"Perhaps."
"Then tell me--is there really a treasure, or--?" The woman gasped; she choked; she could scarcely force the question for fear of disappointment. "Tell me there is, Sebastian." She clutched the bars and shook them. "I've heard so many lies that I begin to doubt."
The old man nodded. "Oh yes, there is a treasure," said he.
"God! You have seen it?" Isabel was trembling as if with an ague. "What is it like? How much is there? Good Sebastian, I'll give you water; I'll have you set free if you tell me."
"How much? I don't know. But there is much--pieces of Spanish gold, silver coins in casks and in little boxes--the boxes are bound with iron and have hasps and staples; bars of precious metal and little paper packages of gems, all tied up and hidden in leather bags." Sebastian could hear his listener panting; her bloodless fingers were wrapped tightly around the bars above his head.-"Yes! Go on."
"There are ornaments, too. God knows they must have come from heaven, they are so beautiful; and pearls from the Caribbean as large as plums."
"Are you speaking the truth?"
"Every peso, every bar, every knickknack I have handled with my own hands. Did I not make the hiding-place all alone? Senora, everything is there just as I tell you--and more. The grants of title from the crown for this quinta and the sugar-plantations, they are there, too. Don Esteban used to fear the government officials, so he hid his papers securely. Without them the lands belong to no one. You understand?"
"Of course! Yes, yes! But the jewels--God! where are they hidden?"
"You would never guess!" Sebastian's voice gathered strength. "Ten thousand men in ten thousand years would never find the place, and nobody knows the secret but Don Esteban and me."
"I believe you. I knew all the time it was here. Well? Where is it?"
Sebastian hesitated and said, piteously, "I am dying--"
Isabel could scarcely contain herself. "I'll give you water, but first tell me where--where! God in heaven! Can't you see that I, too, am perishing?"
"I must have a drink."
"Tell me first."
Sebastian lifted his head and, meeting the speaker's eyes, laughed hoarsely.
At the sound of his unnatural merriment Isabel recoiled as if stung. She stared at the slave's face in amazement and then in fury. She stammered, incoherently, "You--you have been--lying!"