CHAPTER XVITHE WAY OUTHysterics were over, weeping at an end. Señora Vallejo now sat on the end of the bed looking straight before her, and on her face was an expression that told she was resigned to whatever Fate had in store for her, that pride and breeding and blood had come to her rescue and she would be craven no more.She held the poniard their last visitor had left behind. None other had come; neither food nor water had been offered them. And until Anita Fernandez, her spirit broken, went to the window and called down to the patio, none would come, they knew; and Señora Vallejo knew, also, that Señorita Anita would die of starvation before she would give in and ask mercy at the hands of the man who had wronged her.Theseñorawatched as the girl paced back and forth, her hands clenched at her sides, suffering from shame and crushed pride.“Will you not rest, Anita?” she asked, presently.“How can there be rest for me,” the girl demanded, “when a man of our blood is doing this thing?”“He is but a distant relative—very distant.”“Were he a million times removed, yet he is of abranch of the Fernandez family. Whether this revolt is successful or not, always will it be said, in speaking of it, that a Fernandez was the instigator. It is not to be endured!”“Yet we must endure it!” theseñorareplied.“Would death wipe out the stain, I had not lived this long! Why did you take the poniard from me, Señora Vallejo? Give it me again!”“Death would not prevent the revolt,señorita, and you are young to die.”“And what remains but death? Would you have me take this man as husband—this man with his treasonable soul and bloody hands? Would you have me reign queen over a nation of ignorant savages, with a throne, sitting on a daïs of white men’s bones? How he lured us here, so we might not be hurt at the mission, so he could hold us until his nefarious work is done! What dupes we have been! If he wins, what hope is left? If he loses, how could I ever face the good frailes and the soldiers and other decent men again? Nothing but death is left—and even that will not wash away the stain!”A sudden noise in the fireplace in the corner—not much of a noise, to be sure, but enough to be heard in the silence that followed the girl’s outburst. She stopped in the middle of the room, looking toward the pile of wood there. Señora Vallejo turned with fear in her face, and thus they remained, breathless, wondering if they were about to face a new horror.Again the noise—as if a dagger were being used to pry the blocks of stone and adobe apart. Then astone fell—and another—and then there was silence for a moment, while theseñoraand the girl gazed spellbound. The elder woman ran to the girl’s side and clasped her in her arms; her hand gripped the hilt of the poniard.A third stone fell with a clatter. Again, silence. Then a head appeared, slowly, inch by inch, first the crown of black hair now covered with dust and soot, then a sooty brow, two piercing eyes, a moustache that looked absolutely disreputable now, a well-formed mouth that flashed open in a smile and showed two rows of even white teeth, an aggressive chin!The two women scarcely breathed; their eyes seemed to be bulging from their sockets. Two hands gripped the edge of the fireplace, more blocks of adobe bulged, and the man himself stumbled into the room, bowing before them and throwing wide his arms as if to indicate the state of his apparel.“Señorita! Señora!” he said, and bowed again, once to each of them.“’Tis Captain Fly-by-Night!” theseñoragasped.“Such I am called, sweet lady. ’Tis unceremonious, I realise, to call upon ladies without being announced, especially when they are in a bed-chamber, and twice especially when a man enters by means of a fireplace that is none too clean. My condition desolates me,señoraandseñorita, but circumstances are such that I am unable to appear before you properly shaved and dressed in clean clothing. I trust you will overlook the matter this once? It never will happen again—if I can prevent it.”“You? Here?” Theseñoritahad found her voice now.“I do not wonder you have difficulty in recognising me——”“Troubles are not heavy enough upon us but we must endure your presence?” she asked. “It is like Captain Fly-by-Night to affront women when they are unprotected, to offer violence——”“Have I offered violence, sweetseñorita?” he asked pleasantly. “Have I said or done what I should not?”“Why are you here? Why do you crawl through the chimney like a thing of evil? For some good purpose?”“Possibly; you may be the best judge of that. My purpose is to remove you from here—the two of you—and take you where there are neither traitors nor hostile Indians—to the mission, to be precise. I understand the close of another day will see siege and perhaps bloodshed at this same San Diego de Alcalá, yet it would be better for you to withstand the one and see the other than to remain at the Fernandez rancho. For surely you realise your situation here. If this revolt fails, as it will, you will be at the mercy of furious gentiles. If it succeeds—well, if it succeeds, you will at least be at the mercy of the traitor who caused it to succeed——”The girl interrupted him again.“You speak boldly of traitors, Captain Fly-by-Night. What about yourself?”“You consider me one?” he asked.“Is not the fact well known,señor? Did not wordcome from the Governor that your perfidy was discovered, and that you were to be taken dead or alive? Have you not been fugitive these two days past?”