"A month's work it cost me!" he cried.

"A month's work! and ten gold pieces!" The Syndic, pale, and almost in a state of collapse--for the bitter satisfaction of imparting the news no longer supported him--stared.

"A month's work ?" he muttered.

"A month?
Years you told me! And a fortune!" "I told you?
Never!" Basterga opened his eyes in seeming amazement.
"Never, good sir, in all my life!" he repeated emphatically.
"But"-- returning grimly to his former point--"ten gold pieces, or a fortune--no matter which, she shall pay dearly for it, the thieving jade!" The Syndic sat heavily in his seat, and, with a hand on either arm of the abbot's chair, stared dully at the other.

"A fortune, you told me," he said, in a voice little above a whisper.