Latour and his guide, Jacinto, travel west to the Indian missions. They spend time in Albuquerque with Padre Gallegos. Gallegos, afraid that Latour will ask him to accompany him on his visits to the West, wraps his foot in bandages and complains that he has gout. Latour and Jacinto push on to the pueblo of Isleta, where they meet Padre Jesus de Baca. The elderly priest lives in poverty among the Indians of the pueblo, claiming only one possession@ — a wooden parrot. He tells Latour that the Indians of Acoma own a portrait of St. Joseph that possesses the miraculous power to bring rain.
Latour earns the admiration and respect of Jacinto. He tells Latour the story of the elevated rock plateau of Acoma. Initially a sanctuary for Indians seeking shelter from other marauding tribes, a great church had been built in the sixteenth-century by the missionary Fray Juan Ramirez. On their return trip, Padre Jesus de Baca tells Latour the story of Friar Baltazar Montoya, a seventeenth-century priest of Acoma. Montoya virtually enslaved the Indians of Acoma, forcing the women to carry water daily up the side of the mountain to nourish his outlandish gardens. The Indians were afraid that Montoya might possess magical powers beyond the ability of the portrait of St. Joseph to bring rain.
Wishing others to admire his garden, Montoya plans a dinner party. He invites several missionaries. During a story by one of the priests, a serving boy becomes distracted and spills a platter of gravy on one of the guests. An angry and drunken Montoya throws a goblet at the boy, which kills him. The guests leave, and the Indians revolt against Montoya by throwing him from the plateau.
