It has been years since Don Alvaro Dabo, the Grand Master of the Order of Santiago, has given up the profession of arms. Now retired in Avila, Castile he lives there in an austere and unadorned residence. Devoting all his time to prayer, he has become contemptuous of the vanity of all earthly goods. Mariana, his daughter, accompanies this proud man's life with admiration and fear. At a gathering of his Order, the knights tell him of a prestigious position in the New World offered by the King. Nothing easier than to make a fortune in such an Eldorado. With this money, he could endow his daughter and marry her to Don Jacinto, her beloved. But will the sainted man agree to, just for the sake of Mariana, stoop to the level of those he disdains?