“Ah, yes! His Excellency the Governor has, intentionally or not, caused me some annoyance by that same order. I must speak harshly to him when next we meet. It is true also that I have been fugitive and forced to use my poor wits to exist, with both soldiers and redskins trying to run me down or run me through.”“So your Indians have turned upon you? You are a double traitor, perhaps. It was only recently I learned that this Rojerio Rocha, who—Heaven help me!—is of a distant branch of my family, is a renegade dealing with hostiles; and he as good as told me, here in this very room, that you also were a renegade, that you fought for leadership, since it was considered one white general was enough. I believe he intimated, too, that you fought concerning myself, regarding the question as to whose property I was to be after your plans had been carried out. ’Tis like Captain Fly-by-Night to heap these additional insults upon an unprotected girl!”“This man you call Rojerio Rocha said all that, eh? Hah! How my blade will sing when we meet!”“He expressed a wish to stand up to you again, I believe. ’Twere a pity you did not slay each other!”“When next we meet my blade shall do more than pierce his shoulder,señorita, I promise you.”“Almost could I forgive your baseness and your cruel boasts concerning myself, if you did that! Almost could I forgive your treason if you took the life of theman who has put the stain of disloyalty upon our name!”“You speak freely of treason,señorita. I am no traitor.”“You—no traitor?” She threw back her head and laughed loudly, scornfully.“May I suggest that you lower your voice?” he queried. “If you bring hostiles into the room all my plans will have gone awry.”“Your plans,señor?”“To remove you and theseñorato the mission,señorita.”She dropped theseñora’sarms from about her and took a step toward him, and again her hands were clenched at her sides and her eyes blazed.“Do you think I would stir a step from this place with you?” she demanded. “Do you think I trust you? Do you imagine you have skill enough, if I were willing, to get two women out of this house, put them in a carreta and drive them to the mission—when the roads are watched, when there are plenty of horses and ponies here for hostiles to use in chase?”“’Tis a difficult proposition, I admit, yet I think it can be solved successfully.”“Leave this house with you?” she stormed at him. “Go to the mission? How could I look a fray in the face again? How could I even speak to my good padre? How could I go to the presidio, where the soldiers were wont to call me the regiment’s daughter? ‘Daughter of an accursed family that spread murder and robbery throughout the coast country,’ they wouldsay now. Here I am, Señor Fly-by-Night, in the home of my father, with his good name besmirched by a traitor, and here I remain, hoping death will come quickly, even before I know whether this treasonable plot succeeds.”“The task will be more difficult than I had imagined,” quoth the caballero.“Go with you? Trust you?” she went on. “To what purpose? You would steal me from this Rojerio Rocha, eh? A pretty pair of rogues!”Now he walked swiftly to her side and looked down into her blazing eyes, and when he spoke it was in a voice she never had heard before.“Señorita,” he said, “I swear to you by all the saints, by my dead mother’s honour, by whatever you will, that I mean you no harm, and that my sole object is to rescue you from this place and take you to the mission, there to hand you over to your padre. I have come here to-night at much risk, since both white and red men seek me. I have used subterfuge and device to reach you safely. And you must allow the rescue!”Señora Vallejo would have spoken, but he silenced her with a wave of his hand and looked at the girl again.“And I say to you I am no traitor,señorita,” he went on. “Never have I raised my hand against His Excellency the Governor, never have I conspired with Indians. In time, things may be explained; for the present I ask you to believe me.”“Yet you are Captain Fly-by-Night—gambler, swindler, wronger of women!”“Which has nothing to do with this present rescue.”“Save this,” she added, quickly, “that Señorita Anita Fernandez does not trust herself with Captain Fly-by-Night, no matter what the circumstances.”The caballero sighed and turned on one heel to walk back to the fireplace, there to stand for a moment in thought.“It is, in a word, a difficult proposition,” he confessed. “Here I am in this house after having difficulties, trying to be a hero and rescue a damsel in distress, also herduenna, and the damsel refuses to be rescued.”“Then depart as you came!” theseñoritasaid.“The damsel,” he went on, scratching his head and not even looking at her, “does not fully appreciate the condition of things. She does not realise in other words, what is for her own good in this matter. Theduenna, not having spoken, naturally leaves things to the caballero——”“I remain here, Captain Fly-by-Night,” Señora Vallejo interrupted. “And do you show what small spark of manhood you may have left by quitting these women’s quarters, where you are an uninvited guest.”