"You do me much honour, sir! What have you learned from me this morning ?" "What I wished to know," answered Giovanni with a change of tone, and looking at him keenly.
Zorzi returned the glance, and the two men faced each other in silence for a moment.

Zorzi knew what Giovanni meant, as soon as the other had spoken.

The quick movement of surprise, which was the only indiscretion of which Zorzi had been guilty, would have betrayed to any one that he knew where the manuscript was, even if it were not in his immediate keeping.

His instinct was to take the offensive and accuse his visitor of having laid a trap for him, but his caution prevailed.
"Whatever you may think that you have learned from me," he said, "remember that I have told you nothing." "Is it here, in this room ?" asked Giovanni, not heeding his last speech, and hoping to surprise him again.
But he was prepared now, and his face did not change as he replied.
"I cannot answer any questions," he said.
"You and my father hid it together," returned Giovanni.

"When you had buried it under the stones in this room, you carried the earth out with a shovel and scattered it about on a flower-bed.