"Here, I say, Cojuelo, cut out this bluff about torture and all that sort of nonsense," exclaimed Standish, with just a suspicion of unsteadiness in his voice. "I tell you I am prepared to pay any sum within reason as a ransom, and you won't get any more by threatening me with physical violence. Look here, I'm willing to apologise for having tried to shoot you, but you know you exasperated me by taunting me about not valuing Miss Rostrevor."

"What a charming piece of condescension on your part!" sneered Cojuelo. "If Don Carlos de Ruiz lied to the Senorita Rostrevor, I shall shoot him. That is another promise, senorita. As for you, perhaps the lash and the red hot iron on your flesh will induce you to speak truth as well as test your courage!"

He turned to the door, outside which the man with the keys was standing.

"Mendoza, order Perez, Riafio and Garcilaso to get ready the whipping post and make hot the branding irons at once," he commanded in Spanish, then repeated the order in English for the benefit of Standish, whose face went livid.

"Oh, surely you won't be so fiendishly cruel!" burst out Myra passionately. "If you dare to harm Tony——"

"We will withdraw, senorita, and leave Senor Standish to nerve himself for the ordeal that awaits him," interrupted Cojuelo, and hustled her out of the cell before she could say more. "I swear I did not lie to you, Myra," he resumed, as he clanged the door shut on the prisoner. "I am bluffing now, and have no intention of flogging or branding Standish, but only of scaring him into confessing that he is willing to give you to me to save himself."

"And if he stands the test, if he refuses to give me up even when threatened with flogging and burning, you will keep your promise and set us both free?" asked Myra, after a breathless pause.

"Yes, assuredly—and I shall also keep my promise to shoot Don Carlos," was the grim reply. "Look, is it not a picturesque scene?" he added, with a change of tone.

The great cave, lighted by electricity, was certainly a remarkable sight, filled as it was with a picturesque crowd of men, some of them in what looked like stage costumes, nearly all chattering like excited children anticipating a treat as they watched some of their fellows erecting a whipping-post in the centre of the place, while another was busy working the bellows of what looked like a blacksmith's furnace and making irons red-hot. A scene a great artist might have loved to paint, yet the atmosphere was so sinister that Myra shivered involuntarily.

"You are frightened, senorita?" queried Don Carlos, and it seemed to Myra there was something mocking and sardonic in his tone. "In England, I remember, you were renowned for your courage and your love of adventure. Surely this is a great adventure?"

The remark stung Myra's pride, and her fair face flushed hotly.

"It disgusts and revolts me that you should try to terrorise a defenceless man to gratify your own vanity and humiliate me," she answered angrily. "As for being afraid, the remote prospect of having to marry you certainly frightens me."

Don Carlos made no answer, but strode across and talked rapidly to the men gathered round the whipping post and the furnace, evidently explaining to them at length what he wished them to do. Myra, of course, could not understand what was said, but she saw that some of the men laughed while others looked disappointed, and she concluded that Don Carlos was telling them that the preparations for the torture of the Englishman were all bluff.

"God grant that Tony's courage does not fail him, and that he stands the test," she whispered under her breath.

"It will be necessary for you to remain and witness the performance, senorita," said Don Carlos coldly, returning to her. "If I spared you the ordeal, you might again refuse to believe me when I reported the result."

"I wish to stay," Myra answered, and her red-gold head went up proudly. "My presence will give the man I love courage."

"It is a great gamble, and you, fair lady, are the stake," said Don Carlos. "The stage is set and our fate will be decided within a few minutes."

He nodded his cowled head, shouted some orders in Spanish to his men, and took up a position beside the whipping-post, which somewhat resembled an ancient pillory. Four men hurried to the cell in which Standish was confined, to reappear after the lapse of a few minutes with the prisoner between them.

They had stripped Standish to the waist, and he walked forward with firm step and head erect, but at the sight of the whipping-post and the furnace, and the sinister figure beside them with a cat-o'-nine-tails in his hand, he halted suddenly with an involuntary gasp, and his face went ashen.

"Cojuelo, you—you can't mean that you are going to be such a fiend as to torture me!" he burst out breathlessly. "I haven't done you any harm. Look here, I'll—I'll double the ransom if you'll let me off. I'll make it twenty thousand pounds."

"Not for fifty thousand pounds would I forego my vengeance," rasped the hooded figure. "Yet you have but to confess that you did agree to go away and leave the Senorita Rostrevor here, well knowing what would happen to her, you have only to tell her now that you renounce her to me, and I will let you go unharmed."

"Don't, Tony, don't!" cried Myra. "Be brave, dear!"

Standish, who had not previously noticed her, jerked round his head at the sound of her voice.

"Myra, for God's sake intercede for me," he screamed, and began to struggle violently as his guards seized him and began to drag him towards the pillory. "Beg him to spare me!"

"Oh, Tony, don't fail me!" cried Myra, shamed by his display of terror. "Don't be a coward! Be brave! Be British!"

Struggling, shouting, protesting and appealing frantically, his face livid and the sweat of fear pouring down it, Standish was dragged towards the stake.

"The burning irons first, I think," snarled Cojuelo. "The burns will make the lash more effective afterwards."

The man beside the furnace drew from the fire a branding iron, the end of which was red-hot, and made a threatening movement. Standish squealed like a rabbit caught in a trap.