“Excellent! Always insist on the proprieties, even with half a thousand red wretches within call ready to commit every crime known to man!” the caballero replied. He looked up suddenly, and the women were frightened at the expression that now came into his face. “You,señora, and you,señorita,” he went on, “say you know my reputation as Captain Fly-by-Night. Suppose I say to you, then, that I am a desperate man,that we are done with pleasantries, and that you must do as I say or expect violence? You understand me, do you not? I am done with playing. Now you must obey!”His voice was stern as he bent toward them and volleyed the words. His eyes seemed to flash in rage, and with two strides he had reached the head of the bed, and tore from it a scarf Señorita Anita had worn, and turned to approach the girl.His movements were so swift that there was no time for the woman to act. He grasped the girl around the waist, and with the scarf he stifled her scream of fright in her throat.“Not a word from you, either,señora!” he commanded; and began winding the scarf around the girl’s head, so that she could make no sound. He picked her up, then, and carried her to the bed and put her upon it, and in a moment had torn the bed covering to strips and tied the girl’s hands behind her back and fastened her feet together. Two frightened eyes looked up at him, a low moan came from her, but that was all.Señora Vallejo was crouched by the fireplace, half stunned with fear, clutching at the poniard. He whirled upon her and she opened her mouth to scream; but he reached her side in time to clap a hand over her lips and choke the scream back into her throat. Once she struck at him with the poniard; and he laughed lightly as he grasped her wrist, took the weapon from her, and placed it in his belt beside his own.“Listen,señora!” he said. “You will do as I sayin everything, without making the least sound, for, by all the saints, if you as much as utter a gurgle I’ll slit your throat like I would a rabbit’s. You understand me,señora? I am master now. Let fear paralyse your vocal cords if you would save your life!”He hurried back to the bed and picked up the girl, then strode to the fireplace again.“In you go,señora!” he ordered. “’Tis but a drop of six feet, and though there is dust and soot it will not harm you. Drop straight into the darkness, and when you are at the bottom stand still. And not a gasp, else your blood will mingle with the soot!”“I—I can’t!” theseñoragasped.“Then will I be saved trouble by slitting your throat and leaving you here! Down,señora!”Trying hard to stifle her sobs of fear, the bulkyseñoraplaced her feet in the hole and slowly lowered herself until her head was on a level with the floor. There stopped, with eyes bulging, until the caballero made a motion with the poniard. And then she let go and dropped, to fall with a thump at the bottom of the chimney in a shower of soot.The caballero listened a moment, until he was sure nobody on the floor had been attracted by the sound, and then he lowered the girl down the chimney, and followed to stand beside theseñorain the darkness.“The window!” he whispered. “Allow me to say,señora, that we are going through the window to the yard, then across the yard to the fence, where I have horses waiting. I advise you to move silently and listen for my orders, and obey them, for the least slipwill mean discovery, and that will mean a quick journey for you to a land where there are neither hostiles nor neophytes—let us hope! The window,señora!”“I—I cannot!”“Then you will be found here on the floor with a slit throat! I am not a man to be trifled with, I assure you! And as for saying that you cannot, a person can do many impossible things when death is behind them and gaining steadily. The window,señora!”The caballero looked out first to see that the coast was clear. There were no Indians on that side of the house now. The majority of them were in pursuit of the fleeing horses, following the stampede, and others were in the patio discussing what had caused the animals to become suddenly insane with fear when it was apparent to all sensible persons that there was nothing of which to be afraid.He stepped back and motioned to theseñora, and she began the task of getting through the window and to the ground below, finally falling with a grunt to the sward. In an instant the caballero stood beside her, with theseñoritain his arms.Theseñorawas guided by whispers now, but they were accompanied by such direful hisses that she continued to tremble with fear. Each instant she expected to feel steel pierce her back, thinking the caballero but awaited an excuse to put her out of the way, and so carry off theseñorita.They reached the clump of palms and rested there for a moment while the caballero listened to the sounds that came from the black night about them. Then theywent forward again, slowly, careful to make no noise.Now they had reached the fence, and because of the caballero’s whispered threats theseñoramanaged to climb it. They came to where the horses were tethered, and there the caballero commanded silence while he listened again, fearing someone might have found the horses and was waiting to see who would claim them.“That steed will be yours,señora,” he said, pointing it out.“I cannot ride,” she moaned.“Then here is where you acquire that accomplishment,señora, else here is where you die. It desolates me that there is not a lady’s saddle on the mount, but it was impossible to provide one. However, the night is dark——”“Ride a man’s saddle? Never!” theseñoragasped.“Then I am quit of one trouble, and the horse will not be needed, since I mean to carry theseñoritaon mine.”“Ah,señor, for the love of the saints——”“Mount,señora! Up, as I aid you! We cannot remain here until dawn!”In imagination she saw him reach toward his belt, and fear gave her strength. Señora Vallejo got into the man’s saddle, and bent forward to grasp the horse’s mane, feeling as much fear for the animal as for the man.