Zorro and the Little Devil Read online

  Zorro didn’t answer because he didn’t have the opportunity … Don Alejandro had stepped between them and he announced, “This man is Senor Zorro, the Curse of Capistrano!”

  Del Riego simply stared. “Is that name supposed to mean something to me, other than the word ‘fox?’”

  “He is a local legend!” said Don Alejandro.

  “In California, you mean.”

  “Yes!”

  “Well, since I am not exactly local to California, it would make sense that his legend has not reached my ears.” He frowned. “I don’t understand why he is wearing a mask. Where I come from, only thieves wear masks. Is this man a thief?”

  “He … has been known to steal occasionally,” Don Alejandro admitted but then quickly added, “But it is always to benefit the poor.”

  “So he steals from the rich to give money to the poor.”

  “Yes! Exactly!”

  “How very Robin Hood of him,” said del Riego grimly. “Nevertheless, if he is a thief, then he is an outlaw and should be arrested.”

  “No!” Don Alejandro cried out.

  “Lieutenant Colonel,” Quintero said, stepping forward. “I am Captain Quintero of Los Angeles. I am the enforcer of the law in that district.”

  “So you must know this Zorro, then?”

  “Very well, Lieutenant Commander.”

  “All right. I defer authority in this matter over to you. What is to be done with him?”

  Zorro stared at Quintero, knowing that he was through. Quintero would unmask him and then very likely, taking no chances, would order him strung up from the nearest yardarm.

  Quintero returned the look.

  “He is a valuable tool in my battles against bandits,” Quintero said. “He is a useful ally and I would ask you to look beyond whatever petty infractions he has committed against people who likely have more riches than they know what to do with.”

  Zorro couldn’t believe it. Don Alejandro smiled broadly.

  “Very well,” said del Riego. To Zorro’s surprise, del Riego then turned and bowed formally to him. “I am sorry to have misjudged you, Senor Zorro.”

  Zorro waved it off. “It is nothing. It happens all the time.”

  Then del Riego turned and looked at Maria’s fallen body. “Shall we throw her over the side as well?”

  “No,” Quintero said immediately. “I would very much appreciate it if you could turn her body over to me, Lieutenant Colonel. Despite the unhealthy alliances she formed at the end of her life, she is nevertheless my sister. I would like to give her a genuine burial.”

  “As you wish,” said del Riego.

  There was a rolled up piece of parchment lying on the deck. Alejandro picked it up, unrolled it, and then promptly glanced from the scroll to the opened treasure chest nearby. “The body in that chest … it is the son of a pirate.”

  “He deserves burial as well,” said Senor Zorro.

  “He will have one,” said Quintero firmly. “I will see to it.”

  Del Riego’s attention had shifted back to Maria. “So she was your sister, eh? Hard to believe that a brother would become a defender of law and order and his sister becomes a pirate.”

  And Quintero said, “I think, deep inside, we are all pirates. It’s just that some of us choose not to act on it.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Things to Say at a Funeral

  Quintero stood in front of the grave as he watched the entombers slowly lower Maria’s coffin into it.

  Fray Felipe stood near the place where the headstone would eventually be set, muttering prayers in Latin while crossing himself. There were a number of other people there as well. Most of them were soldiers under his command, who had shown up because Quintero specifically said he wanted a decent turn out for his sister’s burial.

  Standing a short distance away was Miguel. Freeing him from jail had been the first thing that Quintero had done. He had his soldiers bring Miguel up to his office and there offered him his deepest and sincerest apologies.

  “Apologizing? To me?” Miguel was barely able to understand why this was happening.

  “Because I ignored your warnings,” Quintero had replied. “I should have listened to you. I should have trusted your source. Instead, pure foolishness caused me to turn you away and arrest you. If I had paid attention, I could have prevented my sister from dying. Her death is on my hands.”

  “Did you stab her? Shoot her? Anything like that?”

  Quintero shook his head.

  “Then you have nothing to blame yourself for, Captain,” Miguel said formally. “I have no doubt you did your best, and cannot consider yourself responsible for her passing.”

  Quintero had stared at him for a long moment. Then he asked, “How are you with horses?”

  “I love horses,” Miguel said. “Many years ago, I was a stable master before my life took some unexpected turns.”

  “We require a stable master here at the pueblo,” Quintero had told him. “There is a minimal salary, but you would have a room here and dine with the soldiers, so you would have very few expenses.”

  “You are offering me a job?” Miguel’s eyes were wide with incredulity. “Truly? I … I am astounded, Captain. I don’t know what to say!”

  “The expected answer is yes.”

  “Yes, absolutely, yes!”

  Now Miguel was standing near him, his eyes lowered, his lips muttering some sort of prayer.

  And standing a few feet away were Don Alejandro de la Vega and his son, Diego. He knew that Alejandro could appreciate the depths of his feelings, but doubted Diego was capable of feeling much of anything.

  The Fray finished his prayers, crossed himself, and then looked toward Quintero. “Do you wish to say anything, Captain?”

