other places of concealment. This was far
away from the capital, but that would make the treasure so much the
safer. The Spaniards would never have thought of going to such a lonely,
deserted place as this, and the Incas would not have spared any time or
trouble necessary to securely hide their treasures."

"If you are right," cried the captain, "this is, indeed, astounding!
Treasure in a mound of stone--a mound covered by water, which could be
let off! The whole shut up in a cave which must have originally been as
dark as pitch! When we come to think of it," he continued excitedly, "it
is an amazing hiding-place, no matter what was put into the mound."

"And do you mean," almost screamed Mrs. Cliff, "that that stone thing
down there is filled with the wealth of the Incas!--the fabulous gold we
read about?"

"I do not know what else it can be," replied Edna. "What I saw when I
looked down into the hole was surely gold."

"Yes," said the captain, "it was gold--gold in small bars."

"Why didn't you get a piece, captain?" asked Ralph. "Then we could be
sure about it. If that thing is nearly filled, there must be tons of it."

"I did not think," said the captain. "I could not think. I was afraid
somebody would come."

"And now tell me this," cried Mrs. Cliff. "Whom does this gold belong to?
That is what I want to know. Whose is if?"

"Come, come!" said the captain, "let us stop talking about this thing,
and thinking about it. We shall all be maniacs if we don't quiet
ourselves a little, and, besides, it cannot be long before those black
fellows come back, and we do not want to be speaking about it then.
To-morrow we will examine the mound and see what it is we have
discovered. In the meantime, let us quiet our minds and get a good
night's sleep, if we can. This whole affair is astounding, but we must
not let it make us crazy before we understand it."

Miss Markham was a young woman very capable of controlling herself. It
was true she had been more affected in consequence of the opening of the
mound than any of the others, but that was because she understood, or
thought she understood, what the discovery meant, and to the others it
was something which at first they could not appreciate. Now she saw the
good common sense of the captain's remarks, and said no more that evening
on the subject of the stone mound.

But Mrs. Cliff and Ralph could not be quiet. They must talk, and as the
captain walked away that they mig