“Do not strangle him,señora,” the caballero suggested lightly, and sprang into his own saddle, with Señorita Anita before him.The girl had ceased moaning some time before, butthe caballero did not remove the scarf. Though he could not see because of the darkness, he sensed that her eyes were flashing angrily and that yet she did not trust him fully, did not believe he was making this rescue in good faith.He urged his horse forward, and bent over to catch the rein of Señora Vallejo’s animal, and so moved away from the fence, guiding his own mount with his knees, holding the girl and leading the steed that theseñoraclutched violently by the mane, expecting every moment to be hurled to the ground.They made a great circle, getting a butte between themselves and the rancho, and then the caballero urged the animals into a trot. No fear of death could stay Señora Vallejo’s tongue then. Two shrieks came from her throat in quick succession so like Indian wails that the caballero thanked his saints nobody would be attracted by them. But he felt called upon to stop the horses and make a statement.“Another chirp like that,señora, and your body is found here in the pasture at daybreak,” he warned. “Clutch the horn of the saddle and leave the animal his hair. Bounce, if you will, but do not scream.”And he started the horses again, and theseñorabounced, and though she screamed no more, yet she breathed ladylike imprecations upon the caballero and all horses, no matter of what breed. Faster and faster he urged the steeds, until theseñorawas in a panic of fear, had given up all hope and expected death momentarily beneath the horse’s hoofs—but clung on, nevertheless.Now the caballero stopped and listened, and then began unwrapping the scarf from theseñorita’shead. She gave a gasp as it fell away, a sob, another moan.“Señorita!” the caballero said, and his voice was soft again.“Señorita, will you not speak to me and say that you forgive? There was no other way, believe me, for you were so determined. You did not trust me, and time was short and the danger great. It was to save you.”“From one shame for another?” she asked.“Not for all the world would I wrong you, offer you harm, hurt your feelings!” he said. “You do not understand,señorita. Back there at the rancho there was naught but danger for you, no matter what the outcome of this revolt. It is better you are at the mission with decent people, and there I am taking you now. It were better to die there,señorita, with yourduenna, and go to death unsullied, than to live and be at the rancho when this revolt is over.”“Unsullied!” she cried. “How can that ever be now, since Rojerio Rocha has done this thing?”“I would not dwell on that,señorita, at the present time. The night is passing, and we must hurry on to the mission, and we can make none too good time considering theseñora’shorsewomanship.” She was sure there was the sound of mirth in his voice. “I ask you only to trust me for the time being, and to do one other thing—when the fighting begins at the mission, repair to the guest house with yourduennaand remain there, despite any orders to the contrary. Dothis, and I swear you’ll never meet death at the hands of hostiles.”“How can you promise that, when you dare not approach the mission or presidio yourself?” she asked.“Trust me, and ask no questions.”“I cannot forget you are Captain Fly-by-Night. It is almost an insult to be rescued by such a man.”She felt his hands grip her for an instant, then the pressure of them relax, and to her ears came a whisper so low that even Señora Vallejo could not hear.“Señorita!Since first I saw you I have longed to hold you in my arms as I am doing now. Since you taunted me down by the creek I have loved you. You are mine, though you think it not. And do not now speak of insults, else will I crush your red lips with mine! What I have been, or who, or what or who I am now—still I love you as a strong man loves, with my whole heart—and for you I would gladly die if it would save you pain.”He started the horses again, since she did not answer. Neither did she struggle to get from his arms, as he had expected she would do. For half a mile they rode in silence, carefully, making their way over the hills toward the mission, avoiding all roads and trails. And then, suddenly, two arms slipped around his neck to pull down his head, and a voice breathed into his ear:“Prove your words, Captain Fly-by-Night. I am motherless, fatherless, and the man who was to have been my husband has cast shame upon my family. There seems just now no future for me among reputablepersons. Who am I to taunt you with your past and reputation—I, daughter of a family of traitors?”“Do not speak so,señorita!” he said.“I do speak so! Perhaps you are more the man than I have thought. May I put you to the test?”“Gladly will I stand it!” he said.“Then prove at least that you will help remove this stain on our family name. Prove that you are not partners with the man who put it there. Prove that, though outcast at present, and pursued by white men and red, you are a loyal man. Do one thing for me, Captain Fly-by-Night, and I will try to think better of you, and I will go on to the mission freely and remain in the guest house looking to you for help, as you have suggested. I can promise nothing more, but, if this much will content you for the time being——”“Name what it is you would have me do,señorita!” he said.“A thing that perhaps you will not dislike. Kill me this Rojerio Rocha!”