"Don't! Don't!" he shrieked in a frenzy of terror. "Oh, spare me, spare me! I'll give her up. I—I can't face it. You can have her!"

"Do you still accuse Don Carlos of having lied?" demanded Cojuelo remorselessly. "Is it not true that you were willing to escape with him, or by his aid, and leave the senorita?"

"Yes, yes, it is true," gasped Standish. "I lied to Myra to try to—to save my face. Don Carlos said he would look after her. Let me go! Let me go!"

"You hear, senorita?" exclaimed Don Carlos, his voice ringing out triumphantly. "To save his own skin, your lover has renounced you.... Release the brave Englishman, my friends. The farce is over."

Nauseated by Tony's piteous exhibition of craven terror, Myra turned away from him in loathing and contempt as the men released him.

"Oh, you coward!" she burst out passionately. "I was so sure you would stand the test and would not fail me that I promised I would marry this devil in your presence if you were dastard enough to offer to give me to him to save your own skin. All these preparations for torture were only bluff to test your courage and your love. You have failed me, Tony, in my hour of greatest need, and I hate and despise you. I would give myself to any bandit now rather than marry you!"

"I hold you to your promise, senorita," cried Cojuelo. "You will marry me here and now in the presence of Senor Standish.... Come hither, Padre Sancho, and perform the marriage service."

A fat little bald-headed man, dressed in a greasy black cassock and carpet slippers, shuffled forward and addressed some questions to Myra in a wheezy voice.

"He is asking if you are willing to marry me," Cojuelo interpreted.

"Yes, I will keep my promise and marry you in the presence of the man who has failed me," said Myra, and flashed a glance at Standish that made him quail.

"Here, I say! I—I didn't realise it was bluff," faltered Standish. "I'll do anything... Cojuelo, I'll pay you fifty thousand if only you'll——"

"Proceed with the ceremony, Padre Sancho," interrupted Cojuelo; and the monk opened his book and began to gabble unintelligibly in his wheezy voice. Presently he paused and addressed a question to the hooded figure.

"I will," said Cojuelo, and took Myra's listless hand in his own. "You Myra, will also answer 'I will,' when the Padre asks you. This ring, which I took from the finger of Don Carlos de Ruiz, will serve for the present."

"Myra, for heaven's sake——" broke in Tony Standish, but Myra paid no heed to him.

"I will," she answered firmly, in response to the priest's unintelligible question.

It struck her suddenly that the priest did not appear to be treating the ceremony seriously, and the thought flashed into her mind that possibly "Padre Sancho" was only one of the brigands deputed by Don Carlos to play a part, and the whole proceeding was as much bluff as had been the preparations to torture Tony Standish.

"Is he fooling me again?" wondered Myra, as Padre Sancho gabbled through the rest of the service, closed his book and raised his right hand as if bestowing a blessing, whereupon some of the brigands behind and around him began to cheer. They cheered more lustily still when their hooded chief put his arm round Myra's shoulders with an air of possession.

"Mother Dolores will escort you to your room, Myra," said Don Carlos. "Forgive your bridegroom for not accompanying you. I have to arrange for the release of Senor Standish."



CHAPTER XVII

Myra was infinitely glad to escape, and she flung herself down in a chair with a sigh that was half a sob when she reached her bedroom.

"You may go, Dolores," she said, and motioned away the old woman, who had been murmuring congratulations.

"Si, maestra, buena maestra," said Dolores smilingly, as she withdrew.

"'Maestra?'—That means 'mistress,'" ruminated Myra. "In what sense is it used? He used the word when he addressed his men after the mock-marriage. 'Nueva maestra,' I think he called me. That must mean 'new mistress.' His new mistress! How many mistresses have there been—and what is going to happen to me? ... Oh, why didn't Tony play the man!"

Time passed and the suspense was becoming almost unbearable when the sound of heavy footsteps in the rocky corridor made Myra's heart jump convulsively. She started to her feet as the door opened to reveal Don Carlos, still wearing his cowl. Behind him were Garcilaso and Mendoza with Standish, now fully dressed and with a bandage round his eyes, between them.

"Does the Senora Cojuelo wish to say farewell to the lover who renounced her?" inquired Don Carlos, with a note of mockery in his voice. "I am now about to redeem my promise and have him escorted back unharmed to the Castillo de Ruiz."

"Why are his eyes bandaged?" asked Myra sharply. "What has happened to him?"

"Nothing has happened," Don Carlos assured her. "The bandage is merely a precautionary measure. He was brought here blindfolded, so that he might have no idea as to the location of my mountain nest. He leaves blindfolded for the same reason. Don Carlos de Ruiz will follow him when I so choose. Have you anything to say to Senor Standish?"

"Nothing," answered Myra, after a moment of hesitation.

"Myra, if only——" said Standish hoarsely, and paused, gulping as if he were choking. "I suppose it isn't any use attempting to say anything," he added weakly.

"Except farewell," remarked Don Carlos ironically, and laid his hand on Myra's arm. "Permit me to escort you to the door, senora mia, to witness the departure of Senor Standish."

In the wake of Standish and his escort, he led Myra along the corridor to the outer hall, and Myra, her senses acute, watched him closely as he manipulated knobs which looked like part of the rocky wall and the great door that looked like rock itself swung open.

"Lead the English senor forward carefully, and remember I have pledged my word that he shall be returned safely to the castle of Don Carlos de Ruiz," said Don Carlos in Spanish. "Farewell, senor," he added in English. "You will have great stories to tell on your return to England of your encounter with El Diablo Cojuelo and how you escaped from him!"

