he spur of the moment to
cover the truth. Sotillo's rapacity, excited to the highest pitch by the
prospect of an immense booty, could believe in nothing adverse. This Jew
might have been very much frightened by the accident, but he knew where
the silver was concealed, and had invented this story, with his Jewish
cunning, to put him entirely off the track as to what had been done.

Sotillo had taken up his quarters on the upper floor in a vast apartment
with heavy black beams. But there was no ceiling, and the eye lost
itself in the darkness under the high pitch of the roof. The thick
shutters stood open. On a long table could be seen a large inkstand,
some stumpy, inky quill pens, and two square wooden boxes, each holding
half a hundred-weight of sand. Sheets of grey coarse official paper
bestrewed the floor. It must have been a room occupied by some higher
official of the Customs, because a large leathern armchair stood behind
the table, with other high-backed chairs scattered about. A net hammock
was swung under one of the beams--for the official's afternoon siesta,
no doubt. A couple of candles stuck into tall iron candlesticks gave a
dim reddish light. The colonel's hat, sword, and revolver lay between
them, and a couple of his more trusty officers lounged gloomily against
the table. The colonel threw himself into the armchair, and a big negro
with a sergeant's stripes on his ragged sleeve, kneeling down, pulled
off his boots. Sotillo's ebony moustache contrasted violently with the
livid colouring of his cheeks. His eyes were sombre and as if sunk very
far into his head. He seemed exhausted by his perplexities, languid with
disappointment; but when the sentry on the landing thrust his head in to
announce the arrival of a prisoner, he revived at once.

"Let him be brought in," he shouted, fiercely.

The door flew open, and Captain Mitchell, bareheaded, his waistcoat
open, the bow of his tie under his ear, was hustled into the room.

Sotillo recognized him at once. He could not have hoped for a more
precious capture; here was a man who could tell him, if he chose,
everything he wished to know--and directly the problem of how best to
make him talk to the point presented itself to his mind. The resentment
of a foreign nation had no terrors for Sotillo. The might of the whole
armed Europe would not have protected Captain Mitchell from insults and
ill-usage, so well as the quick reflection of Sotillo that this was an
E