“It was this, which I was to give to an engineer.”
“What engineer?”
“One Mason, of the Chicuna Mine: such being the names which came into my head. He asked, ‘Is there an English engineer?’ ‘Truly,’ I said, following my inspiration, ‘there is Mason of the Chicuna Mine.’ ‘Give him this, then,’ he said.”
“What is it?”
“I know not. Writing. He had several like it.”
“Is it English money?”
“No. The English use only gold.”
“Accursed Lutherans, and that they steal!”
“I think that the writing is the symbol of a secret society to which all these dogs belong,” one of the soldiers said. “These symbols they pass to each other by messengers to give warning of their accursednesses.”
“Tear it up then.”