“You want to die for him?” Barbados asked.
“I offer myself in his place, since your fiends must be amused. I did not get a chance to draw a card, or surely I’d have drawn a deuce.”
Don Audre put his hand on the sergeant’s arm.
“This is useless, my friend,” he said.
“Not so!” Sergeant Gonzales declared. “You are a fine man of parts, Don Audre Ruiz, and really amount to something in the world. And I am but a big pig. There are many better men who can fill my place.”
“Whatever your birth and station, you are now, in my estimation, a caballero and a brave man,” Don Audre said.
Barbados roared his laughter.
“A hero!” he sneered. “I cannot let you take the caballero’s place, fool soldier, but, since you wish to be roasted, your wish is granted. We’ll roast you later, when we have need of more sport. These other caballeros will be ransomed, but there is nobody in the world who would ransom you for as much as a bottle of thin wine.”
“That is true, fiend of hell!” Sergeant Gonzales said.