  Quintero had been wondering about exactly that for quite some time. Now was the moment to speak of his sister. Now was the moment to say nice things or evil things. To speak of her for the unfulfilled hopes of a life cut short, or the righteous anger of a brother who had seen his sister hanging around with evil pirate cretins.

  Should he speak the truth? Or speak the lies left over in his heart from a relationship that had never really existed?

  He shook his head and raised a hand, waving the Fray off.

  Felipe’s eyes shifted to Diego’s father. “Don Alejandro?”

  Alejandro likewise shook his head.

  Felipe seemed to shrug and began to lift his prayer book for the final blessing when, to Quintero’s astonishment, Don Diego took several steps forward, stopped, and began to speak.

  “I thank thee God, that I have lived

  In this great world and known its many joys:

  The songs of birds, the strongest sweet scent of hay,

  And cooling breezes in the secret dusk;

  The flaming sunsets at the close of day,

  Hills and the lovely, heather-covered moors;

  Music at night, and the moonlight on the sea,

  The beat of waves upon the rocky shore

  And wild white spray, flung high in ecstasy;

  The faithful eyes of dogs, and treasured books,

  The love of Kin and fellowship of friends

  And all that makes life dear and beautiful.

  “I thank Thee too, that there has come to me

  A little sorrow and sometimes defeat,

  A little heartache and the loneliness

  That comes with parting and the words ‘Good-bye’;

  Dawn breaking after weary hours of pain,

  When I discovered that night’s gloom must yield

  And morning light break through to me again.

  Because of these and other blessings poured

  Unasked upon my wondering head,

  Because I know that there is yet to come

  An even richer and more glorious life,

  And most of all, because Thine only Son

  Once sacrificed life’s loveliness for me,

  I thank Thee, God, that I have lived.�
��

  There was a long silence after Diego spoke. Finally Quintero broke it. “That was beautiful,” he said. “Did you write it?”

  Diego shook his head. “A woman. Elizabeth Craven, if I am recalling her name correctly.”

  “A woman?” said Quintero in clear surprise. “I had no idea that women could write such lovely things.”

  “Oh, you’d be surprised. Women can do most things that men can do, and some things that men cannot.”

  Slowly Quintero nodded. “That was certainly my sister, all right.”

  The Fray read the final blessings, and then Quintero picked up a shovel, scooped up a mound of dirt, and dropped it down onto the coffin. It was purely ceremonial; the entombers were going to take care of the rest.

  Quintero couldn’t bring himself to stay and watch. He turned on his heel then and walked away. Alejandro and Diego fell into step on either side of him.

  “She might not have been the woman that either of us believed her to be,” said Don Alejandro. “But in the end, she did the right thing. She slew her slayer.”

  “Yes, she did,” said Quintero. Surprisingly, he chuckled. “That is very typical of her, to exact final vengeance on he who did her wrong.”

  “Will you inform your mother of her passing?” Diego asked.

  Quintero shook his head. “She is old and weak. Let her pass with the belief that both of her children are out among the world, accomplishing mighty deeds. And if Maria is able to get into heaven, she can be at the front gates to welcome my mother in.”

  “And what of Zorro?” Diego asked. “My father tells me that you spared him with del Riego. That, indeed, you spoke quite highly of him.”

  “He tried to warn me of Diabolito’s plans. If I had listened to him, we would not be burying my sister, and your father and I would never have been captured. I felt I owed him a debt for his attempts, at least, to do good. But that debt is now paid in full. When next I see him, it will be as his adversary.”

  “You know what, Captain?” said Diego. He put a hand on Quintero’s shoulder. “I’d wager Senor Zorro wouldn’t have it any other way.”

  Diego and the Baron

  By Hieronymus Karl Friedrich von Münchausen

  In which the Baron escapes the great fish … lands in America … meets a young boy … rescues another … battles a god.

  I have learned from experience that a modicum of snuff can be most efficacious.

  One well-placed bit of it into the great fish’s snout caused the beast to expel air in a sneeze that was remarkably prodigious. I clutched firmly onto the reins of my beauty of a horse, my Bucephalus of a creature, as dear to me as Alexander’s mount was to him, and we rode out of the monster’s mouth to be pitched directly into the waters of the Pacific of oceans.

  I was most relieved that I had taught my horse to swim at some point in my past, which, if I am to be totally honest as I always am, the details of the lessons have passed on in my mind. I am not a young man, after all, and so should be allowed those occasions when the specifics of one of my feats is poorly recalled. Fortunately enough, the horse recalled it perfectly and so, with its legs pumping away quite indefatigably, the horse swam with much vehemence toward what appeared to be a welcoming shoreline.

  I must admit I was concerned that the great beast would return, seeking vengeance upon me for having managed to evacuate its mouth through the usage of snuff. It appeared, however, that it had lost its taste, either for combat or merely for me. So it was that the beast did not make any sort of return engagement and I was able to steer my intrepid mount to safety.

  The horse nearly stumbled as it mounted the saving shore and I immediately wondered in what land I had now found myself. Warm air wafted around me, which led me to think I was somewhere near the equator, but there was no way that I could know for certainty.