Hysterics were over, weeping at an end. Señora Vallejo now sat on the end of the bed looking straight before her, and on her face was an expression that told she was resigned to whatever Fate had in store for her, that pride and breeding and blood had come to her rescue and she would be craven no more.
She held the poniard their last visitor had left behind. None other had come; neither food nor water had been offered them. And until Anita Fernandez, her spirit broken, went to the window and called down to the patio, none would come, they knew; and Señora Vallejo knew, also, that Señorita Anita would die of starvation before she would give in and ask mercy at the hands of the man who had wronged her.
Theseñorawatched as the girl paced back and forth, her hands clenched at her sides, suffering from shame and crushed pride.
“Will you not rest, Anita?” she asked, presently.
“How can there be rest for me,” the girl demanded, “when a man of our blood is doing this thing?”
“He is but a distant relative—very distant.”
“Were he a million times removed, yet he is of abranch of the Fernandez family. Whether this revolt is successful or not, always will it be said, in speaking of it, that a Fernandez was the instigator. It is not to be endured!”
“Yet we must endure it!” theseñorareplied.
“Would death wipe out the stain, I had not lived this long! Why did you take the poniard from me, Señora Vallejo? Give it me again!”
“Death would not prevent the revolt,señorita, and you are young to die.”
“And what remains but death? Would you have me take this man as husband—this man with his treasonable soul and bloody hands? Would you have me reign queen over a nation of ignorant savages, with a throne, sitting on a daïs of white men’s bones? How he lured us here, so we might not be hurt at the mission, so he could hold us until his nefarious work is done! What dupes we have been! If he wins, what hope is left? If he loses, how could I ever face the good frailes and the soldiers and other decent men again? Nothing but death is left—and even that will not wash away the stain!”
A sudden noise in the fireplace in the corner—not much of a noise, to be sure, but enough to be heard in the silence that followed the girl’s outburst. She stopped in the middle of the room, looking toward the pile of wood there. Señora Vallejo turned with fear in her face, and thus they remained, breathless, wondering if they were about to face a new horror.
Again the noise—as if a dagger were being used to pry the blocks of stone and adobe apart. Then astone fell—and another—and then there was silence for a moment, while theseñoraand the girl gazed spellbound. The elder woman ran to the girl’s side and clasped her in her arms; her hand gripped the hilt of the poniard.
A third stone fell with a clatter. Again, silence. Then a head appeared, slowly, inch by inch, first the crown of black hair now covered with dust and soot, then a sooty brow, two piercing eyes, a moustache that looked absolutely disreputable now, a well-formed mouth that flashed open in a smile and showed two rows of even white teeth, an aggressive chin!
The two women scarcely breathed; their eyes seemed to be bulging from their sockets. Two hands gripped the edge of the fireplace, more blocks of adobe bulged, and the man himself stumbled into the room, bowing before them and throwing wide his arms as if to indicate the state of his apparel.
“Señorita! Señora!” he said, and bowed again, once to each of them.
“’Tis Captain Fly-by-Night!” theseñoragasped.
“Such I am called, sweet lady. ’Tis unceremonious, I realise, to call upon ladies without being announced, especially when they are in a bed-chamber, and twice especially when a man enters by means of a fireplace that is none too clean. My condition desolates me,señoraandseñorita, but circumstances are such that I am unable to appear before you properly shaved and dressed in clean clothing. I trust you will overlook the matter this once? It never will happen again—if I can prevent it.”
“You? Here?” Theseñoritahad found her voice now.
“I do not wonder you have difficulty in recognising me——”
“Troubles are not heavy enough upon us but we must endure your presence?” she asked. “It is like Captain Fly-by-Night to affront women when they are unprotected, to offer violence——”
“Have I offered violence, sweetseñorita?” he asked pleasantly. “Have I said or done what I should not?”
“Why are you here? Why do you crawl through the chimney like a thing of evil? For some good purpose?”
“Possibly; you may be the best judge of that. My purpose is to remove you from here—the two of you—and take you where there are neither traitors nor hostile Indians—to the mission, to be precise. I understand the close of another day will see siege and perhaps bloodshed at this same San Diego de Alcalá, yet it would be better for you to withstand the one and see the other than to remain at the Fernandez rancho. For surely you realise your situation here. If this revolt fails, as it will, you will be at the mercy of furious gentiles. If it succeeds—well, if it succeeds, you will at least be at the mercy of the traitor who caused it to succeed——”
The girl interrupted him again.
“You speak boldly of traitors, Captain Fly-by-Night. What about yourself?”
“You consider me one?” he asked.
“Is not the fact well known,señor? Did not wordcome from the Governor that your perfidy was discovered, and that you were to be taken dead or alive? Have you not been fugitive these two days past?”
