“You are a woman of evil,” he snarled at her, still shaking with rage, “a witch that traffics with the powers of darkness and all devilish things. Yet are you woman, born of woman, and therefore mortal. The weakness of mortality and of woman is yours, wherefore I give you now your choice of two things. Either you shall be thrown into the whirl of water and perish, or ...” “Or?” she prompted. “Or....” He paused, licked his dry lips, and burst forth. “No! By the Mother of God, I am not afraid. Or marry me this day, which is the other choice.” “You would marry me for me? Or for the treasure?” “For the treasure,” he admitted brazenly. “But it is written in the Book of Life that I shall marry Francis,” she objected. “Then will we rewrite that page in the Book of Life.” “As if it could be done!” she laughed. “Then will I prove your mortality there in the whirl, whither I shall fling you as you flung the flowers.” Truly intrepid Torres was for the time—intrepid because of the ancient drink that burned in his blood and brain, and because he was master of the situation. Also, like a true Latin-American, he loved a scene wherein he could strut and elocute. Yet she startled him by emitting a hiss similar to the Latin way of calling a servitor. He regarded her suspiciously, glanced at the doorway to the sleeping chamber, then returned his gaze to her. Like a ghost, seeing it only vaguely out of the corner of his eye, the great white hound erupted through the doorway. Startled again, Torres involuntarily stepped to the side. But his foot failed to come to rest on the emptiness of air it encountered, and the weight of his body toppled him down off the platform into the water. Even as he fell and screamed his despair, he saw the hound in mid-air leaping after him. Swimmer that he was, Torres was like a straw in the grip of the current; and the Lady Who Dreams, gazing down upon him fascinated from the edge of the platform, saw him disappear, and the hound after him, into the heart of the whirlpool from which there was no return. CHAPTER XX Long the Lady Who Dreams gazed down at the playing waters. At last, with a sighed “My poor dog,” she arose. The passing of Torres had meant nothing to her. Accustomed from girlhood to exercise the high powers of life and death over her semi-savage and degenerate people, human life, per se, had no sacredness to her. If life were good and lovely, then, naturally, it was the right thing to let it live. But if life were evil, ugly, and dangerous to other lives, then the thing was to let it die or make it die. Thus, to her, Torres had been an episode——unpleasant, but quickly over. But it was too bad about the dog. Clapping her hands loudly as she entered her chamber, to summon one of her women, she made sure that the lid of the jewel chest was raised. To the woman she gave a command, and herself returned to the platform, from where she could look into the room unobserved.