Mr. Decker then tells hew he rented a house adjoining the prison, and instructed Miss Cisneros to give the drugged candies to the other women who were in the prison with her. As soon as the drug produced the desired effect on them, the bars of the prison were cut from the outside, and Miss Cisneros was assisted through the window, onto the roof of the house Mr. Decker had rented, kept in concealment for two days, and then smuggled on board a ship, bound for the land of liberty.
Her arrival in New York is thus described:
"Evangeline Cisneros, one week ago a prisoner among the outcast wretches in a Havana prison, is a guest at the Waldorf hotel. Surrounded by luxury and elegance, she is alternately laughing and crying over the events of one short week. One week ago last night a correspondent broke the bars of her cell and led her to liberty over the flat roofs of the Cuban capital. It is the memory of those thrilling few minutes that meant for her a lifetime of captivity or a future of peace and liberty that most often occurs to her now.
"She arrived to-day on the Ward liner, Seneca, and was taken from the steamer by a boat at quarantine, thanks to the courtesy of the Government and the quarantine authorities. When the Seneca sailed from Havana there figured on the passenger list one Juan Sola. A girl who signed the name of Juana Sola to the declaration, exacted by the Custom House officers, was the nearest passenger to making good the lost one. Her declaration was that she brought nothing dutiable into the country.
"If ever that declaration was truthfully made, it was made in the case of this brown-eyed, chestnut-haired girl, who was so anxious to please the man who made her sign. All she had was the simple red gown she had on her back and a bundle that contained a suit of clothes such as a planter's son might have worn.
"Those were the clothes that Juan Sola wore when he ran up the gang-plank in Havana, with a big slouch hat over the chestnut hair, that even danger of discovery could not tempt her to cut, and a fat cigar between a red, laughing pair of lips that accidentally, maybe, blew a cloud of smoke into the face of the chief of police, who was watching that plank, and made the features of the young man very indistinct indeed.
"There was no reason why the chief of police should scan too closely the young man with the big cigar. Juan Sola's passport had been duly issued by the Spanish government, and as far as the papers showed, there was no reason to suspect him.
"Of course Juan Sola was the girl the correspondent had rescued from prison, and the fame of whose escape was on every tongue in Havana, the girl for whose capture the police had for three days been breaking into houses and guarding the roads, and yet she passed under their noses with no disguise but a boy's suit of clothes.
"Miss Cisneros did not court any more danger than was necessary,
and at once went to her cabin. The next day, however, when Morro
Castle was left far behind, she appeared on deck, transformed into
Senorita Juana Sola, alias Evangelina Cisneros.
"When the ship sighted Cape Hatteras light the young woman asked what light it was, and when told that it was an American beacon, she knelt down in the saloon and prayed. After that she wept for joy. She must have been all strung up with excitement over her experiences, and when she saw the light she could contain herself no longer, but simply overflowed.