Father Salvi, pale and haggard, rose trembling, and left the tribunal. In the street he saw a girl, leaning against the wall, rigid, motionless, her eyes far away. The sun shone full down on her. She seemed not to breathe but to count, one after another, the muffled blows inside. It was Tarsilo's sister. The torture continued until the soldier, breathless, let his arm fall, and the alferez ordered his victim released. But Tarsilo still refused to speak. Then Dona Consolacion whispered in her husband's ear; he nodded. "To the well with him!" he said. The Filipinos know what that means. In Tagalo it is called timbain. We do not know who invented this judiciary process, but it must belong to antiquity. Truth coming out of a well is perhaps a sarcastic interpretation. In the middle of the patio of the tribunal was a picturesque well curb of uncut stones. It had a rustic crank of bamboo; its water was slimy and putrid. All sorts of refuse had been thrown around it and in it. Toward this Tarsilo was led. He was very pale, and his lips trembled, if he was not praying. The pride he had shown appeared now to be crushed out; he seemed resigned to suffer. The poor wretch looked enviously at the pile of bodies, and sighed heavily. "Speak then!" said the directorcillo. "You will be hung anyway. Why not die without so much suffering?" But Tarsilo remained mute. When the well was reached, they bound his feet. He was to be let down head foremost. He was fastened to the curb; the crank turned, and his body disappeared. The alferez noted the seconds with his watch. At the signal the body was drawn up, too pitiable to describe; but Tarsilo was still mute. Again he was let down, again he refused to speak; when he was drawn up the third time, he no longer breathed. His torturers looked at each other in consternation. The alferez ordered the body taken down, and they all examined it for signs of life; but there were none. "See," said a cuadrillero, at last, "he has strangled himself with his tongue!" "Put the body with the others," ordered the alferez nervously. "We must examine the other unknown prisoner." L. ACCURST. The news spread that the prisoners were to be taken to the capital, and members of their families ran wildly from convent to barracks, from barracks to tribunal, but found no consolation anywhere. The curate was said to be ill. The guards dealt roughly with the supplicating women, and the gobernadorcillo was more useless than ever. The friends of the accused, therefore, had collected near the prison, waiting for them to be brought out. Doray, Don Filipo's young wife, wandered back and forth, her child in her arms, both crying. The Capitana Tinay called on her son Antonio, and brave Capitana Maria watched the grating behind which were her twins, her only children. At two in the afternoon, an uncovered cart drawn by two oxen stopped in front of the tribunal. It was surrounded, and there were loud threats of breaking it.