"Ask not why this was so. For one thing, I did not fear him. For another thing, being not a Greek, he had no cause for doubting my faithfulness. But I do not profess to penetrate the interior of his dark soul. Only God can know the reasons which actuated him. At his solicitation, I prolonged my stay and dwelt in a suite of rooms in the Great Palace. He was a true friend to me. He sympathised with me in my loss. He respected my endeavour to make reparation for the blasphemy of my grief. He trusted in me absolutely. "One night when we sat together alone, he told me that he was convinced he should not reign long. The nobles were too eager in their hatred of him, and the Angeloi were then already lifting up their heads, anxious to seize the throne. The priests, too, were against him, and the common people would side with whoever gained success, forgetting quickly the justice he had given them. He asked me if I would assist him in a certain matter, and when he assured me that it would not involve the shedding of blood, I assented. "Then he told me that all the treasure he had amassed from the nobles he had punished--truly, Hugh, a sum passing belief, millions of Byzants--he had set aside to constitute a fund for the rebuilding of the Empire. But he could not trust the rulers who came after him, and therefore he had hidden it in a certain place in the confines of the Palace of the Bucoleon. It was his desire that I should consent to have the secret of its location imparted to me, and after he was dead exert my own judgment as to whether the treasure should be revealed or not. It was his wish, in this respect, that I should carry the secret with me to my grave, an I had any doubt that whoever was entrusted with the wealth would employ it for aught save the advancement of the Empire. "Shortly thereafter by the terms of my vow I was obliged to depart for the Holy Land, and not many months had passed when Andronicus was assassinated, as he had foreseen, and Isaac Angelos took his place. In some way--I know not how--the story of the Treasure of the Bucoleon had become known to the inner circle of Greeks who ruled the Empire. Isaac knew of it, and sent to me repeatedly, bidding me come and reveal it to him. But I was fighting lustily to preserve the Holy Sepulchre and, afterwards, to save what we could of the Kingdom of Jerusalem from Saladin, and moreover I doubted always Isaac's right to the treasure, for report said of him that he was more concerned with dissipation and pleasure than with the well-being of his subjects.