Back toward the slope the pirates drove the remaining troopers. And there the battle waged at some distance from the burning huts of the pirate camp. The women tried to quench the flames, but could not. The wind from the sea carried flaming pieces of palm frond and fired more huts.
Don Audre Ruiz had tugged at his bonds until almost exhausted, but had been unable to get free. Once the battle surged near him, and then away again. Clouds of smoke from the burning huts rolled over him, surged around him. Great chunks of flaming material floated past him on the still breeze.
Don Audre wondered whether the pirates were to be victorious, whether, in the end, they would roast him at the stake, as they had started to do. He choked in the dense smoke; his eyes smarted and then pained; he tried to see how the fight was going, but could only get a glimpse now and then.
And then he saw something that caused a thrill of horror to pass through him. One of the burning brands had fallen at the edge of the pile of fuel about the stake. It smoldered, burst into flames again. The fuel caught, and the flames spread.
Don Audre Ruiz, helpless against the stake, watched the flames creep nearer, the fire spread and become more raging. Once more he struggled hopelessly against the chain and ropes that held him fast. What irony was this that he should burn without human hands firing the fuel?
Already he could feel the heat of the flames. Slowly they were eating their way toward him through the heaps of fuel the pirates had dropped. Soon they would touch him, smoke and fire would engulf him, and later men would find naught but his charred remains.
CHAPTER XXX.
FRAY FELIPE GETS HIS GOBLET.
Señor Zorro thanked his saints that the horse he had seized in front of the presidio at San Diego de Alcála was a noble animal of endurance and speed.
He kicked at the mount’s flanks and rode like the wind in the wake of the troopers. He knew that he was gaining on them, but they had such an advantage of time that he realized he could not reach the pirate camp before Ramón and his soldiers.
As his horse negotiated the last slope before reaching the sea, Señor Zorro could hear, coming from a distance, the din of battle. He stopped his mount in the fringe of trees and looked down upon the scene.