The decision was made in the house of Margarita Martí, widow of a Tarongí. Rafael Valls, the man the community turned to in matters of faith, promised them God would send an angel to protect them, as He had protected the three young men in the furnace of Babylon. Valls arranged the ship himself: an English vessel that would carry them out of the King of Spain's dominions, to live by the Law of Moses in freedom.
Rafael Agustín Pomar, who was there, later described it to the tribunal. They left their homes between nine and ten at night: Melchor Forteza and his wife, a widow with her children, Miguel and Guillermo Tarongí with their wives, Pomar's own wife. Some of the wives, he said, had been brought along «deceived», without sharing their husbands' faith.
But it rained so hard the ship could not set sail. Afraid that daybreak would expose them, they walked home in the dark, sure that no one had seen them.
They were wrong. Between eleven and midnight the warden woke the inquisitors: the families reconciled in 1679 had «taken to the water» and the whole neighborhood was in uproar. The officers found the houses empty. They searched the docks, the coves and the city gates, and called on the Viceroy for help. Within days the whole street was in prison. The bonfires of 1691 began with that night of rain.
