"I cannot go alone, Gil." She shuddered.
"Turn round, dear Heart; put your feet on the rungs of the ladder, so! Ah! what was that?" Silencio glanced anxiously toward the open doorway. A heavy cracking of the stout house-door showed to what lengths Escobeda and his followers were prepared to venture.
"Go, go! At the bottom is a lantern; light it if you can, while I close the trap-door."
Raquel shrank at the mouth of this black opening, which seemed to yawn for them. The damp smell of mould, the cold, the gloom, were sudden and dreadful reminders of the tomb which this might become. She imagined it a charnel house. She dreaded to descend for fear that she should place her feet upon a corpse, or lay her fingers on the fleshless bones of a skeleton.
"Courage, my Heart! Courage! Go down! Do not delay."
At the kindness of his tone, Raquel, taking courage, began to descend. Terrible thoughts filled her mind. What if Escobeda and his men should discover their retreat, and cut off escape at their destination? What that destination was she knew not. Her eyes tried vainly to pierce the mysterious gloom. It was as if she looked into the blackness of a cavern. She turned and gazed for a moment back into the homelike interior which she was leaving, perhaps for all time. The loud blows upon the house-door were the accompaniment of her terrified thoughts.
Raquel descended nervously, her trembling limbs almost refusing to support her. She reached the bottom of the ladder, and by the aid of the dim light from above, she found the lantern and the matches, which Silencio's thoughtful premonition had placed there, ready for her coming. As she lighted the lantern she heard a terrific crash.
Silencio, with a last glance at the open door of the counting-house, which he had forgotten to close, now lowered the trap-door, and joined Raquel in the dark passage. He stood and listened for a moment. He heard a footstep on the floor above, and taking Raquel's hand in his, together they sped along the path which he hoped would lead her to safety.
"Oh, child!" he said, in sharp, panting words, as they breathlessly pursued the obscure way, "for the first time I have given you proof of my love."
Raquel turned to look at him. She saw his dark face revealed fitfully by the flashes of the lantern swinging from his hand.