There was only one way to put the hazard to the touch. This was to send Palacio into Cartagena with a note to the bizarre old gentleman. It meant revealing the hiding-place on the hill of La Popa and inviting capture. The message would have to be an appeal to find some ingenious plan of smuggling the fugitive through the city streets. He was not yet strong enough even to walk down the rocky path to the foot of the hill.
“A rotten poor bet,” said the guest of the good Palacio, “but show me another one. And if I can get into Cartagena, I can get out again. By God, I’m going to kiss my girl.”
CHAPTER X
THE GREAT YELLOW TIGER
Sending a message to Señor Bazán was easier said than done. Pen and paper were not essential to the simple life of Palacio for the excellent reason that he had never learned to read or write. The hut was rummaged in vain. Much perturbed, Palacio limped into the chapel and returned with a tattered missal. Heaven knows how long this illuminated black-letter volume had reposed in a dusty niche of the pulpit. Sacrilege it might be to tear out a broad-margined leaf, but Palacio promised himself to do penance. With a sharp bit of charcoal the derelict mariner wrote on the margin:
My Dear Señor Bazán:
I am disabled and in serious trouble. If you feel like lending a hand, you will have to send somebody to get me down the hill of La Popa, and safely to your house. The Señorita Teresa Fernandez told me how to say ver las orejas del lobo. “To see the ears of the wolf” means to be in great danger, I take it. This seems to fit the case of
Yours sincerely
Richard Cary
Anxiously Palacio looked on and furiously rumpled his gray beard. He did not approve. To hear the name of old Ramon Bazán was enough. Some unpleasant gossip or other had lingered in his simple mind. He had not always been the hermit of La Popa. Timidly at first and then in a scolding humor he objected to the procedure. The beloved guest was safe, as things were, and rapidly regaining health and vigor. Leave it to Palacio to safeguard him against his enemies and, in due time, to devise some means of flight. It might be up the great river and across the mountains to the other ocean, such a journey as Palacio had made in his own youth.