  I rode cautiously forward. My steed seemed to be on unsteady legs, which led me to believe that the poor creature was hungry. Fortunately I had a sack of feed still dangling from my belt, and so I dismounted, went around to the horse’s head, and opened up the bag so that it could put its snout within and sate its appetite. There did not seem to be any source of fresh water about, but I did what I could to satisfy my horse’s hunger.

  It was at that moment I heard the rapid patter of feet. They were very light, which indicated to me the possessor was doubtless a young boy. Considering how fast his feet were moving, and the audible huffing and puffing of breath in and out of his lungs, it was plainly evident to me that something had him most agitated. I had no idea what it might be, but it was clear that he was coming closer to me with every passing moment.

  Seconds later I saw him. There was an outcropping of rocks off to the left and from that partly obscured area came the young boy, running as fast as he could.

  For a young boy, he was remarkably well dressed. He seemed to be a decade in age. Yet despite his youth, he was not clad in short pants but instead in blue trousers that were lined with some manner of gilt edging running down either pants leg. It might have gone quite well with a matching jacket, but the lad was sporting none. Instead he was wearing a white shirt that had apparently already undergone some manner of damage. The parts of the sleeve covering his elbows were torn, and there was blood trickling from scratches that had obviously occurred earlier. There were also dirt stains on the front of the shirt as if the lad had been digging into a pit or some other deep, muddy place.

  His eyes widened when he saw me, and he ran up to me and started speaking quickly. The language was English, but with a pronounced Spanish accent. English being a second language in which I was reasonably proficient, I knew that I would be able to understand him, but he was going to have to accommodate me by slowing down his speech because he was so overly excited and clearly so wound up that I found it impossible to discern individual words and thus fully understand what in the world had gotten the lad so agitated.

  ***

  He nodded and started repeating himself again, some babble about a vast pit and someone whom I thought he declared as being named Bedardo, which was certainly the most unusual moniker that my old ears had ever discerned. I put up both of my hands to cause the boy to cease his babbling. When I finally managed to get him to stop talking, I addressed him in as slow and mannered a form that I could muster.

  “First thing is first, dear boy,” I said, hoping that adopting a paternal mien would help ease his concerns. “Where am I, exactly?”

  The boy blinked in what I assumed to be surprise. “You are on a beach in Los Angeles.”

  “And what part of Spain is this Los Angeles?”

  He shook his head so violently that I thought it might topple off his head because of his vehemence. “It’s in California. In America.”

  America. The country that went back on its agreements with its founding nation and fought a battle for independence that the British actually managed to lose even though they outnumbered their enemy ten to one. I must say that the British never really seemed to manage warfare all that well, standing second only to the French when it came to outright incompetence.

  “I see,” said I. “And do you have a name here in America?”

  The boy once again nodded near frantically. “Diego. Diego de la Vega.”

  “Greetings, young Diego. It appears to me that you seem rather frantic. Please tell me, as slowly as you can utter the words since English is not my primary tongue.”

  Young Diego clearly understood because he spoke very clearly then.

  It seemed that he and his young playmate, who it turned out was in fact named Bernardo, not Bedardo, although I must admit that I had ne’er heard the name Bernardo either before arriving on this strange land, had been playing and exploring in a range of caves not far off. Apparently Diego’s father had cautioned him to stay away from the site, but in the spirit of young boys everywhere, Diego had only taken that forbidding rule of his father as a challenge to in fact go exactly where he had been forbidden.

  Berna
rdo had joined him, because apparently the two lads were good friends, despite, as I later discovered, the fact that Bernardo was a member of the native citizens of the country who had oftentimes, as it turned out, been displaced by the newly arrived colonists over a period of many years. Apparently Bernardo did not hold a grudge against Diego or his associates for the crimes committed against them, which I must say was rather sporting of him.

  So it was that when the boys entered into the cave to explore it, Bernardo had tumbled forward into some unseen drop that neither of the boys had managed to spot before Bernardo fell. Diego said that he never heard Bernardo hit the ground far below, which made him think that the pit was truly bottomless in nature and he would never see his friend again.

  I asked the terrified lad if he had attempted to descend into the pit himself, to which he vehemently shook his head. “Did he not call out for help?” I asked.

  “He cannot speak,” Diego said to me.

  “Does he not know the language?”

  “Oh, he knows it,” Diego assured me. “He just cannot speak. Or hear very well.”

  “Then we shall attend to him,” I said firmly.

  The boy seemed to study me then, his glance taking in my sword and uniform. “Are you a soldier?” he asked of me.

  “I,” I said with grandeur, “am Baron Hieronymus Karl Friedrich von Münchausen. You may bow to me if you wish, although that token of respect is not mandatory.”

  “I don’t bow,” young Diego informed me.

  It was at that point I began to reform my earlier opinion of Diego. I had assumed him to be some typical poor lad who lived somewhere about in a hut. But the pride with which he now spoke led me to assume that he was, in fact, of some local nobility. The specifics of it did not matter, but it is always good to know exactly with whom you are dealing.

  “Very well, my little non-bowing friend.” I reached down a hand and he immediately took it. I pulled him up onto the horse’s back and settled him on the saddle in front of me. “Do you know how to steer a horse?”

  “Yes. My father taught me.”