‘Conyngham!’ he shouted, laying aside that ceremony upon which he never set great store.
‘Yes,’ answered a voice from within. ‘Is that you, Concepçion?’
‘Of course; throw them out.’
‘But the door is locked,’ answered Conyngham in a muffled voice. And the carriage began to rock and crack upon its springs, as if an earthquake were taking place inside it.
‘The window is good enough for such rubbish,’ said Concepçion. As he spoke a man, violently propelled from within, came head foremost, and most blasphemously vociferous, into Concepçion’s arms, who immediately, and with the rapidity of a terrier, had him by the throat and forced him under water.
‘You have hold of my leg—you, on the other side,’ shouted Conyngham from the turmoil within.
‘A thousand pardons, señor!’ said the soldier, and took a new grip of another limb.
Concepçion, holding his man under water, heard the sharp crack of another head upon the soldier’s kneecap, and knew that all was well.
‘That is all?’ he inquired.
‘That is all,’ replied the soldier, who did not seem at all nervous now. ‘And we have killed no one.’