He dashed to the door, the others following. He sprang into the saddle of the mount Don Audre had procured. He drove home the spurs cruelly, and rode like a demon through the bright moonlight and up the slope, then taking the shortest trail to the sea.
CHAPTER VI.
ZORRO STRIKES.
At the hacienda of Don Carlos Pulido the outer door was opened slowly, stealthily. A villainous face showed. Then the door was thrown open wide and half a dozen men stormed into the room. Doña Catalina gave a shriek of fear and sprang backward, and as the little señorita rushed to her, clasped her in her arms. Don Carlos looked up quickly from a garment he had been inspecting and sprang to his feet.
“Pirates!” he roared.
The aged don seemed to renew his youth with the cry. He darted back against the wall, shrieking for his servants and his men, his hand darting to the blade that happened to be at his side. But the surprise was complete, and there was no hope of a victory over the pirate crew. Servants rushed in loyally, to be cut down. Doña Catalina and Lolita crouched in a corner, the aged don standing protectingly before them.
Sanchez made for him, seeing the girl. The pirate laughed, attacked like a fiend, and Don Carlos went down before he could give a wound.
Doña Catalina’s shriek rang in his ears. Then there came another shriek as Señorita Lolita felt herself being torn from her mother’s arms. Sanchez whirled her behind him, and another of the pirates clutched her in his arms.
“Easy with the wench!” Sanchez cried. “She is to be saved for some great man!”
The little señorita struggled and fought, her gentleness gone in the face of this emergency. Horror claimed her and almost destroyed her reason. She had heard whispered wild tales of what happened to women captured by pirates.
Out of the house she was carried, shrieking in her fear. The pirates poured out, too. Some of the outbuildings were ablaze now, and the shrieking, swearing crew was looting the house for what valuables could be carried easily.