Standish's face contorted in momentary passion, then with a sigh and a gesture of utter despair he submitted himself to be led away by Mendoza and Garcilaso. Myra, her face tense and white, took an involuntary step forward, and instantly Don Carlos's hand closed on her arm.

"You forget, dear lady, that you are the price of his freedom, and your place is with your husband," he said, as he drew her back into the hall and touched a lever which released the door.

To Myra the clang of the door as it shut seemed like a death-knell.

Don Carlos took off his cowl and flung it aside, smoothed his jet-black hair with his hands, and drew a long breath. His eyes and expression were inscrutable as he gazed fixedly at Myra.

"Exit Mr. Antony Standish," he said slowly, after a pause. "One chapter of your life is closed, Myra. Now another opens, the most wonderful chapter of all, in which you will fulfil your destiny."

Myra suddenly found herself cold and trembling, and to gain time and avoid Don Carlos's eyes she crossed the room to the radiator and held out her shaking hands to its warmth.

"Are you frightened, Myra mine?" asked Don Carlos gently crossing to her side. "Are you still afraid of love?"

"If this is your idea of love, I hate it!" responded Myra with sudden passion. "You have humiliated me until I feel that I am less than the dust. What greater humiliation could you inflict on any woman than to prove to her that the man who professed to love her would surrender her to a bandit? You have humiliated me as much as Tony Standish, and perhaps you have further humiliations in store."

"If you have a sense of proportion, you should thank me instead of reproaching me for proving Standish to be at heart a knave," Don Carlos retorted, the hard note creeping into his voice again. "If you tell me you still love him, and prefer him to me, I will send you back to him at once. Can you truthfully say that you still love him and would marry him if you were free?"

Myra shook her red-gold head despairingly, and sank down into a corner of the couch with a sigh.

"If he were the only man on earth, I would not marry him now," she answered. "But that does not alter the case or excuse your conduct."

"I do not understand, Myra," said Don Carlos. "It was only because you had promised to marry Standish that you hardened your heart against love and me. You have surrendered to love now, at last, and——"

"I have not," interrupted Myra. "I hate you for what has happened."

"Yet, hating me, you have become my wife," Don Carlos commented, with an air of perplexity.

"I am not your wife," protested Myra. "You have fooled me before, but you cannot fool me into believing that the farcical service, gabbled in a language I do not understand by one of your men masquerading as a monk, constitutes a marriage."

"Padre Sancho is an ordained priest. The ceremony was not a farce. You are now my wife—the wife of El Diablo Cojuelo, the outlaw. Later on, when you marry Don Carlos—if Don Carlos still desires you—you shall have a more elaborate ceremony, if you wish it, and you will be doubly married without being a bigamist."

There came an interruption at that moment. Madre Dolores appeared, murmuring apologies, with a tall glass of wine in her skinny hand, and seemingly made some appeal to Don Carlos.

"Myra, some of my men are holding festival to celebrate our marriage, and they have sent Mother Dolores to ask us to do them the honour of taking wine with them and allowing them to toast us," Don Carlos explained. "It would be a gracious act, which will endear you to all my men, to consent."

"But I have told you I cannot believe the marriage ceremony was other than a farce," objected Myra. "Is this another trick to humiliate me and make it appear I have surrendered?"

"Again you misjudge me," replied Don Carlos abruptly. "It is a compliment, and should be proof to you that my men know the marriage ceremony was no farce. They will take it as an affront if you refuse their invitation."

"What does that matter to me?" exclaimed Myra rebelliously.

Don Carlos's brows drew together and he looked chagrined.

"Tell the men, Mother Dolores, that the senora is either as lacking in courage as the Englishman, or considers them such a gang of cut-throat ruffians, that she cannot be persuaded to nerve herself to face them," he said, addressing the old woman. "Tell them she is aware she is affronting them and——"

"How dare you suggest I am a coward?" interrupted Myra, starting to her feet. "Tell them nothing of the sort, Dolores. I am not afraid to face them——"

"So we will be graciously pleased to accept the invitation," added Don Carlos as she paused.

"Yes," said Myra. "Otherwise, I suppose, you will taunt me with being a coward."

"I think I managed that rather cleverly, Myra," Don Carlos said, his face crinkling into a mischievous smile. "I thought you would not notice that I was giving my instructions to Mother Dolores in English, of which she scarcely understands a word!"

Myra crimsoned in annoyance, but she made no retort, nor did she offer any protest when Don Carlos, after a few words of thanks to the puzzled Dolores, who scurried away, drew her hand through his arm and led her through the corridors to the great cave.

Dolores had spread the news of their coming, and every man was on his feet, glass or flagon in hand. Myra and Don Carlos were each handed a tall glass of wine, and the band drank their health with enthusiasm, shouting all sorts of good wishes. Don Carlos toasted them in turn, drained his glass, and called to Myra to follow his example.

"Drink to me and to love, Myra mine," he cried.

Myra was so confused by the shouting and by the men pressing around with uplifted glasses and flagons that she scarcely knew what she was doing and hurriedly swallowed the wine.

"Thank you, beloved," said Don Carlos, drawing her hand into the crook of his arm again. "We will go now."

Through the corridors they went again, and Myra's heart seemed to miss a beat as he paused at her bedroom and opened the door. She looked up at him with dread and appeal in her dilated blue eyes, to see him smiling exultantly.

