“And with you!” Don Audre Ruiz returned.
Señor Zorro walked slowly away from the door and approached the window again. The horse Sanchez had been riding was now but a short distance from the adobe building. The two guards were squatted before the hut wherein the captured weapons had been stored, drinking and talking. Other pirates were in the distance, walking around, stretched in the shade of the huts, gambling, shouting, quarreling.
Señor Zorro knew well that it would profit nothing to get those weapons in the hut, for the caballeros could not be liberated quickly, and so the element of surprise in an attack would be lost. Moreover, were they liberated and their swords in their hands, they would only be cut down by the pirate crew after they had taken some toll.
Señor Zorro wanted his own sword, but did not know whether there would be time for him to get possession of it. He would not dare stop to attack the two guards, for the other pirates would rush up and endanger his chance for escape. It would be far better, he decided quickly, to seize the horse and ride with what speed he could toward the distant village of San Diego de Alcála, get help there at the presidio, and return to the work of rescue with an armed force behind him.
Back to the door he hurried.
“Audre!” he called, softly.
“Sí?”
“Raise a din in there, create a bedlam of a sort, and ’twill help me vastly. Pretend to be fighting among yourselves.”
He did not have very long to wait. He could hear Don Audre Ruiz whispering instructions to the other caballeros, and almost instantly they began shrieking at one another, pounding on the heavy door, making a bedlam of noise. Señor Zorro hurried across to the outside window and called to the guards before the hut.
“Come here!” he shouted. “The prisoners are fighting and slaying one another!”