"Certainly; but I am only a young girl," answered she, with animation, "a child, as you yourself have said, who does not know herself. That offer of marriage ought not then in any way, and especially with regard to the rules of society to have been addressed to me, but to my father. But no! You had another design: that marriage was but a pretext for you to seize on the immense riches you covet. At this moment you would not dare to maintain the contrary." "Who knows?" murmured he, with an air of raillery. "So you have preferred to cause me to fall into a snare, to carry me away from my family, whom my disappearance has plunged into the most profound despair, and to force me to follow you--I, a poor defenceless child, a prisoner in the midst of bandits, of whom you are the chief." "Since, according to your own expression, Señorita, I have so brutally carried you away from your family, have I conducted myself towards you otherwise than as a gentleman of my name and race ought?" "It is true," answered she, bursting into a fit of laughter; "I must admit that. But what is the cause of these attentions and this respect?" "Love most sincere and most--" "Enough of lies, Señor;" she cried, "your first word on entering under this tent betrayed you." "Señorita!" "You believe yourself to have arrived in the latitude of the diamond country discovered by one of my ancestors, and you wish at last to try and obtain from me--for avarice blinds you--the revelation of the secret you believe I possess!" CHAPTER VIII. A NOBLE BANDIT. There was, after this accusation, so energetically pronounced by the young girl, some minutes of deathlike silence in the tent. Without, the wind lashed the trees, and intertwined the branches with sounds almost like human wailings; the leaves were whirled in the air, and fell quivering on the thicket; at short intervals the lugubrious note of the owl, concealed in the hollows of the rocks, was heard, repeated from the distance like a dismal echo. Vague and indefinable sounds arose, carried on the wings of the wind, dying away only to be continually repeated, and further adding to the mysterious horror of this sombre and moonless night, the thick darkness of which gave to the objects a fantastically deathlike appearance. The marquis had risen, his arms crossed behind his back, his head reclining on his breast; he strode about the tent, a prey to an agitation which he made vain efforts to conceal. Doña Laura, half lying on the sofa, her head thrown backwards, followed him with a fixed and mocking look, waiting with anxiety the approaching explosion of that anger she had not been afraid to excite. At last, after some minutes, which appeared an age to the young girl, the marquis stopped in front of her, and raised his head.