Isabel saw how cracked and dry were his thick lips, how near the
torture had come to prostrating him.

"I'll do more," she promised, and her voice was like honey. "I'll
tell Pancho Cueto to unlock you, even if I risk Esteban's anger by
so doing. You have suffered too much, my good fellow. Indeed you
have. Well, I can help you now and in the future, or--I can make
your life just such a misery as it has been to-day. Will you be my
friend? Will you tell me something?" She was close to the window;
her black eyes were gleaming; her face was ablaze with greed.

"What can I tell you?"

"Oh, you know very well! I've asked it often enough, but you have
lied, just as my husband has lied to me. He is a miser; he has no
heart; he cares for nobody, as you can see. You must hate him now,
even as I hate him." There was a silence during which Dona Isabel
tried to read the expression on that tortured face in the
sunlight. "Do you?"

"Perhaps."

"Then tell me--is there really a treasure, or--?" The woman
gasped; she choked; she could scarcely force the question for fear
of disappointment. "Tell me there is, Sebastian." She clutched the
bars and shook them. "I've heard so many lies that I begin to
doubt."

The old man nodded. "Oh yes, there is a treasure," said he.