"Mine! Mine at last, Myra!" he said in a low, vibrant voice, as he slipped his arm around her waist and drew her into the room. "The hour for which I have waited and craved."

"Don Carlos, is it useless to appeal to you to let me go?" gasped Myra. "Surely I have suffered enough without—without—this——?"

"Darling, why should you fear love now?" responded Don Carlos tenderly, enfolding her in his arms. "Let me fire your heart with the burning ardour of my passion. I have won you, and I swore I would, and I claim my reward. Myra, mia, I want you—want you!"

His dark eyes were ablaze with ardour, his lean face was flushed, and his breath was coming and going pantingly as he crushed Myra to him and kissed her until his kisses seemed to be burning her very Soul and her senses were reeling. All power of resistance had gone from her. She felt dazedly as if she were encompassed by flames and no hope of escape. She was conquered....

* * *

Languidly Myra opened her eyes—and sat up with an involuntary cry of consternation, for she could see nothing, and the terrifying thought flashed through her mind that she had gone blind. Then she remembered that the rocky apartment was dark as a tomb when the electric lights were not burning, and she groped for the switch.

As the lights sprang to life, realisation of what had happened burned its way into her horrified consciousness, and a burning blush stained her pale, lovely face. She was alone in the bedroom, but she knew instinctively that she had not been alone for long. Her hands went convulsively to her breast, and she shuddered violently and moaned in anguish.

Then followed anger—fierce, passionate fury against the man who had imposed his will on her, and with clenched fists she beat the pillow on which she knew his head had rested. The fury of rage speedily exhausted itself, and Myra buried her face in her hands and sobbed fearlessly.

"He will come back," she thought distractedly. "He will come back to make mock of me, to gloat over me. Oh, if only I could get away! If only I could die!"

She sprang out of bed and began to dress in frantic haste, starting at every sound. She could not have explained what she intended to do or the reason for her haste. All she knew was that she must get out of the bedroom before Don Carlos returned.

Her hurried toilet completed, Myra with trembling fingers cautiously opened the bedroom door and peeped out. The rocky corridor was deserted, no sound came from the great cave, and the whole place seemed almost uncannily silent. With an effort of will Myra mastered her panic and tiptoed silently along the corridor towards the outer hall.

The corridor was lighted, but she found the hall, when she reached it, in darkness, save for one tiny light above the electric switch on the wall near the entrance. Myra pressed the switch and at once the apartment was flooded with light.

"Oh, God, help me to remember!" breathed Myra, after a swift glance around, to assure herself the place was untenanted. "Help me to get away—if only it is to die among the mountains."

She had watched Don Carlos closely a few hours previously as he manipulated the levers which opened the secret door when giving Standish his freedom, and the thought had flashed into her mind that she could manipulate the levers as he had done, and escape into the outer world.

Her first attempt was a failure, and she bit her lips in chagrin and hurt her delicate hands tugging vainly at various knobs and slides. But again and again she tried, and at last, when she was about to give up in despair, she heard a sudden click and the great door swung open!



CHAPTER XVIII

With a gasp of relief, Myra darted out, negotiated the narrow crevice which hid the door from view, and found herself in the open—and in brilliant sunshine. She paused for a moment, to collect herself, fancied she heard a noise behind her, and sped away like a startled doe.

There appeared to be no path, and she ran aimlessly and without the slightest sense of direction, clambering over rocks and slithering down slopes, several times narrowly escaping disaster, and once only escaping from plunging headlong over a precipice by clinging frantically to a boulder on the very verge. And the boulder, which must have been balanced like a logan stone, went crashing over the side of the precipice the moment she had released her hold on it and recovered her equilibrium.

Although she had, as it were, been courting death, Myra was so terrified that she could not proceed for several minutes, and she had to muster up all her courage to negotiate the perilous path. After that, she advanced with greater caution, and at last reached a little grassy plateau, a sort of oasis amid the bleak rocks, commanding a magnificent view of the mountain range and the country.

Far below her, Myra could see a twisted white ribbon—so it looked from a distance—which she knew must be a road, and on the white ribbon were ant-like moving objects which she knew must be horses and men—the civil guard and the military, in all probability, seeking for her and for "El Diablo Cojuelo."

"If only I can get to them, I shall be safe," said Myra aloud. "Oh, if only I knew the easiest and quickest way down! I think I can see other men climbing up as if they had seen me... I wonder if they have seen me? I wonder if they could hear me if I called?" She had lost some of her sense of proportion, forgotten how far away the men must be, and she gathered her breath and shouted as loud as she could:

"Help! help!"

Almost instantly there came an answering shout, but to Myra's consternation the shout came from somewhere above her, and not from below. She looked round and upwards, but at first could see no one, then she heard the shout again, heard the voice of Don Carlos cry: "Myra, where are you?" saw a head appear over the side of a rocky ledge about fifty feet above her, and panic seized her again.

From the little plateau there ran for a distance a sort of natural path, and down this Myra fled as fast as her feet would carry her—which was not fast, for already her thin shoes were almost in ribbons, and one foot had been badly cut by a sharp stone. But she was scarcely conscious of the pain in her anxiety to escape.

She could hear Don Carlos shouting to her to stop, and fancied she could hear him in close pursuit as she sped down the steep path. Again she came to the edge of a ravine, and she had to creep cautiously along the edge of a rough and treacherous path.

