It is hardly possible that every one of them should have betrayed his trust, unless sure of the governor's protection.

I cannot prove that he had all these men shot in order to silence them, employed men to assassinate Colonel Mendez, or set men to murder me in my hotel and afterwards to intercept us in crossing the sierra.

Still, I have no shadow of doubt in my mind that it was so.
"However, I do not think you will find him at Badajos.

No doubt, as soon as he heard I had got safely down into the valley of the Tagus, he made off.

There is just a possibility that the contractors, knowing that their lives will be forfeited by the discovery of the frauds, might at once have sent in supplies of powder, flour, and other things, to take the place of the casks and sacks of earth; in which case he would probably deny the truth of my statement altogether, and declare that I had simply invented it in order to do credit to myself.