While they are finding executioner for him, Paciotto rapidly whispers in Guy’s ear: “The entrance to the passage is from a house now occupied by an old deaf and dumb woman, Señora Sebastian. She knows nothing about it, the place having been rented to her at little stipend after the work had been completed. You take up four stones in the center of the cellar and it shows you the passageway. But this vaulted gallery at two places before you come to the moat, and one right under the fosse itself, is guarded by iron doors of strength sufficient to resist anything but barrels of gunpowder. Each of these doors is opened by ingenious locks. According to the device of this skilled mechanic, each of these locks requires three peculiar keys that must be used in a certain varying order. Employed outside of this rotation the locks will yield no vantage to the keys. Any attempt to blow down the iron gates with powder would destroy the passageway itself, and let the Schelde in upon and drown you.” “But what has the statue to do with this?” whispers Guy. “Ah! that is Alva’s cunning joke upon his turbulent soldiery. By the Captain General’s mystery in regard to it half the mercenaries of his Antwerp garrison swear that the statue itself is the storehouse of Alva’s gold. This is by his design. He does not fear the citizens taking his treasure, but that his own soldiers, unpaid for years, may break into open mutiny. The first thing they would seize would be the booty of their commander. Therefore the first thing they would break into for his gold would be the pedestal of his statue. That done, the vaulted passageway from the town would be impassable to anything save fish, for the statue is so contrived that if disturbed on its base a sluice gate is opened and the waters of the moat flood the only path to Alva’s treasure. After that, even if they discovered the true hiding place of his gold, it would be a month before the mercenaries could obtain it by mining and blowing up the Bastion of the Duke. Within that month the mutiny would certainly be put down and the treasure saved.” “But the keys?” whispers Guy impatiently, for the rising murmurs of the crowd outside shows him time is precious. “I have here—open my doublet and cut away the lining,” whispers Paciotto, “for my hands are bound—drafts of each key with its number, from which you can have them made, besides an account of how they should be used; also a drawing of the excavation leading to the treasure of the Duke. Give me vengeance on him—you mean to try, I can see it in your face—if you succeed, a rare surprise for him of Alva. How he will rave when in his empty treasure house he finds no plunder. All his tenth penny tax gone; the thing for which he has imperilled his favor with the king, the thing for which he has crushed these Netherlands to the earth. No gold for Alva—no gold—ho! ho!—ha! ha!—he! he!” and bursts into hideous despairing chuckle—his last laugh on earth.