"He is to change his clothes then? Will your worship be pleased to give a helping hand, for it will be a full hour before he gets the use of his limbs. A damnable shower-bath it is, this inferniello; and for that matter, so are they all."
It was with no small difficulty that the alguazil accomplished his task of undressing the prisoner, who seemed more dead than alive, and lay passive and motionless while he was stripped, first of his manga, then of his embroidered jacket, and finally of his hose. He seemed to have lost nearly all sensation; only at times an agonized sigh burst from his over-charged breast, and was accompanied by a convulsive quivering of the whole body. His sufferings had evidently been dreadful.
"We will leave him his under garments," said the alcalde, who had experienced, on trying to remove them, that kind of unconscious resistance which even persons in a swoon will sometimes make when their instinctive sense of modesty is wounded. Then, throwing his cloak round the prisoner, he took him in his arms, and partly bore, partly dragged him out of the inferniello.
"Is it he?" asked one of the two figures who had remained near the pillar, raising the cap a little as he spoke.
"It is," muttered the other.
"It is," repeated the alguazil.
"De pregonero a verdugo," muttered the executioner; "so says the proverb, but here things are reversed. Follow me, Señorias—I will lead you to a place where he shall sleep safely; that is to say if the rats, whom he will have for companions, will allow him."
The party now disappeared in the windings of a corridor, whence, after a short absence, the executioner and alguazil again emerged, bringing with them a young man whose stature, hair, and general appearance, coincided strongly with those of the prisoner they had just carried away. Like the latter, the newcomer had a cap drawn over his face, but he appeared much less exhausted and suffering.
"Jesus Maria! Where am I, Señores? For the mother of God's sake, where am I?"
"Silencio!" growled the hangman, placing him against the wall, and beginning to undress him. The manga as soon stripped off, and the jacket followed.