Glancing over her shoulder after she had crossed the most perilous part, Myra saw that Don Carlos was now close behind her, and that she must inevitably be overtaken. Almost she succumbed to a mad impulse to hurl herself to destruction into the ravine, but in the moment of hesitation before taking the fatal plunge she heard the sound of many voices ascending.

A great boulder blocked her view of the mountainside immediately below her, but on rounding the rock she saw, within a hundred yards of her, a company of men in uniform advancing in straggling order up the mountain. Myra cried out breathlessly, some of the men saw her and shouted excitedly and one who seemed to be an officer came running towards her and reached her side just as Don Carlos appeared behind her.

"Myra, Myra!" shouted Don Carlos. "Do not——"

Myra did not hear the rest of his shout. Excitedly she clutched the arm of the officer of the Guardia Civil.

"Save me! Save me!" she gasped. "That man is El Diablo Cojuelo! Don Carlos is El Diablo Cojuelo! Do you understand? Don't let him take me back."

"Yes, senorita," said the officer quickly in English. "I understand. You alla right now from El Diablo Cojuelo."

"You do not understand," gasped Myra half-frantically, pointing at Don Carlos, now only a few yards away from her. "That man is El Diablo Cojuelo. Don Carlos de Ruiz is El Diablo Cojuelo. Arrest him!"

It seemed to her that as she spoke the words denouncing Don Carlos the whole world went suddenly pitch dark, and she felt herself falling, falling through space. What actually happened was that she fainted, and the officer of the Civil Guard was just in time to catch her ere she fell.

She recovered consciousness to find a swarthy, weather-beaten man supporting her head and holding a water-bottle to her lips, and to see many dark eyes regarding her with sympathetic curiosity. Until her brain cleared she could not realise where she was and what had been happening, and she felt horribly scared. Then she heard the voice of Don Carlos and she remembered everything.

"Don't let him take me back!" she cried, sitting up. "I tell you, he is El Diablo Cojuelo!"

"Alla right, senorita, you secure from El Diablo Cojuelo now," said the officer.

"Yes, you are safe from El Diablo Cojuelo now, Myra," said Don Carlos, moving nearer, "and explanations can wait until we get to the Castle."

Myra realised that it would be rather absurd to continue to try to make the officer, who had but an imperfect knowledge of English, understand that Don Carlos and El Diablo Cojuelo were one man.

Still feeling faint and shaken, Myra was assisted down the mountain-side after a little while, and was eventually lifted on to a mule. The journey to the high road that ran through the heart of the Sierras was accomplished without untoward incident, and by great good fortune a motor car, carrying two high officials of the Guardia Civil, drove up just as the party reached the road. Into the car Myra and Don Carlos were invited, after some voluble explanations on the part of their escort, and were speedily conveyed to El Castillo de Ruiz.

"Welcome home, Myra, my wife," whispered Don Carlos, as he stepped out of the car and proffered his hand. "When you have recovered, we will discuss the question of taking vengeance on El Diablo Cojuelo," he added. "He is now entirely at your mercy."

"And I shall not spare him!" responded Myra.

* * *

"I am simply aching with curiosity, Myra," said Lady Fermanagh a few hours later. "Do, please, tell me everything. Tony has been talking strangely, and Don Carlos is reticent about what happened at the bandit's lair, but I suppose it was he who rescued you."

"Has he said so?" asked Myra.

She had collapsed on reaching the Castillo de Ruiz, but was now feeling better after a long rest, a warm bath, and a dainty meal.

"Not in so many words," answered Lady Fermanagh. "He seems desperately worried, and so does Tony, who says he will have to return to England to-morrow. I can't make out what has been happening, Myra. Do tell me."

"It is difficult to explain, Aunt," said Myra slowly, after much hesitation. "El Diablo Cojuelo professed to have fallen in love with me at first sight, and I was crazy enough to promise to become his wife if Tony offered to renounce me. Tony did renounce me when he was threatened with torture, and I was married to El Diablo Cojuelo in his presence last night. Tony failed me, and now I hate and despise him."

"Myra!" gasped Lady Fermanagh in horrified amazement. "Married to the brigand! You—you don't mean actually married?"

"I don't believe it could have been a proper marriage, although Don—er—Cojuelo swore the man who performed the service was an ordained priest," said Myra, avoiding her aunt's eyes. "I don't suppose it matters much now whether I am Cojuelo's wife—or only his mistress."

"His mistress!" Lady Fermanagh was white to the lips as she repeated the words. "You mean that he——?"

The hot colour stained Myra's pale face as she met her aunt's eyes, and nodded her red-gold head in shamed assent.

"Myra, you are ruined!" Lady Fermanagh almost wailed, wringing her be-ringed hands. "What madness possessed you to offer to marry the brigand?"

"He taunted me—and Tony failed me," Myra answered, oddly reluctant to explain everything. "I wish I were dead."

"Does Don Carlos know?" asked her aunt, and again Myra flushed as she nodded assent.

"Yes, he alone knows, Aunt," she said, "and he alone knows whether the marriage service was a mockery or not."

Lady Fermanagh, still wringing her hands, rose and paced agitatedly up and down the room, her nimble brain busy trying to think of some way of saving the situation.

