“No, I’ve got the key to the gate here,” remarked the coachman, patting his vest pocket.
Pacheco looked at Cantarote, and made a gesture with his hand as if he were picking up something. Cantarote lowered his eyelids as a sign that he had understood, and with the utmost neatness put his hand into the old man’s vest, took out the key, and, holding his cards in his left hand, handed it to Pacheco behind the coachman’s back.
The bandit got up.
“Let me have a cap,” he said to El Cuervo.
The innkeeper brought one.
“Keep him busy for an hour.”
This said, Pacheco hurried to the Countess’ house, opened wide the gate, climbed to the box, and drove the carriage outside; then he closed the gate, climbed back again, and took his place near the theatre.
From his hiding-place, Quentin had discovered something curious and worthy of note. In one of the boxes near the curtain was the Countess, alone, with her back to the stage, and gazing at some one through her glasses. Quentin followed her look, and by bending low and leaning his body over the box, he discovered that the box at which she was directing her glances was occupied by the Governor and two other persons; but the Countess also looked elsewhere: toward a parquette where there were a toreador and several young gentlemen.
“Which is she looking at?” Quentin asked himself. “Is it the Governor, or the toreador?”
The Countess rested her opera glasses absently upon the railing of the box.