In book five, Latour and Jacinto take a trip to visit Padre Martinez. When the men near their destination, they are greeted by Martinez along with horsemen to lead them to el Ranchero de Taos. Upon their arrival at el Ranchero, Martinez is greeted very lavishly with women laying down shawls for him to step on as he walks. Padre Martinez is very well respected as a Priest, but Latour almost has a hard time believing that after seeing the overall atmosphere and spirit in the house. He mentions that cats, dust, and overall filth make up most of the house. When Latour walks upon a sleeping boy named Trinidad, he learns about the boy and almost believes him to be stupid. Trinidad tried to crucify himself during the holy month. When the crucifix fell over because of his body weight, he took back lashings and passed out before the 100th one. Latour and Martinez share a celibacy conversation and disagree on both sides of the story. Lucero, a close friend of Martinez, gets in a battle of words and wits with his pal. The quarreling between the two caused Latour to send Vaillant to read a letter to the two, taking their priesthoods. Martinez eventually died and left 1/3 of his money to his son and wanted to the rest to go to Mass. However, the money was not released until Lucero died which happened shortly after Martinez did. When Lucero was lying on his death bed, he explained specific instructions on how the money was to be released, where it was located, and to whom it was to be presented. Before he did that, he killed a robber trying to steal the money from his house.