orehead and dropped upon the slab as he
slowly got it up. His heart beat so that he fancied he could hear it,
both from the effort he made, and from his intense excitement, now that
the thing he had most desired in the world was within his grasp. At last
the big stone was raised upright, and the light of the lamp that stood
on the floor fell slanting across the dark hole. Giovanni brought the
lamp to the edge and looked in. He could not see the box, but a quantity
of loose earth lay there, under which it was doubtless buried. He knelt
down and began to scoop the earth out, using his two hands together.
Then he thrust one hand in, and felt about for the box. There was
nothing there. He cleared out the cavity thoroughly, and tried to loosen
the soil at the bottom, tearing his nails in his excitement. It must be
there, he was sure.

But it was not. When he realised that he had been tricked, he collapsed,
kneeling as he was, and sat upon his heels, and his crooked hands all
dark with the dusty earth clutched at the stones beside him. He remained
thus a long time, staring at the empty hole. Then caution, which was
even stronger in his nature than greed, brought him to himself. His thin
face was grey and haggard as he carefully swept the earth back to its
place, removing all traces of what he had done. Then he knew how foolish
he had been to let Zorzi know what he had partly heard and partly
guessed.

Of course, as soon as Zorzi understood that Giovanni had found out where
the book was, he had taken it out and put it away in a safer place, to
which Giovanni had no clue at all. Zorzi was diabolically clever, and
would not have been so foolish as to hide the treasure again in the same
room or in the same way. It was probably in the garden now, but it would
take a strong man a day or two to dig up all the earth there to the
depth at which the book must have been buried. Zorzi must have done the
work at night, after the furnaces were out, and when there were no night
boys to watch him. But then, the boys had been feeding the fires in the
laboratory until the previous night, and it followed that he must have
bailed the box this very evening.

Giovanni got the slab back into its place without injuring it, and he
rubbed the edges with dust, and swept the place with a broom, as Zorzi
had done twice already. Then he took the lamp and set it on the table
before the window. The light fell on the gold piece that lay there. He
took it,