José's face clouded; and his eyes, which had burned brightly with excitement during his recital, were suddenly dulled by trouble. A few moments later he became visibly ashamed of his suspiciousness, and he would have begun stammering a speech if Antonio, who could read the whole of his simple mind, had not said: "Wait. I understand. You believe our Lord sent you to snatch back His own from wicked men. For nearly four years you have guarded the treasure like a faithful watch-dog, and now you hesitate to trust me. It is natural." José stared in wonder at this mysterious monk, who knew his thoughts even better than he knew them himself. "But listen," Antonio went on. "For nearly four years I too have guarded a secret. The night when you dug up the boxes, José, that same night was the last night the world saw me as a monk. Like you, I lay all that night under the trees. Since then the world has known me as a clerk, a wine-grower, a commercial traveler, a farmer. But to-night, as soon as you asked me for my secret, I gave it. You are the only man in the world who knows that the owner of this little farm is the monk Antonio. Still, although I've told you my secret, that does not force you to tell me yours." José stirred uneasily. "This is what I propose," concluded Antonio. "I will swear to you, here and now, a solemn oath that if you tell me your secret I will never reveal it until the monks return. And you, on your part, shall swear that you will not breathe a hint of my own secret to a living soul." "The things are buried in the cloister," José blurted out. "There are graves there, under the stones, but they haven't all got monks inside. I lifted up a gravestone with no printing on it and I put the boxes in. It's on the north side, to the left, just opposite the little Moses in the bulrushes." "I thank you, José, and I admire you," said Antonio, pressing the huge hand. "All the same, we will swear our oaths. It will make both of us easier in our minds." A small book of the Gospels, printed in the vernacular, lay on the table. Antonio placed his hand upon it, and swore in clear words and solemn tones that he would keep the secret of the buried boxes. The oath he dictated to José was longer and more picturesque. Before framing it he elicited the names of the saints whom José's family had most delighted to honor. Eventually the young peasant swore himself to secrecy by the holy Gospels; by the true faith of a Christian; by Nossa Senhora dos Remedios de Lamego; by San Torquato of Guimarães; by San Braz; by San Pedro d' Alcantará; by the Pope's three crowns; by his mother's memory; and by his own hopes of eternal salvation. Antonio felt a qualm or two in enouncing such a formula: but did not the success of his life's work demand that José should be held back from his own impulsiveness by every chain his faith could forge?