part of the money he hid was wrung from the toil of slaves and the traffic in their bodies, much of it was clean enough, and in time the earth purified it all.
In the city at this time was a certain Colonel Cobo, in command of Spanish Volunteers, those execrable convict troops from the Isle of Pines whose atrocities had already marked them as wolves rather than men, and to him Pancho went with his story. "Ah yes! That Varona boy. I've heard of him," Cobo remarked, when his caller had finished his account.
But even had she felt assured of meeting sympathy, her pride was pure Castilian, and it would never down. She, a Varona, whose name was one to conjure with, whose lineage was of the highest! She to beg? The thing was quite impossible. One crumb, so taken, would have choked her.
To avoid bloodshed, I'll agree to sell my interest cheap, for cash. Come! What will you bid? Start it low. Do I hear a dollar bid? A dollar! A dollar! A dollar! My share of the famous Varona fortune going for a dollar!" "There! He doesn't believe a word of it," Esteban said. Norine gave an impatient shrug.
It was a negro woman, grubbing in the earth with a sharpened stick. After a suspicious scrutiny of him she resumed her digging. Nothing but a heap of stones and plaster remained of the Varona home. The grounds, once beautiful even when neglected as in Dona Isabel's time, were now a scene of total desolation.
Judson had heard something of O'Reilly's story; he had heard mention of Esteban and Rosa Varona; he stood, therefore, in silent wonderment, listening to the incoherent words that poured from his friend's lips. O'Reilly held the boy tenderly in his arms; tears rolled down his cheeks as he implored Esteban to hear and to heed him. "TRY to hear me! TRY!" There was fierce agony in the cry.
But mere thought of the law frightened her; the longer she pondered her situation the more she realized her own impotence. There was no doubt that the courts were corrupt: they were notoriously venal at best, and this war had made them worse. Graft was rampant everywhere. To confess publicly that Esteban Varona had left no deeds, no title to his property, would indeed be the sheerest folly.
Into Matanzas, city of beggary and death, came Rosa Varona and her two negro companions, looking for relief. They made the journey without mishap, for they were too destitute to warrant plundering, and Rosa's disguise concealed what charms remained to her. But once they had entered the city, what an awakening! What suffering, what poverty, what rags they saw!
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