“Ah, yes! His Excellency the Governor has, intentionally or not, caused me some annoyance by that same order. I must speak harshly to him when next we meet. It is true also that I have been fugitive and forced to use my poor wits to exist, with both soldiers and redskins trying to run me down or run me through.”
“So your Indians have turned upon you? You are a double traitor, perhaps. It was only recently I learned that this Rojerio Rocha, who—Heaven help me!—is of a distant branch of my family, is a renegade dealing with hostiles; and he as good as told me, here in this very room, that you also were a renegade, that you fought for leadership, since it was considered one white general was enough. I believe he intimated, too, that you fought concerning myself, regarding the question as to whose property I was to be after your plans had been carried out. ’Tis like Captain Fly-by-Night to heap these additional insults upon an unprotected girl!”
“This man you call Rojerio Rocha said all that, eh? Hah! How my blade will sing when we meet!”
“He expressed a wish to stand up to you again, I believe. ’Twere a pity you did not slay each other!”
“When next we meet my blade shall do more than pierce his shoulder,señorita, I promise you.”
“Almost could I forgive your baseness and your cruel boasts concerning myself, if you did that! Almost could I forgive your treason if you took the life of theman who has put the stain of disloyalty upon our name!”
“You speak freely of treason,señorita. I am no traitor.”
“You—no traitor?” She threw back her head and laughed loudly, scornfully.
“May I suggest that you lower your voice?” he queried. “If you bring hostiles into the room all my plans will have gone awry.”
“Your plans,señor?”
“To remove you and theseñorato the mission,señorita.”
She dropped theseñora’sarms from about her and took a step toward him, and again her hands were clenched at her sides and her eyes blazed.
“Do you think I would stir a step from this place with you?” she demanded. “Do you think I trust you? Do you imagine you have skill enough, if I were willing, to get two women out of this house, put them in a carreta and drive them to the mission—when the roads are watched, when there are plenty of horses and ponies here for hostiles to use in chase?”
“’Tis a difficult proposition, I admit, yet I think it can be solved successfully.”
“Leave this house with you?” she stormed at him. “Go to the mission? How could I look a fray in the face again? How could I even speak to my good padre? How could I go to the presidio, where the soldiers were wont to call me the regiment’s daughter? ‘Daughter of an accursed family that spread murder and robbery throughout the coast country,’ they wouldsay now. Here I am, Señor Fly-by-Night, in the home of my father, with his good name besmirched by a traitor, and here I remain, hoping death will come quickly, even before I know whether this treasonable plot succeeds.”
“The task will be more difficult than I had imagined,” quoth the caballero.
“Go with you? Trust you?” she went on. “To what purpose? You would steal me from this Rojerio Rocha, eh? A pretty pair of rogues!”
Now he walked swiftly to her side and looked down into her blazing eyes, and when he spoke it was in a voice she never had heard before.
“Señorita,” he said, “I swear to you by all the saints, by my dead mother’s honour, by whatever you will, that I mean you no harm, and that my sole object is to rescue you from this place and take you to the mission, there to hand you over to your padre. I have come here to-night at much risk, since both white and red men seek me. I have used subterfuge and device to reach you safely. And you must allow the rescue!”
Señora Vallejo would have spoken, but he silenced her with a wave of his hand and looked at the girl again.
“And I say to you I am no traitor,señorita,” he went on. “Never have I raised my hand against His Excellency the Governor, never have I conspired with Indians. In time, things may be explained; for the present I ask you to believe me.”
“Yet you are Captain Fly-by-Night—gambler, swindler, wronger of women!”
“Which has nothing to do with this present rescue.”
“Save this,” she added, quickly, “that Señorita Anita Fernandez does not trust herself with Captain Fly-by-Night, no matter what the circumstances.”
The caballero sighed and turned on one heel to walk back to the fireplace, there to stand for a moment in thought.
“It is, in a word, a difficult proposition,” he confessed. “Here I am in this house after having difficulties, trying to be a hero and rescue a damsel in distress, also herduenna, and the damsel refuses to be rescued.”
“Then depart as you came!” theseñoritasaid.
“The damsel,” he went on, scratching his head and not even looking at her, “does not fully appreciate the condition of things. She does not realise in other words, what is for her own good in this matter. Theduenna, not having spoken, naturally leaves things to the caballero——”
“I remain here, Captain Fly-by-Night,” Señora Vallejo interrupted. “And do you show what small spark of manhood you may have left by quitting these women’s quarters, where you are an uninvited guest.”
“Excellent! Always insist on the proprieties, even with half a thousand red wretches within call ready to commit every crime known to man!” the caballero replied. He looked up suddenly, and the women were frightened at the expression that now came into his face. “You,señora, and you,señorita,” he went on, “say you know my reputation as Captain Fly-by-Night. Suppose I say to you, then, that I am a desperate man,that we are done with pleasantries, and that you must do as I say or expect violence? You understand me, do you not? I am done with playing. Now you must obey!”
