"Monsieur le Baron, deign to listen to me. There is in America, in a country near Panama, a village called La Joya, and this village is composed of a single house. A large square house three stories high, built of bricks dried in the sun, each side of the square being five hundred feet long, and each story retiring from the one under it for a distance of twelve feet, so as to leave in front of it a terrace which runs all round the house. In the centre is an inner court, in which provisions and ammunition are stored; there are no windows, only loop-holes, no door, only ladders,--ladders to mount from the ground to the first terrace, and from the first to the second, and from the second to the third; ladders to descend into the inner court; no doors to the rooms, only traps; no staircases to the apartments, only ladders. At night the trap-doors are closed, the ladders are drawn up, and blunderbusses and carbines are placed in the loop-holes; there is no way of entering; it is a house by day, a citadel by night. Eight hundred inhabitants,--such is this village. Why such precautions? Because the country is dangerous, and full of man-eaters. Then, why do people go there? Because it is a marvellous country, and gold is found there." "What are you driving at?" Marius, who had passed from disappointment to impatience, interrupted. "To this, M. le Baron. I am a worn-out ex-diplomatist. I am sick of our old civilization, and wish to try the savages." "What next?" "Monsieur le Baron, egotism is the law of the world. The proletarian peasant-wench who works by the day turns round when the diligence passes, but the peasant-woman who is laboring on her own field does not turn. The poor man's dog barks after the rich, the rich man's dog barks after the poor; each for himself, and self-interest is the object of mankind. Gold is the magnet." "What next? Conclude." "I should like to go and settle at La Joya. There are three of us. I have my wife and my daughter, a very lovely girl. The voyage is long and expensive, and I am short of funds." "How does that concern me?" Marius asked. The stranger thrust his neck out of his cravat, with a gesture peculiar to the vulture, and said, with a more affable smile than before,-- "Monsieur le Baron cannot have read my letter?" That was almost true, and the fact is that the contents of the epistle had escaped Marius; he had seen the writing rather than read the letter, and he scarce remembered it. A new hint had just been given him, and he noticed the detail, "My wife and daughter." He fixed a penetrating glance on the stranger,--a magistrate could not have done it better,--but he confined himself to saying,-- "Be more precise." The stranger thrust his hands in his trousers' pockets, raised his head without straightening his backbone, but on his side scrutinizing Marius through his green spectacles. "Very good, M. le Baron, I will be precise. I have a secret to sell you." "Does it concern me?" "Slightly."