THE SEÑORITA PLOTS ALSO.
Captain Ramón, hurrying outside, found Barbados in the open space
before the other adobe building. The pirate chief, it was easy to see,
had been drinking heavily of rich, stolen wine. Among the pirates slain
were some of Barbados’s particular friends, and he was trying to drown
his sorrow at their untimely taking off.
He turned as the _commandante_ approached and greeted him with a shout.
“Ha!” he cried, lurching drunkenly. “So you have not started for San
Diego de Alcála yet, _capitan_? You have just come from the little
_señorita――sí_? Yet your face does not bear the marks of her nails,
which is strange. I would not want the taming of her. By my naked
blade, I would not!”
“Attend me!” the captain commanded, grasping the pirate chief by the
arm. “Is it your intention to torture this Señor Zorro your men have
taken?”
Barbados cursed loudly, breathed heavily, and squinted his eyes until
they were only two tiny slits. “I shall make him squirm and squeal!” he
declared loudly. “And then I shall turn him into a proper ghost!”
“Death is nothing to a man like that,” Captain Ramón told him. “But
torture is a different matter.”
“Then I’ll see to it that he is prettily tortured!” Barbados declared.
“There are two sorts of torture, Barbados――the physical and the
mental,” said the captain.
“Mental? I do not understand such things!”
“Torture to the mind,” the captain explained. “That is the worst kind
by far. If you would have some sport with this Señor Zorro, whom we
both hate, listen to me. The _señorita_, who was to have been his
bride, is afraid that you will torture and slay him. I have told
her that I will save him by fetching the troopers from San Diego de
Alcála――if she will wed with me.”
“Ha! Is this treason?” Barbados cried.
“Are you a fool?” questioned the captain. “And am I one? There must
be no talk of treason between us. Attend! She will go to this Señor
Zorro and explain to him what she intends doing. Just think of that,
Barbados! There is torture for you! He, who loves her so much, will
think that she is to become the bride of another man. Ha! He will
squirm and squeal indeed! A prisoner, and unable to prevent it! Ha!”
“Ha!” Barbados cried, understanding finally, and grinning to show his
appreciation.
“And we will taunt him with it,” the _commandante_ continued. “We’ll
watch him squirm!”
“But it appears to me, _capitan_, that in this affair you are acting
the part of an ass,” Barbados dared to say. “Why work so hard to get
the wench to agree to wed you when you can take her at your pleasure?”
“Because it will hurt this Señor Zorro a great deal more to know that
she gives her consent,” the captain replied. “We’ll taunt him about it,
and then I’ll ride for the soldiers. And your men will sweep them off
the earth and then ride to San Diego de Alcála and loot the place. As
for this Señor Zorro――having tortured him mentally, you will proceed to
torture him physically when you celebrate your victory.”
“It appeals to me!” Barbados declared suddenly. “He slew some of my
closest friends. Yet I would not wait too long! Some of these fine
enemies must be tortured soon, while I am in the proper mood for it!”
“And there can be more mental torture,” the captain said. “Do not touch
him until the very last. Make him watch as some of his friends are
being tortured. Let him hear their shrieks of pain. Let him see Don
Audre Ruiz, his boon companion, suffer. That will hurt him as much as
being tortured himself.”
“Ha! By my naked blade, _capitan_, you should have been born a pirate!”
Barbados shrieked.
“Then it is agreed?”
“_Sí!_ It is agreed!”
“I will get the _señorita_ and let her tell Señor Zorro what she
intends to do.”
“There are two rooms in that adobe building,” Barbados explained. “This
Señor Zorro is alone in the front one, for I thought it best not to
put him with the others. The door between has a heavy lock, and I have
the key. You can let the _señorita_ go in there, and we’ll listen at
the window and enjoy his pain when she tells him. Ha! I say it again,
_capitan_――you should be a pirate! You are wasted in the army!”
Captain Ramón hastened back to the _señorita_, whispered that he had
been able to arrange things as she wished, grinned at old Inez, and
then conducted the daughter of the Pulidos across the open space and
toward the adobe building where Señor Zorro and the _caballeros_ were
being held prisoners.
Barbados was waiting. He leered at the girl, then called one of his men
to his side, and commanded that he unfasten and open the door. Señor
Zorro, his wrists still lashed behind his back, was pacing around the
room. From the room adjoining came the voices of the _caballeros_.
“Señor Zorro, here is a pretty wench who has some words for your ears,”
Barbados called. “She is not so pretty as she was, having dirtied
herself in an attempt to escape, but possibly she will serve. I give
you a few minutes in which to hold speech. Do not abuse the privilege.”
“Whatever you may do in the future, I thank you for this, Señor
Pirate!” Zorro said.
Barbados laughed and withdrew, and closed the door behind him. The
_señorita_ stepped forward slowly, her hands held at her breast, a look
of anguish in her sweet face. Señor Zorro was smiling down at her.
“The saints are good, _señorita_!” he whispered. “That I may see you
again――”
“Diego, my beloved, it is a sad errand!” she interrupted. “Yet I had to
come.”
His face was grave for an instant, and then he smiled at her once more.
“So they have sent you to tell me that I must die?” he asked. “I could
not receive a warrant of death from sweeter hands. My one regret is
that I have failed in your rescue. I do not fear the coming of death.
It will be only another adventure. It is for you that I fear.”