His voice was stern as he bent toward them and volleyed the words. His eyes seemed to flash in rage, and with two strides he had reached the head of the bed, and tore from it a scarf Señorita Anita had worn, and turned to approach the girl.
His movements were so swift that there was no time for the woman to act. He grasped the girl around the waist, and with the scarf he stifled her scream of fright in her throat.
“Not a word from you, either,señora!” he commanded; and began winding the scarf around the girl’s head, so that she could make no sound. He picked her up, then, and carried her to the bed and put her upon it, and in a moment had torn the bed covering to strips and tied the girl’s hands behind her back and fastened her feet together. Two frightened eyes looked up at him, a low moan came from her, but that was all.
Señora Vallejo was crouched by the fireplace, half stunned with fear, clutching at the poniard. He whirled upon her and she opened her mouth to scream; but he reached her side in time to clap a hand over her lips and choke the scream back into her throat. Once she struck at him with the poniard; and he laughed lightly as he grasped her wrist, took the weapon from her, and placed it in his belt beside his own.
“Listen,señora!” he said. “You will do as I sayin everything, without making the least sound, for, by all the saints, if you as much as utter a gurgle I’ll slit your throat like I would a rabbit’s. You understand me,señora? I am master now. Let fear paralyse your vocal cords if you would save your life!”
He hurried back to the bed and picked up the girl, then strode to the fireplace again.
“In you go,señora!” he ordered. “’Tis but a drop of six feet, and though there is dust and soot it will not harm you. Drop straight into the darkness, and when you are at the bottom stand still. And not a gasp, else your blood will mingle with the soot!”
“I—I can’t!” theseñoragasped.
“Then will I be saved trouble by slitting your throat and leaving you here! Down,señora!”
Trying hard to stifle her sobs of fear, the bulkyseñoraplaced her feet in the hole and slowly lowered herself until her head was on a level with the floor. There stopped, with eyes bulging, until the caballero made a motion with the poniard. And then she let go and dropped, to fall with a thump at the bottom of the chimney in a shower of soot.
The caballero listened a moment, until he was sure nobody on the floor had been attracted by the sound, and then he lowered the girl down the chimney, and followed to stand beside theseñorain the darkness.
“The window!” he whispered. “Allow me to say,señora, that we are going through the window to the yard, then across the yard to the fence, where I have horses waiting. I advise you to move silently and listen for my orders, and obey them, for the least slipwill mean discovery, and that will mean a quick journey for you to a land where there are neither hostiles nor neophytes—let us hope! The window,señora!”
“I—I cannot!”
“Then you will be found here on the floor with a slit throat! I am not a man to be trifled with, I assure you! And as for saying that you cannot, a person can do many impossible things when death is behind them and gaining steadily. The window,señora!”
The caballero looked out first to see that the coast was clear. There were no Indians on that side of the house now. The majority of them were in pursuit of the fleeing horses, following the stampede, and others were in the patio discussing what had caused the animals to become suddenly insane with fear when it was apparent to all sensible persons that there was nothing of which to be afraid.
He stepped back and motioned to theseñora, and she began the task of getting through the window and to the ground below, finally falling with a grunt to the sward. In an instant the caballero stood beside her, with theseñoritain his arms.
Theseñorawas guided by whispers now, but they were accompanied by such direful hisses that she continued to tremble with fear. Each instant she expected to feel steel pierce her back, thinking the caballero but awaited an excuse to put her out of the way, and so carry off theseñorita.
They reached the clump of palms and rested there for a moment while the caballero listened to the sounds that came from the black night about them. Then theywent forward again, slowly, careful to make no noise.
Now they had reached the fence, and because of the caballero’s whispered threats theseñoramanaged to climb it. They came to where the horses were tethered, and there the caballero commanded silence while he listened again, fearing someone might have found the horses and was waiting to see who would claim them.
“That steed will be yours,señora,” he said, pointing it out.
“I cannot ride,” she moaned.
“Then here is where you acquire that accomplishment,señora, else here is where you die. It desolates me that there is not a lady’s saddle on the mount, but it was impossible to provide one. However, the night is dark——”
“Ride a man’s saddle? Never!” theseñoragasped.
“Then I am quit of one trouble, and the horse will not be needed, since I mean to carry theseñoritaon mine.”
“Ah,señor, for the love of the saints——”
“Mount,señora! Up, as I aid you! We cannot remain here until dawn!”
In imagination she saw him reach toward his belt, and fear gave her strength. Señora Vallejo got into the man’s saddle, and bent forward to grasp the horse’s mane, feeling as much fear for the animal as for the man.
