In amongst the burnt piling the Jefe sent his men to investigate, and they waded and swam about in the shoal water, being careful to avoid being caught by the outlying suck of the whirlpool. Augustino, the Silent, made the find, close in to shore. “I am standing on something,” he announced, the level of the lake barely to his knees. Torres plunged in, and, reaching under till he buried his head and shoulders, felt out the object. “It is the chest, I am certain,” he declared. “—Come! All of you! Drag this out to the dry land so that we may examine into it!” But when this was accomplished, and just as he bent to open the lid, the Jefe stopped him. “Go back into the water, the lot of you,” he commanded his men. “There are a number of chests like this, and the expedition will be a failure if we don’t find them. One chest would not pay the expenses.” Not until all the men were floundering and groping in the water, did Torres raise the lid. The Jefe stood transfixed. He could only gaze and mutter inarticulate mouthings. “Now will you believe?” Torres queried. “It is beyond price. We are the richest two men in Panama, in South America, in the world. This is the Maya treasure. We heard of it when we were boys. Our fathers and our grandfathers dreamed of it. The Conquistadores failed to find it. And it is ours——ours!” And, while the two men, almost stupefied, stood and stared, one by one their followers crept out of the water, formed a silent semi-circle at their backs, and likewise stared. Neither did the Jefe and Torres know their men stood at their backs, nor did the men know of the Lost Souls that were creeping stealthily upon them from the rear. As it was, all were staring at the treasure with fascinated amazement when the attack was sprung. Bows and arrows, at ten yards distance, are deadly, especially when due time is taken to make certain of aim. Two-thirds of the treasure-seekers went down simultaneously. Through Vicente, who had chanced to be standing directly behind Torres, no less than two spears and five arrows had perforated. The handful of survivors had barely time to seize their rifles and whirl, when the club attack was upon them. In this Rafael and Ignacio, two of the gendarmes who had been on the adventure to the Juchitan oil fields, almost immediately had their skulls cracked. And, as usual, the Lost Souls women saw to it that the wounded did not remain wounded long. The end for Torres and the Jefe was but a matter of moments, when a loud roar from the mountain followed by a crashing avalanche of rock, created a diversion. The few Lost Souls that remained alive, darted back terror-stricken into the shelter of the bushes. The Jefe and Torres, who alone stood on their feet and breathed, cast their eyes up the cliff to where the smoke still issued from the new-made hole, and saw Henry Morgan and the Queen step into the sunshine on the lip of the cliff.