"Virgin! What a place that was!" exclaimed Suarez, his dark eyes
sparkling even yet with the recollection of it. "In one day we secured
more gold than we could carry. We threw away food to make room for it,
and then threw away gold to secure the food again. We called it the
Golden Valley. When weary of digging, we would spin coins to see who
drew corner lots in the town we had mapped out on a level piece of
land."
White men and Indians alike caught the fever. They accumulated a
useless hoard, having no means of transport other than their own backs,
and then, all precautions being relaxed, the nomad Indians, whom they
despised, rushed the camp when they were sleeping. They were nearly
all killed by stones shot from slings. Suarez was only stunned, and he
and a Spaniard, with two Indians, were reserved for future slaughter.
"The others were eaten," he said, "and their bones were used for making
fires. I saw my friend, Giacomo, felled like a bullock, and the
Indians as well. By chance, I was the last. I had no hope of escape.
I was too downcast even to make a fight of it, when, at the eleventh
hour, the mad idea seized me that I might please and astonish my
captors by performing a few sleight-of-hand tricks.
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