"I will see Don Carlos, Myra, beg him to keep your secret, beg him to assert that the so-called marriage was a farce and a mockery," she announced suddenly, after a long pause. "He is a chivalrous gentleman, and I know he will lie if necessary, to save your honour.... Why do you sneer, child? ... Don't you realise that everything depends on Don Carlos, and how you behave towards Tony?"

"I have nothing but contempt for Tony now. I despise him."

"Don't be a little fool," snapped Lady Fermanagh. "Your only hope of saving yourself is to forgive Tony for his cowardice and marry him. He will be grateful to you all his life. Don Carlos can tell him that the marriage ceremony was only a farce, and that he arranged with the bandit for your liberation immediately afterwards, or else explain that he helped you to escape. How did you escape, by the way? You have not told me. Did Don Carlos help?"

"Don Carlos showed me the way to open the secret door," answered Myra. "Aunt Clarissa, nothing will induce me to marry Tony Standish now."

"But you must, you must!" insisted her aunt passionately. "It is the only way of saving yourself. Think how you are placed, and what a ghastly tragedy it would be if it became known that you had surrendered yourself to a brigand. I will see Don Carlos at once, beg him, for your sake——"

"No! no!" interrupted Myra, springing to her feet. "I will not permit it, aunt. On no account must you appeal to Don Carlos. I will see him myself. You do not understand."

"No, I certainly do not understand, and I think you must be crazy," responded her aunt, with an impatient sigh. "Oh, Myra, don't you realise in what a terrible position you have placed yourself? You lay the blame on Tony Standish, but now only he can save you."

"Tony Standish has nothing to do with the matter now," retorted Myra. "Only Don Carlos can save me. I beg you, Aunt Clarissa, not to make any appeal to him. Leave me to settle the matter myself with him and to decide my own fate, work out my own destiny. Shall I see him now or wait till morning?"

"I think you had better wait till morning, and take time to consider how you are placed," said Lady Fermanagh, after a thoughtful pause, regarding Myra searchingly. "I fancy your mind must be temporarily deranged. Myra, are you keeping something back from me?"

"Everything depends on Don Carlos—and Cojuelo," Myra responded, evading the question. "Please say nothing to him, aunt, until I have spoken to him alone."

"Oh, the whole affair seems a crazy nightmare, and I don't know what to make of it all," said her aunt, with another sigh. "I wish we had never come to this wretched, lawless place. You must have had a premonition of trouble when you at first refused Don Carlos's invitation for no particular reason. Myra, my dear, I am sorry for you!"

Her feelings got the better of her, and with tears in her eyes she flung her arms around Myra and hugged her close to her breast. And Myra suddenly broke down, buried her face in her aunt's shoulder, and cried like a hurt child.

"Better go to bed, dear," said Lady Fermanagh recovering herself after a few minutes. "We are all suffering from the strain and are not normal.... Go to bed, Myra, and try to make up your mind to go back to England with Tony to-morrow...."



CHAPTER XIX

Myra went to bed, but it was a long time before she could compose herself to woo sleep, so full was her mind of disturbing thoughts, so many problems did she find herself called on to solve.

"Does he love me?" That was the question that she put to herself time and again, and could not answer. "Do I love him?" was another. And at heart she knew that if she were certain that the answer to the first question was in the affirmative, she could answer the second in a like manner.

"What will it profit me if I denounce him?" she soliloquised. "He says he is at my mercy, but he can claim me, and boast that I offered to marry him, even if I do revenge myself by denouncing him. Always he seems to have the advantage of me. To save my 'honour' now, and satisfy Aunt Clarissa, I shall either have to humble myself to ask him to marry me publicly, or else forgive Tony. Either course is repugnant."

She fell asleep at last, but was wrestling with her problem even in her jumbled dreams. She woke with a start, and with the impression strong upon her that someone or something had touched her face and her breast. Scared, she groped for the electric switch and flashed on the light above the bed, and as she did so she remembered having awakened months previously at Auchinleven just in the same sort of fright, to find Don Carlos's note on her pillow.

Some odd instinct or intuition told her that history had repeated itself, and it came hardly as a surprise to find a half-sheet of notepaper tucked into her nightdress close to her heart. With fingers that trembled slightly, Myra unfolded the note and read:

"Give me your heart and love, my wife, and I will devote my life to you. If you have no love, show no mercy."

Myra read the words again and again, sorely puzzled to decide what exactly they meant, wondering, incidentally, why Don Carlos had not awakened her to whisper what he had to say instead of leaving a note on her breast.

"Is he ashamed or afraid?" she asked herself—and could not answer her own question, nor a score of other questions which she put to herself as she tossed about restlessly for the remainder of the night, unable to sleep.

Her aunt, in dressing-gown and slippers, came to her room while she was sipping her early morning cup of tea.

"I hope you slept well, Myra dear, and are feeling better," she said. "I have hardly slept at all, and feel a wreck. Have you made up your mind what to do?"

"Not quite," Myra answered. "I must see Don Carlos first. But I think I have decided to show no mercy to El Diablo Cojuelo."

"I don't know what you mean," commented her aunt. "For heaven's sake be sensible, Myra. It isn't a question of showing mercy to the brigand, but of saving yourself and your reputation. I shall be in agonies of anxiety until you have made a decision."

"I shall be in agonies myself until I have decided—and perhaps afterwards," replied Myra enigmatically. "I shall get up now and get the ordeal over as quickly as possible."