“Fear not for me!” she said. “Nor fear the coming of death, either. It
is not a warrant of death that I bring you, Diego. I have come to tell
you that you are to go free.”
“Free?” Señor Zorro gasped. “Have pirates turned kind? Has old Fray
Felipe demonstrated to them the error of their ways? Is the devil going
to mass these days? _Señorita_, you are trying to make the sentence
lighter by saying it in a kind manner. Speak out! Don Diego Vega is not
afraid to learn the truth, and most certainly Señor Zorro is not.”
“I know that you are not afraid, Diego. I dread to tell you this thing,
though it means your life.”
He stepped closer to her suddenly, and looked down into her eyes. “What
are you trying to tell me?” he asked kindly. “Do not be afraid to
speak.”
“That you are to go free, Diego,” she replied, failing to meet his
glance.
“And how may that be?” he asked.
“Captain Ramón is to arrange it.”
“Put not your trust in Ramón!”
“Ah, Diego, but there is naught else to do!” she said. “He tells me
that he is tricking the pirates. He will ride to San Diego de Alcála
and return with the troopers from the _presidio_ there. The pirates
will be slain or captured, and you and the _caballeros_ will be saved.”
“Ramón will do this?” Señor Zorro cried. “Is there some hidden spark of
gentlehood in the beast?”
“He will do it, Diego――for a price.”
“Ha! I might have known it! Well, I can pay the cur! What is the price?”
“Not money, Diego, beloved! The price is that I wed him.”
Señor Zorro sucked in his breath sharply and bent quickly over her.
“You wed with him?” he said. “Wed with a snake like Captain Ramón?”
“Only to save you, Diego! Ah, do not think that I am untrue! He but
asks my word――the word of a Pulido! And the wedding is not to take
place until he returns with the troopers, the pirates are slain, and
you are free.”
“_Señorita――_”
“There will be torture and death for you, else,” she was quick to
add. “And I will remain true, Diego. I shall but promise to wed him,
understand. And after the ceremony, before he can claim me as his
bride, I――I shall die!”
“And do you think that I would accept such a sacrifice?” Señor Zorro
asked. “Could I live and see you the bride of another man? And could I
live knowing that you had taken your own life for me? No, _señorita_!”
“If I do not, they will torture and slay you!”
“Then let them torture and slay!” he said. “You cannot do this thing!
You――a daughter of the Pulido blood! Think of the blood in your veins!”
“I could not be his wife, except in name, but I can die!” she said.
“Only a thrust of the dagger after the ceremony! The blood of the
Pulidos tells me to do that!”
“I command you――entreat you――”
“Can I see you die?” she asked. “And, if I refuse, there will be
nothing except death for me as well as for you. For Ramón will try,
then, to make me his by force.”
“Better to die in defense of your honor, _señorita_, than have your
fair name linked with his even for a moment!” Señor Zorro declared. “I
demand that you refuse to do this thing! Ah, _señorita_, all hope is
not gone! They have taken my sword, and they have bound my hands, but I
am not helpless entirely. The spirit of Zorro still burns in my breast!
Given but a little time, and I’ll win through!”
“Diego!”
“If we could work for time――” he said.
“Perhaps I can hold him off for an hour,” she whispered. “But no longer
than that, I am sure. And――there may be a way. I have thought of
something!”
“What is it?”
“Whisper,” she commanded. “I am sure that they are listening outside
the window. Pretend that all is agreed between us. Let me embrace you!”
Barbados and Captain Ramón not only were listening, but also they were
peering through the window. And they saw her go up close to him, press
against him, saw her arms go around him, as though in a last embrace.
But her back was toward the window, and they could not see all.
For, as she pressed against him, the little _señorita_ took from
her bosom the dagger that the woman Inez had given her when she had
attempted to make an escape, and which had been forgotten afterward.
And she reached around him even as she buried her head against his
breast, and sawed with the sharp dagger at the cords that bound his
wrists.
“Careful!” she warned. “Hold the ends of the ropes, so they will not
know that you are free!”
“_Sí!_” he breathed. “Never in all the world was there ever a _señorita_
like you! Hope sings within me again!”
“Do not let it show in your face!” she warned.
Her hands crept to the front again, and she slipped the dagger into
the sash around his waist. She knew that he felt it, and knew that it
was there. And then she stepped back, and raised her voice so that
those at the window could hear.
“It is the only way, Diego!” she said. “I must leave you――I cannot
endure this scene longer! Take my lips, Diego――for the last time!”
She raised her head, and her eyes closed. He bent forward, their lips
touched. And then she gave a little cry as though of pain, and rushed
back toward the door. And Señor Zorro remained standing against the
wall, anguish in his countenance.
Barbados opened the door and let the _señorita_ out of the room, then
closed and fastened the door again. Captain Ramón hurried up to her.
“You have decided, _señorita_?” he asked.
“Almost am I ready to give you my sacred word, but not quite,” she
replied. “It is a terrible thing for me, _señor_. Give me but one
little hour. Let me go to old Fray Felipe and have him pray with me.”
“I am growing tired of waiting!” Captain Ramón said. “I should be on my
way already. Why not decide now?”
“You will have ample time to return with the troopers long before
nightfall,” she whispered quickly, as Barbados turned away to howl an
order to some of his men. “Give me only an hour――perhaps less!”
“Very well――an hour!” said the captain. “But no longer! I’ll find the
_fray_ for you, and put you both in one of the huts under guard until
you can make up your mind.”