Then they rowed away. “Where are we going?” asked Martin. “To Leyden, I suppose,” said Foy, “if we can get there, which, without a sail or weapons, seems unlikely.” “I have put some arms in the boat,” interrupted Adrian, “the best I could get,” and from a locker he drew out a common heavy axe, a couple of Spanish swords, a knife, a smaller axe, a cross-bow and some bolts. “Not so bad,” said Martin, rowing with his left hand as he handled the big axe with his right, “but I wish that I had my sword Silence, which that accursed Ramiro took from me and hung about his neck. I wonder why he troubled himself with the thing? It is too long for a man of his inches.” “I don’t know,” said Adrian, “but when last I saw him he was working at its hilt with a chisel, which seemed strange. He always wanted that sword. During the siege he offered a large reward to any soldier who could kill you and bring it to him.” “Working at the hilt with a chisel?” gasped Martin. “By Heaven, I had forgotten! The map, the map! Some wicked villain must have told him that the map of the treasure was there—that is why he wanted the sword.” “Who could have told him?” asked Foy. “It was only known to you and me and Martha, and we are not of the sort to tell. What? Give away the secret of Hendrik Brant’s treasure which he could die for and we were sworn to keep, to save our miserable lives? Shame upon the thought!” Martha heard, and looked at Elsa, a questioning look beneath which the poor girl turned a fiery red, though by good fortune in that light none could see her blushes. Still, she must speak lest the suspicion should lie on others. “I ought to have told you before,” she said in a low voice, “but I forgot—I mean that I have always been so dreadfully ashamed. It was I who betrayed the secret of the sword Silence.” “You? How did you know it?” asked Foy. “Mother Martha told me on the night of the church burning after you escaped from Leyden.” Martin grunted. “One woman to trust another, and at her age too; what a fool!” “Fool yourself, you thick-brained Frisian,” broke in Martha angrily, “where did you learn to teach your betters wisdom? I told the Jufvrouw because I knew that we might all of us be swept away, and I thought it well that then she should know where to look for a key to the treasure.” “A woman’s kind of reason,” answered Martin imperturbably, “and a bad one at that, for if we had been finished off she must have found it difficult to get hold of the sword. But all this is done with. The point is, why did the Jufvrouw tell Ramiro?” “Because I am a coward,” answered Elsa with a sob. “You know, Foy, I always was a coward, and I never shall be anything else. I told him to save myself.” “From what?” “From being married.” Adrian winced palpably, and Foy, noting it, could not resist pushing the point. “From being married? But I understand—doubtless Adrian will explain the thing,” he added grimly—“that you were forced through some ceremony.”