"What are you about to do with that piece of chalk?" asked I; "for assuredly there is something veiled under the request."
"You shall soon learn,—that is, if we see this real or enchanted diamond," said Hislop, laughing.
"What do you mean?"
"That I shall put this diamond, if such indeed it is, into my old mother's lap, when I go home to Scotland!" said he, with a boisterous laugh, in which I could not resist joining.
CHAPTER LII.
THE VALLEY OF THE DIAMOND.
We rode due eastward by a narrow path that traversed mountains of rock, covered by wild laurels, rosewood trees, and vines. Far away on our left, wearing the deepest indigo tint, spread the ocean, the horizon line of which was distinctly seen against a sky of coppery red that appeared beneath the bank of squally clouds, which were fast dispersing now, or whirling upward into mid air and melting away.
In a valley on our left some lights were seen to glitter as if from the windows of houses.
"That is Montanza de Centejo, no doubt," said Hislop.
In a few minutes more we saw the three rosewood trees, and then the wayside well beneath the shadow of their branches. It was a simple and rude arch of stone, from a wooden duct in which the water flowed into a stone basin.