“By my faith, then,” said the negro in a serious tone, “I differ with you in opinion about that.”
“You do? And what is your opinion about it?” inquired Costal, stopping and turning his eyes upon his companion.
“I would stake my life upon it,” replied the negro, still speaking seriously, “that while you were dancing around the rock, I saw the Siren.”
“Saw the Siren?”
“Yes. Just where we had been—up by the ahuehuetes—I saw by the blaze of our fire a face, surrounded by a diadem of shining gold. What could that have been but the Siren?”
“You must have been mistaken, friend Clara.”
“I was not mistaken. I saw what I tell you, and I shouldn’t a bit wonder that what we took for pebbles were neither more nor less than a shower of pepitas (nuggets) of gold, which the spirit had thrown down to us.”
“Carajo! why did you allow us to leave the place without telling me of this?”
“Because it has just occurred to me now that it was pepitas, and not pebbles; besides, our touchwood is all gone, and we could not have kindled another fire.”
“We might have groped in the dark.”