Tony Gomez left him soon after that, taking with him the empty tray and the candle. Not another word had passed between Phil and the young Mexican, and yet, foolish as he told himself it was, he had been strangely reassured by the other’s manner.
“That fellow isn’t very much in sympathy with old Espato,” he thought as, stretched out on his hard bed, he thought over the harrowing events of the night. “There was something in his voice when he spoke of him a while ago, that sounded as if he had it in for the old scoundrel, I suppose that isn’t unusual though,” he added, thoughtfully. “Probably there are lots of his men who aren’t in sympathy with all the things their chief does. They simply obey him because they’re afraid to do anything else. But there you are again,” he told himself, once more yielding to utter discouragement. “Even if this Antonio Gomez, or whatever his name is, really wanted to help me out—which of course, he doesn’t—he wouldn’t dare. I suppose that old scoundrel Espato would hack him into little pieces if he should find him out. He seems to enjoy doing that sort of thing.” And he shivered as he thought of the various kinds of torture Espato had promised him.
Outside there rose the sound of loud laughter. Evidently Espato and his followers were making merry—celebrating his capture, perhaps and the enjoyment they expected to have in torturing him, later on.
It was maddening to lie there so near the outside world and freedom and yet to feel himself bound, a captive, utterly at the mercy of a scoundrel who was notoriously known to show no mercy.
Phil ground his teeth and tried to shift to another position which might prove a little less uncomfortable.
“If ever I get out of this alive,” he thought, miserably, “Make believe I won’t appreciate a good bed again. It’s funny how you never do half appreciate those things until you have to do without them. But I guess I won’t have to worry about beds or anything else very much longer,” he added, bitterly. “I guess Espato was right. I’ve pretty near fought my last fight.”
Toward morning, just as dawn was breaking over the hills, he fell asleep.
CHAPTER XXIII
The Bandit’s Messenger
It was a gorgeous day, that first day of Phil’s imprisonment in the dungeon with the slit high up in the wall, a kind of day when boys, especially the Radio Boys, always longed to do something particularly daring and thrilling—anything, so long as it promised adventure.
Alas for poor Phil! Rising from his hard bed, cramped and aching in every muscle of his body, so stiff that he could hardly move, he gazed longingly at the patch of intensely blue sky that could be seen through the makeshift slit of a window.