Comprehension filled the eyes of the woman, and she gazed at Breakstone with growing wonder.
"It is so!" she exclaimed. "I remember now. It was three years ago. There was a band of prisoners, twelve or fifteen, maybe, but he was the youngest of them all, and so worn, so weak! I could not see his eyes, but he had the figure and manner of the youth who stands there! It was why I looked, and then looked again, the resemblance that I could not remember."
"It is his brother who is with me," said Breakstone. "Can you tell where these prisoners were taken?"
"I do not know, but I have heard that they were carried into the mountains to the south and west, where they were to be held until Texas was brought back to Mexico, or to be put to death as outlaws."
"What prisons lie in these mountains to the south and west?"
"I do not know how many, but we have heard most of the Castle of Montevideo. Some of our own people have gone there, never to come back."
She and her companions shuddered at the name of the Castle of Montevideo. It seemed to have some vague, mysterious terror for them. It was now Bill Breakstone who had the intuition. The Castle of Montevideo was the place. It was there that they had taken John Bedford. He translated clearly for Phil, who became very pale.
"It is the place, Phil," he said. "We must go to the Castle of Montevideo to find him."
He drew from his pocket a large octagonal gold piece, worth fifty dollars, then coined by the United States.
"Give this to her, Bill," he said, "and tell her it is for the drink of water that she gave to the blindfolded boy three years ago."