The other prisoners had also risen, in their excitement, the German with a startling clatter of his wooden shoes.
“You’d better take those blocks off your feet,” advised Conover, “they make too much noise; your stocking feet will be best for you. Carry the shoes in your hand, if you must have them.”
“Ach!” panted the baron, “der desert sand voult purn my feed off mitoudt ’em!”
“Then carry them in your hands. And now listen: Whatever the risk is, I’m going to take it. This door I came through here is a secret one, and only a few even of the Toltecs know of it. I’m going to hope that suspicion will fall on some of those who do know. For I think it isn’t understood that I possess the secret. Itzlan told me about it long ago, but perhaps she even has forgot that she did. Anyway, I take the risk.
“Listen: You are to follow me quietly out of this place and down the stone steps—the steps of sacrifice. There is a little path which we can take past the boiling lake, and we can get out of town by it, for, besides the lake, there are only a few houses, as the steam makes it unpleasant for people to live there.
“I think we can get out of the town, as the night is dark, and the steam, which is bad to-night, makes the air even thicker.”
He had dropped, or forgotten, nearly all of his dialect, his words showing now, in his haste and excitement, that once, at any rate, he had been a man of some education and attainments.
“When you reach the horses you will find the child there, tied up by the bushes. My Indian friend has stolen him and placed him there, and I had him give the kid a sleeping drink to keep him from making any noise. It sounds cruel, but it seemed necessary.
“But I’m wasting too much time. No,” he said, as Wild Bill sought to take him by the hand, “I don’t feel worthy to touch the hand of any honest and upright white man. You know why. But perhaps I can right things this way, and I want to, and I’ll take the risk. It will not be so great, and Itzlan will stand by me and protect me, no matter what comes.”
They heard him turn about.