Summary
In a striking pre-narrative sequence echoing ancient hagiography, the pagan Roman official Valerain, intent on a bacchanalian abduction of the revered St. Cecilia for his decadent birthday celebration, finds his profane impulse utterly disarmed by her profound spiritual serenity, compelling him instead to a posture of humbled reverence. This timeless tableau prefigures the central drama where Conchita Cordova, a voice of angelic purity in the San Miguelito cathedral choir, becomes ensnared in a web of avarice and geopolitical intrigue. John Rannie, a ruthless oil magnate whose industrial expansion has dispossessed local peasantry, fixates on Conchita. Discovering her fiancé, Juan Mendoza, is compromised by employment with Adolf Wylie, a German espionage agent, Rannie leverages this vulnerability, demanding Conchita's capitulation to avert Juan's exposure. Though her spirit recoils from the sordid proposition, Conchita resolves to sacrifice her virtue for Juan's salvation. Yet, as she prepares for this agonizing concession, Rannie, witnessing her profound selflessness as she removes her sacred cross, experiences a sudden, transformative moral awakening, pleading for her forgiveness. Simultaneously, the indignant villagers, inflamed by Wylie's manipulations, ignite Rannie's oil fields in a furious act of rebellion. Juan, consumed by a jealous misapprehension of Conchita's perceived affection for Rannie, violently desecrates her cross, heating it to brand her breast as a mark of shame—a cruel act she vehemently rebukes. The narrative culminates in Conchita's courageous intervention, rescuing Rannie from the vengeful mob, an act that solidifies his spiritual metamorphosis, leading him to kneel beside her in the sanctuary of the church, a contemporary echo of Valerain's ancient genuflection before St. Cecilia.
Synopsis
In a prologue set in ancient Rome, the pagan Valerain attempts to abduct St. Cecilia to his debauched birthday feast, but her spiritual beauty stops him, and he kneels before her. In the main story, Conchita Cordova sings in the cathedral choir in her village of San Miguelito near the Rio Grande. Millionaire oil man John Rannie, whose oil fields have displaced the peasants, desires Conchita, and when he learns that her fiance, Juan Mendoza, has been employed by Adolf Wylie, a German spy, Rannie threatens to expose Juan unless Conchita gives herself to him. Although disillusioned, Conchita decides to save Juan, but as she removes her cross, Rannie is moved by her sacrifice, and begs forgiveness. Meanwhile, the villagers, incited by Wylie, set Rannie's fields on fire. When Juan, thinking that Conchita loved Rannie, throws her cross in the fireplace and places it on her breast as a brand of shame, she rebukes him. After Conchita saves Rannie from being burned by the villagers, he kneels beside her in church. In Rome, Valerain kneels before St. Cecilia.
