Сердца трёх / Hearts of three - стр. 11

“There are many Romeros who dwell everywhere in Panama,” laughed Pedro Zurita,[61] the assistant jailer.[62] “Do you mean the rich Tomas Romero who owns many cattle on the hills?”

“Yes, senor, it must be he. I shall find him. If my precious stock-in-trade[63] can be safely stored, I shall seek him now.” As he talked, he took out from his pocket two silver pesos and handed them to the jailer.

Pedro Zurita and the gendarmes began to carry the boxes into the jail.

“Careful, senors, careful,” the old one pleaded, greatly anxious. “Handle it gently. It is fragile, most fragile.”

Then he added gratefully: “A thousand thanks, senors. It has been my good fortune to meet with honest men with whom my goods will be safe. Tomorrow I shall return, and take my goods. Adios, senors, adios!”

In the guardroom, fifty feet away from Henry’s cell, the gendarmes were robbing Leopoldo Narvaez. Pedro Zurita made a profound survey of the large box.

“Leave it alone, Pedro,” one of the gendarmes laughed at him. The assistant jailer sighed, walked away and sat down, looked back at the box, and sighed again.

“Take the hatchet there and open the box,” he said. “Open the box, Ignacio,[64] we will look, we will only look. Then we will close the box again.”

“Whiskey! The old man was a fool,” laughed gendarmes. “That whiskey was his, all his, and he has never taken one little sip!”

In few minutes everybody was drunk. Pedro Zurita became sentimental.

“My prisoners,” he maundered. “I love them as brothers. Life is sad. My prisoners are my very children. My heart bleeds for them. Behold! I weep. Let us share with them. Let them have a moment’s happiness. Ignacio, carry a bottle of this elixir to the Gringo Morgan. Give him my love. He will drink and be happy today.”

The voice outside caught Henry’s attention, and he was crossing his big cell to the window when he heard a key in the door. Ignacio came in, completely drunk, bottle in hand, which he gravely presented to Henry.

“With the high compliments of our good jailer, Pedro Zurita,” he mumbled. “He says to drink and forget that he must stretch your neck tomorrow.”

“My high compliments to Senor Pedro Zurita, and tell him from me to go to hell along with his whiskey,” Henry replied.

The gendarme suddenly become sober.

“Very well, senor,” he said, then passed out and locked the door.

In a rush Henry was at the window just in time to encounter Francis face to face. Francis was thrusting a revolver to him through the bars.

“Henry,” Francis said. “Stand back in your cell, because there’s going to be a hole in this wall. The Angelique is waiting for you. Now, stand back.”

Hardly had Henry backed into a rear corner of his cell, when the door was clumsily unlocked and opened.

“Kill the Gringo!” cried the gendarmes.

Ignacio fired wildly from his gun, missing Henry by half the width of the cell. The next moment he went down under the impact of Henry’s bullet. Henry waited for the explosion.

It came. The window and the wall beneath it became all one aperture. Francis dragged him out through the hole.

“The horses are waiting up the next alley,” Francis told Henry, as they gripped hands. “And Leoncia is waiting with them. Fifteen minutes’ gallop will take us to the beach, where the boat is waiting.”