es. Me he did not see, and I waited.
Then in a moment, Senorita, the figure moved so that the moonlight fell
upon him. It was that messenger of the Evil One, De Soria."

"John Sawyer?" the girl repeated in a hushed tone.

"So you know him, Senorita." The old woman's lip curled. "Before your
coming, or ever a rooftree was raised in Limasito, he was Juan De
Soria, son of thieves and black of heart as his master's skin."

The girl shivered.

"El Negrito!" she whispered. "You think he came from Alvarez? But
what dealings does the Americano Wiley have with El Negrito?"

The old woman muttered and her withered, clenched hand struck her
breast.

"It is that which I would see in the cauldron," she hissed. "Before El
Negrito, comes always his creature, De Soria, and with him come fire
and looting and death! The Senor Wiley turns all things to his purpose
and if he has sold himself to the Evil One and traffics with El
Negrito, I would be warned. I have seen one of his raids, Senorita; it
was as if the sky rained destruction and slaughter!"

Her head sank on her breast and a brief, tense silence ensued.

"I do not believe such evil of the Senor Wiley," Billie remarked at
last. "Cruel he is and like a madman in his anger, but between him and
El Negrito there could be no covenant. It may be that he came upon
Sawyer skulking about and was warning him off the hacienda. Sawyer has
been in Limasito for many days, and he plays high at my father's casa."

"With what gold?" the old woman retorted. "He who has been beggar and
thief since the hour of his birth. Much gold he could not steal for he
has not the wit. For what evil compact has he been paid in riches?"

The girl shrugged.

"Luck turns," she said laconically. "Once a man came to the Blue Chip
with pesos ciento and broke the faro bank. Fortune--buena suerte--has
smiled on as worthless ones as Sawyer. But you, Tia Juana; what did
you do last night when you saw?"

"I crept away, silently, so that none knew of my presence and returned
to Jose." Tia Juana chuckled mirthlessly. "My vengeance can wait.
The Senor Wiley is a fool, and the son of fools! It was not to the boy
he should have gone for knowledge of the Pool; Jose knows no more than
the idle words he repeated one evil day to the Senor Hallock, for which
I beat him soundly! It is I who have seen the Pool of the Lost Souls,
only I who knows where Dolores and her lover sleep."

Her voice died in