She wasted no time over her toilet, and save that she was very pale, she looked her usual lovely self as she left her room and walked towards the staircase. She halted for a moment in indecision as she saw Antony Standish on the landing, evidently waiting for her, then went on.

"I say, Myra, don't cut me," exclaimed Standish appealingly, nervously fingering his tie. "I've been waiting for you. I—I don't want to try to excuse myself for what happened up in that cursed brigand's den. My nerve deserted me completely."

"And you deserted me," interjected Myra coldly.

"You see, there was Don Carlos to be thought of as well as you, and—and I thought the only hope of being any help was to get away," Standish went on lamely. "Myra, I beg of you not to expose me to the world as a coward, and to forgive me. There are officials down below waiting to question you about what happened. They've been questioning me, and I'm afraid I didn't tell them the truth. Now they're questioning Don Carlos. From what I can make of it, someone has suggested that Don Carlos is in league with the brigand Cojuelo."

"Who suggested that?" asked Myra, with a convulsive start.

"I don't know, but the officials wanted to know if I saw Don Carlos at Cojuelo's place, and how I got away," Standish answered. "I told a lot of lies, and said that Cojuelo let me go when I promised to pay a ransom of fifty thousand pounds. Myra, you won't give me away and show me up? I'll shoot myself if you do. Myra, if you say nothing about my funking things, I'll swear never to breathe a word about your marrying the brigand fellow."

"That is indeed kind!" commented Myra ironically. "I do not propose to make public what happened if I can avoid it, but possibly El Diablo Cojuelo may tell."

Standish drew a breath of relief and wiped his moist brow.

"Thank you," he said. "I'll come down with you, if I may, and perhaps I may be able to help you through with the officials."

"I hardly think I shall need your help," responded Myra coldly.

For all her outward appearance of self-possession, she was trembling inwardly, and her heart was beating unsteadily as she went down to the hall, to find Don Carlos and three officers in somewhat elaborate uniforms engaged in earnest conversation around a table, beside which was also seated another officer whom Myra recognised as the one who had led the Guardia Civil who had rescued her.

All rose immediately she appeared, and bowed courteously, and the junior officer hastened to place a chair for her.

"You will pardon us for troubling you so soon after your ordeal, Miss Rostrevor, but it is necessary that we ask you some questions in regard to El Diablo Cojuelo," said one of the officers in excellent English.

Myra merely inclined her head and seated herself, darting a glance at Don Carlos. His face was pale and his expression was as impassive and inscrutable as a Sphinx.

"This officer, who led the company which found you in the mountains yesterday, states that you were then apparently running away from Don Carlos de Ruiz," continued the superior official. "He also states that he understood you to assert positively that Don Carlos is El Diablo Cojuelo. Is that so, senorita?"

"If you have no love, show no mercy." The words of the note she had found on her breast flashed back into Myra's mind in the fraction of a second that she hesitated before answering the question on which the fate of Don Carlos depended. And in that fraction of a second she found the answer to many questions she had put to herself.

"What an absurd suggestion!" she exclaimed with scarce a tremor in her voice. "The officer is quite mistaken, but the fault is probably mine. I was so agitated that I did not know what I was saying, and was obsessed with the idea that El Diablo Cojuelo was close behind me."

Don Carlos sprang to his feet with an exultant laugh.

"You hear, senors!" he exclaimed. "I thought it would be more convincing if I left it to Miss Rostrevor to assure you the fantastic suggestion is without foundation. Now I am willing to answer any questions and tell you everything. Are you satisfied now? The Senor Standish has told you that I was flung into the cell in which he was imprisoned after he had tried to kill Cojuelo, and that Cojuelo afterwards threatened to torture him and shoot me unless we agreed to his terms."

"Pardon, Don Carlos, but I am merely carrying out my duty," said the Commandante, and turned to Myra again. "Did you see Don Carlos as well as Cojuelo, senorita, while you were in the outlaw's den?" he inquired.

"Yes, I saw them both together several times," answered Myra. "I heard Cojuelo threaten to shoot Don Carlos. It was Don Carlos who enabled me to make my escape, but I thought in my panic that it was Cojuelo who was trying to overtake me when I cried out to the officer of the Civil Guards."

"Is there, then, some resemblance between Don Carlos and the brigand Cojuelo?" asked the Commandante.

Momentarily nonplussed, Myra shook her head.

"I cannot tell," she answered. "El Diablo Cojuelo always wore a cowl which disguised him."

"Yes, that's right, sir," broke in Tony Standish from the background. "We never saw the blighter without his cowl. I challenged him to be a man and meet me face to face, but he would not remove his disguise. You can take it from me, sir, that the idea that there was any connection between Cojuelo and Don Carlos is all moonshine."

"Thank you, Mr. Standish," said Don Carlos gravely, and glanced round at the faces of the officers. "May I take it, senors, that you are satisfied?"

The Commandante nodded, tugging at his grey moustache.

"Certainly, Don Carlos," he said. "You will understand that it was necessary for us to investigate the report that the English senorita had asserted that you were El Diablo Cojuelo, and that your refusal to deny the fact or to supply any explanation made this examination necessary. I understand that you may have considered the implication an insult, and now I can only apologise for troubling you and devote my energies to hunting down El Diablo Cojuelo. Can you offer us any assistance in locating his lair in the mountains?"

"You need trouble yourself no longer about El Diablo Cojuelo, senor," replied Don Carlos. "He is dead."

"Dead?"

