“Listen, José, bid those rascals to give up the search and go to bed, it is useless. Then do you come quietly to my room, and we will visit the Indian and his daughter. If we are to screw their secret out of them, it must be done to-night, for, like a fool, I told that Englishman the story when the wine was in me, thinking that he would never live to repeat it.”
“Yes, yes, it must be to-night, for to-morrow we may have to fly. But what if the brutes won’t speak, father?”
“We will find means to make them,” answered the old man with a hideous chuckle; “but whether they speak or not, they must be silenced afterwards——” and he drew his hand across his throat, adding, “Come.”
An hour passed while we stood in the hole trembling with excitement, hope, and fear, and then once more we heard footfalls, followed presently by the sound of a voice whispering on the further side of the panel.
“Are you there, lord?” the whisper said. “It is I, Luisa.”
“Yes,” I answered.
Now she touched the spring and opened the panel.
“Listen,” she said, “they have gone to sleep all of them, but before dawn they will be up again to search for you far and wide. Therefore you must do one of two things; lie hid here, perhaps for days, or take your chance of escape at once.”
“How can we escape?” I asked.
“There is but one way, lord, through the chapel. The door into it is locked, but I can show you a place from which the priests used to watch those below, and thence, if you are brave, you can drop to the ground beneath, for the height is not great. Once there, you can escape into the garden through the window over the altar, which is broken, as I have seen from without, though to do so, perhaps, you will have to climb upon each other’s shoulders. Then you must fly as swiftly as you can by the light of the moon, which has risen. The dogs have been gorged and tied up, so, if the Heart is your friend, you may yet go unharmed.”