While I was absorbed in the contemplation of this enchanting landscape, the convoy had advanced considerably beyond me. I then fancied that the belt which bound the body of the bravo and the soldier together was not so tight as it used to be. This circumstance, remarked also by others, led me to believe that Juanito was conniving at a plan of escape on the part of the prisoner. I asked myself, though it was a business repugnant to my feelings, if I ought not to apprise the captain of the matter. However, I thought that my presence would be a hinderance to Verduzco's attempt to escape, and so preferred remaining where I was. Suddenly the belt, cut by the bravo's knife, divided into two, and the bandit, slipping from the horse's back to the ground, darted off at a run. The lancer was up with him at a single bound of his horse. Juanito applied the muzzle of his carbine to the bravo's head, drew the trigger, and blew out his brains before I could even utter a cry.
"On my word," said Juanito, replacing the carbine in its case, still smoking, "he can't complain that I have not had a regard for his feelings, for I could have got possession of his boots two hours sooner."
Set completely at ease on this delicate point, the sergeant dismounted, and, snatching the objects of his desire, pulled them off the corpse and put them on.
"I knew quite well," added he, "that I would complete my equipment at last."
"My dear Juanito," said I to him, "you are a faithful servant to the captain, although I always suspected the contrary; but there is a mystery wrapped up in this which I do not comprehend, and if you unriddle it for me I will give you a piastre."
"With much pleasure," said Juanito, taking the money; "I wish I could find every day a confessor equal in generosity to your lordship."
The sergeant remounted, and, while walking our horses together, he said,
"What you saw me do was by an order of the captain. To shoot this wicked knave would have been, in the eyes of the law, a crime that would have cost us dear; to place him in the hands of the judges would have offered him a favorable chance of getting off altogether; to kill him, on the contrary, when he was trying to escape, was quite lawful. The attempt at flight, at which I seemed to connive, was only a plan concerted between the captain and me, and the prisoner fell into the snare."
"But why has your captain acted in such a way to a man with whom he had formerly such intimate relations?"
"Ah! that's quite another thing!" replied Juanito. "Before sending Verduzco to a better world, my captain charged me to confess my prisoner. Here is what he told me, and which I will tell only to you, or to those who will give me a piastre for the information. Counting upon the influence which he had in high places, Verduzco engaged to procure for the captain an acting order as commander of the first convoy which left Mexico, the agreement being that he was to allow the conducta to be pillaged on its march, and that afterward the proceeds should be shared between them. Don Blas accepted these conditions; but I must say in his favor that he seemed to have repented of the bargain he had made with the bandit. Now, you know what happened to the convoy; but the best of the joke is, that the successful coup was made by another band than that of Verduzco's, who had not reckoned on any thing of the kind. While the bravo was waiting for the conducta beyond Hoya, another body of robbers, better informed, met it before it reached that place. It was by these wretches that the captain was wounded. He fancied that Verduzco had betrayed him, and it was on that account that I received the order to seize the first opportunity that offered to blow the ruffian's brains out."