"Yes, he is dead. Senor Standish, as he told you, fired at him and thought he had missed, but he had sorely wounded the brigand, and when I tackled Cojuelo afterwards, when he was endeavouring to prevent Miss Rostrevor from escaping, he collapsed and died at my feet. He will trouble us no more, senors, and I intend to claim his greatest treasure as my reward for having made an end to him."

"Don Carlos, but this is news indeed!" cried the Commandante excitedly. "El Diablo Cojuelo dead! Ten thousand congratulations, my dear Don Carlos! Congratulations to you, also, Senor Standish, on ridding my country of such a dangerous pest. To shoot a brigand in his own den was indeed conduct worthy of a gallant Englishman!"

"Oh—er—thanks," stammered Tony, avoiding looking at Myra. "Why the deuce didn't you tell us this before, Don Carlos?"



CONCLUSION

The officers had taken their leave after much handshaking and bowing. Left alone with Don Carlos, Standish, and with Lady Fermanagh, who had been a silent and puzzled witness of the proceedings, Myra suddenly felt her self-possession deserting her, and fled back to her own room.

"Why did I lie to save him?" she breathed, as she flung herself down on her knees by the bedside and buried her face. "Why?"

She did not need to ask the question. Her heart had given her the answer. She knew she had lied to save the man she loved.

There came a knock at the door, and she started up, hastily dabbing her eyes and trying to control herself.

"Come in," she called faintly, after a pause, as the knock was repeated.

The door opened, and Don Carlos entered. He was pale, but his dark eyes were shining with happiness.

"Myra, darling," he said huskily, and stopped, overcome by emotion.

He held out his arms.... Deep was calling unto deep. Love was calling. And Myra Rostrevor answered the call. She was in the arms of her lover, her conqueror, returning his passionate kisses with a fervour equal to his own.

"I love you, Carlos, I love you," she whispered between kisses. "I love you although you have been such a brute. If I had denounced you as El Diablo Cojuelo, what would have happened?"

"I should have confessed, then killed myself," Carlos answered. "Without you, beloved, life meant nothing to me. I staked all in the hope that you would prove you loved me, and I won! I feared that although I had made you mine I had failed to win your heart. Say again that you love me, dear heart, and will love me always."

"I love you, darling, I love you with all of me," Myra murmured, kissing him passionately. "I realise now that I have loved you for a long time, and was only afraid to confess myself conquered because I feared you only wanted to win me to gratify your pride.... Am I really your wife, dear?" she added, breathless and blushing, as she disengaged herself at last from his embrace.

"You are the wife of Cojuelo, or, rather the widow of Cojuelo, sweetheart," Carlos answered. "But now that poor Cojuelo is dead, you are going to marry Don Carlos de Ruiz, who has decided to give up playing at being an outlaw and devote his life to loving the most beautiful, delicious, adorable woman in the world. Kiss me again, beloved...."

"I don't know how to explain things, Carlos, to Lady Fermanagh, and don't know what she will think of us," said Myra, a little later. "And although it was nice of you to give credit to Tony for killing El Diablo Cojuelo, I shall feel dreadful when I have to tell him I am going to marry you."

"Don't worry, darling," said Don Carlos. "I have already told Lady Fermanagh and Mr. Standish that you promised to marry me if I saved you from El Diablo Cojuelo. Mr. Standish is leaving for home immediately, but Lady Fermanagh will remain for our wedding."

"You seem to have taken a great deal for granted, you wretch!" exclaimed Myra, dimpling into smiles. "As I know I am the wife of Cojuelo, I shall feel I am committing bigamy when I marry you, Carlos."

"And I shall have the satisfaction of marrying a second time the loveliest girl in the world," laughed Don Carlos happily, as he drew her unresisting into his arms again.

"I don't know what to make of it all, Myra, but I suppose it will be best not to ask too many questions," said Lady Fermanagh. "Rather odd, isn't it, that the brigand Cojuelo should have married you when he was mortally wounded, and that you should have promised to marry Don Carlos, yet married the brigand although you were engaged to Tony?"

"Yes, perhaps it does seem rather odd, aunt," admitted Myra, her eyes twinkling.

"Decidedly odd!" her aunt commented, with a wry smile. "I don't think the matter will bear very close investigation, and I suppose it concerns only Don Carlos and you. Incidentally, I don't know how Tony will explain matters in England, but I suppose that does not matter much either. Have you no regrets, Myra?"

"Yes," answered Myra, after a pause. "I think I rather regret losing my first husband. But I feel quite sure Carlos will prove a good substitute."



THE END



BANDIT LOVE

By JUANITA SAVAGE

Juanita Savage needs no introduction to American readers; hundreds of thousands have already thrilled to her vigorous romances of love and adventure. In "Bandit Love" there is the same sultry throb and barbaric drive that characterize all her work. Here is the love story of a beautiful Irish girl who rode horses like an Arizona cowboy, whose hair was red as flame, and whose lover was an English gentleman. But then, there was the Spaniard, too! Hot-headed, he was, passionate and lawless as a Tartar. Needless to say the story takes some startling turns. The end is surprising. And the satisfying conclusion it all comes to is this, that the eternal feminine still responds to courage in the male.

BY THE AUTHOR OF

THE CITY OF DESIRE DON LORENZO'S BRIDE PASSION ISLAND THE SPANIARD



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[Transcriber's note: This is where the book catalog ended.]

THE END