As she stood thus, looking at him over their clasped hands, with her black surfaced eyes, there came the sound of a door opening behind the men. The black eyes of the girl shifted a little from Strawbridge's face and stared over his shoulder. A change came over her features as if she had seen a ghost. Even her scarlet lips paled. With her lips she formed, rather than said the name, "Esteban!"
Both Fombombo and Strawbridge whirled. In the doorway stood a peon boy with a knife in his hand. He wore the cheap finery which peons don for concert night. Esteban's face was drawn and clay-colored, and he stood blinking in the bright light which bewildered his eyes.
The dictator evidently did not know who Esteban was. He rapped out sternly:
"Bribon, what do you mean entering this room without permission?"
The youth replied with a sudden lunge at the President. Strawbridge saw the flash of the knife, and, with a remnant of his old football interference, shot his body, shoulder down, straight into the midriff of the leaping figure.
The American's two hundred and ten pounds hit the boy like a catapult. It smashed him backward and down. His knife snapped out of his hands, his hat flew off, his head struck heavily on the tiled floor. The general was calling angrily for the guards. A moment later three of these little men entered the door, with their rifles.
The President pointed at the youth on the floor.
"Take that bribon. He made an attack on me. You rascals will have to explain how he got in!"
The three guards, rather panic-struck, pounced on the peon. They got him up and held his arms behind him. Strawbridge's blow in the stomach had made Esteban sick, and now he bent over as far as his captors would permit, retching and slobbering, with anguished eyes looking at the girl.
"Madruja!" he gasped between his convulsions. "Eh, Madruja, mi vida, I would give my last breath for—"