“Do not strangle him,señora,” the caballero suggested lightly, and sprang into his own saddle, with Señorita Anita before him.
The girl had ceased moaning some time before, butthe caballero did not remove the scarf. Though he could not see because of the darkness, he sensed that her eyes were flashing angrily and that yet she did not trust him fully, did not believe he was making this rescue in good faith.
He urged his horse forward, and bent over to catch the rein of Señora Vallejo’s animal, and so moved away from the fence, guiding his own mount with his knees, holding the girl and leading the steed that theseñoraclutched violently by the mane, expecting every moment to be hurled to the ground.
They made a great circle, getting a butte between themselves and the rancho, and then the caballero urged the animals into a trot. No fear of death could stay Señora Vallejo’s tongue then. Two shrieks came from her throat in quick succession so like Indian wails that the caballero thanked his saints nobody would be attracted by them. But he felt called upon to stop the horses and make a statement.
“Another chirp like that,señora, and your body is found here in the pasture at daybreak,” he warned. “Clutch the horn of the saddle and leave the animal his hair. Bounce, if you will, but do not scream.”
And he started the horses again, and theseñorabounced, and though she screamed no more, yet she breathed ladylike imprecations upon the caballero and all horses, no matter of what breed. Faster and faster he urged the steeds, until theseñorawas in a panic of fear, had given up all hope and expected death momentarily beneath the horse’s hoofs—but clung on, nevertheless.
Now the caballero stopped and listened, and then began unwrapping the scarf from theseñorita’shead. She gave a gasp as it fell away, a sob, another moan.
“Señorita!” the caballero said, and his voice was soft again.
“Señorita, will you not speak to me and say that you forgive? There was no other way, believe me, for you were so determined. You did not trust me, and time was short and the danger great. It was to save you.”
“From one shame for another?” she asked.
“Not for all the world would I wrong you, offer you harm, hurt your feelings!” he said. “You do not understand,señorita. Back there at the rancho there was naught but danger for you, no matter what the outcome of this revolt. It is better you are at the mission with decent people, and there I am taking you now. It were better to die there,señorita, with yourduenna, and go to death unsullied, than to live and be at the rancho when this revolt is over.”
“Unsullied!” she cried. “How can that ever be now, since Rojerio Rocha has done this thing?”
“I would not dwell on that,señorita, at the present time. The night is passing, and we must hurry on to the mission, and we can make none too good time considering theseñora’shorsewomanship.” She was sure there was the sound of mirth in his voice. “I ask you only to trust me for the time being, and to do one other thing—when the fighting begins at the mission, repair to the guest house with yourduennaand remain there, despite any orders to the contrary. Dothis, and I swear you’ll never meet death at the hands of hostiles.”
“How can you promise that, when you dare not approach the mission or presidio yourself?” she asked.
“Trust me, and ask no questions.”
“I cannot forget you are Captain Fly-by-Night. It is almost an insult to be rescued by such a man.”
She felt his hands grip her for an instant, then the pressure of them relax, and to her ears came a whisper so low that even Señora Vallejo could not hear.
“Señorita!Since first I saw you I have longed to hold you in my arms as I am doing now. Since you taunted me down by the creek I have loved you. You are mine, though you think it not. And do not now speak of insults, else will I crush your red lips with mine! What I have been, or who, or what or who I am now—still I love you as a strong man loves, with my whole heart—and for you I would gladly die if it would save you pain.”
He started the horses again, since she did not answer. Neither did she struggle to get from his arms, as he had expected she would do. For half a mile they rode in silence, carefully, making their way over the hills toward the mission, avoiding all roads and trails. And then, suddenly, two arms slipped around his neck to pull down his head, and a voice breathed into his ear:
“Prove your words, Captain Fly-by-Night. I am motherless, fatherless, and the man who was to have been my husband has cast shame upon my family. There seems just now no future for me among reputablepersons. Who am I to taunt you with your past and reputation—I, daughter of a family of traitors?”
“Do not speak so,señorita!” he said.
“I do speak so! Perhaps you are more the man than I have thought. May I put you to the test?”
“Gladly will I stand it!” he said.
“Then prove at least that you will help remove this stain on our family name. Prove that you are not partners with the man who put it there. Prove that, though outcast at present, and pursued by white men and red, you are a loyal man. Do one thing for me, Captain Fly-by-Night, and I will try to think better of you, and I will go on to the mission freely and remain in the guest house looking to you for help, as you have suggested. I can promise nothing more, but, if this much will content you for the time being——”
“Name what it is you would have me do,señorita!” he said.
“A thing that perhaps you will not dislike. Kill me this Rojerio Rocha!”