“Well, what is it? Spit it out.”
“But first,” Yi Poon shook his head, “you pay me six hundred dollars gold. Then I tell you secret.”
“I’ll pay you,” Torres said readily, although without the slightest thought of keeping his word. “You tell me first, then, if no lie, I’ll pay you.—See!”
From his breast pocket he drew a wallet bulging with paper bills; and Yi Poon, uneasily acquiescing, led him down the road to the crone on the beach.
“This old woman,” he explained, “she no lie. She sick woman. Pretty soon she die. She is afraid. She talk to priest along Colon. Priest say she must tell secret, or die and go to hell. So she no lie.”
“Well, if she doesn’t lie, what is it she must tell?”
“You pay me?”
“Sure. Six hundred gold.”
“Well, she born Cadiz in old country. She number one servant, number one baby nurse. One time she take job with English family that come traveling in her country. Long time she work with that family. She go back along England. Then, bime by——you know Spanish blood very hot——she get very mad. That family have one little baby girl. She steal little baby girl and run away to Panama. That little baby girl Senor Solano he adopt just the same his own daughter. He have plenty sons and no daughter. So that little baby girl he make his daughter. But that old woman she no tell what name belong little girl’s family. That family very high blood, very rich, everybody in England know that family. That family’s name ‘Morgan.’ You know that name? In Colon comes San Antonio men who say Senor Solano’s daughter marry English Gringo named Morgan. That Gringo Morgan the Senorita Leoncia’s brother.”
“Ah!” said Torres with maleficent delight.