After my grandmother, Maria Magdalena, grew up my uncles took a trip and left her alone for some time. Near their house there was a big elderberry bush. Every year it produced so much fruit that its branches would give up and almost reach the ground.
My grandmother had heard that something strange was happening to her neighbor. Every night a handsome youth would visit her and in the morning he could not be found anywhere around. After a while her neighbor got sick and died. No one knew what had happened.
One evening someone knocked on the door and when my grandmother opened it she saw a well dressed man who wanted to win her favor. My grandmother closed the door in his face and then hid. After that day the handsome young man would return every night to seducer her and win her.
He would stand in the door and tell her he was going to the city of Cusco. He wanted to be with her and would take her with him. Tired of this, my grandmother laid out mens clothes on her blanket, pants, shirt, and so on. Only because of this the man quit coming to her door.
My grandmother realized that the handsome young man was not what he looked like. He was, instead, an ancient one, a machu. and that he carried a bag of gold. She realized he lived in the elderberry bush. He was the same man who used to go visit her neighbor and her death was caused by her having been with him.
The last night the machu came was a rainy day when he suddenly knocked on the door and said he was going off to Cusco. Because of her rejection he left and entered into the elderberry bush. Lightning struck and split the bush. From that moment on he never came to my grandmother’s house again.
