"You are right. What am I thinking about? There must be no noise.
Caramba! A pretty business that would be, wouldn't it? With my men
running up here to see what it was all about. No, no! No gunshots,
no disturbance of any kind. You understand what I mean, eh?"
His face twisted into a grin as he tossed the revolver aside, then
undertook to detach a stone from the crumbling curb. "No noise!"
he chuckled. "No noise whatever."
O'Reilly, stupefied by the sudden appearance of this monstrous
creature, stunned by the certainty of a catastrophe to Rosa, awoke
to the fact that this man intended to brain him where he stood. In
a panic he cast his eyes about him, thinking to take shelter in
the treasure-cave, but that retreat was closed to him, for he had
wedged the wooden timbers together at the first alarm. He was like
a rat in a pit, utterly at the mercy of this maniac. And Cobo was
a maniac at the moment; he had so far lost control of himself as
to allow the stone to slip out of his grasp. It fell with a thud
at O'Reilly's feet, causing the assassin to laugh once more.
"Ho, ho!" he hiccoughed. "My fingers are clumsy, eh? But there is
no need for haste." He stretched out his arm again, laid hold of
another missile, and strained to loosen it from its bed. "Jewels!
Pearls the size of plums! And I a poor man! I can't believe it
yet.
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