Looming in the shadows, Zorro took in the situation of the alcalde´s office and the cuartel. Obviously the alcalde had put every lancer out on duty, for they were forming a ring around the building, standing less than two meters apart. There was no way to break through such a cordon unnoticed. And he´d prefer to speak with the alcalde in private tonight.

There was still light coming from the office, so De Soto was probably waiting for him there, as a spider in his webb. Carefully he considered his options. The roof provided an opportunity to get inside unnoticed. But one peep from the alcalde and he´d have thirty lancers aiming at his back. They never hit him - actually, he suspected that several of them always missed on purpose - but this was a time to talk, not to fight. So he´d have to get those lancers away on some wildgoose-chase. Perhaps his friend Mendoza could help?

He crept a little closer and watched the guarding lancers intently. Where was Mendoza?

He didn´t have to wait long: sergeant Mendoza appeared around the corner. He was continually checking up on his men, now and then being startled by some sound of the desertnight. That gave Zorro an idea. He grabbed a handful of sand, and the next time the sergeant rounded the corner he threw the sand in a nearby thornbush.

Mendoza jumped around. "Madre de Dios, what was that?" He peered into the darkness.

The private behind him softly enquired: "What was that sound, sergeant?"

"I don´t know!" Mendoza hissed back at him. "I´ll go and check it out; you stay here on guard in case Zorro shows up."

Hesitantly he moved towards the dark shadows of the adjoining building. Swiftly, Zorro moved behind the back wall, out of sight from the lancers. And when Mendoza peered around the corner, ready to run, he whispered cordially: "Buenas tardes, sergeant!"

Mendoza jumped again, but before he could utter a sound he felt Zorro´s gloved hand over his mouth.

"Quiet, my friend. We don´t want to raise the alarm just yet, do we?"

He took away his hand and Mendoza hissed worried: "Zorro! The alcalde has the entire cuartel surrounded, and given the order that we should shoot to kill if you try to get in!"

Zorro nodded. "I noticed. That´s why I need your help tonight."

Mendoza looked flabbergasted. "You...? You want help from me?!"

"Of course!" Zorro answered lightheartedly. "That´s what friends are for, isn´t it?"

Mendoza swallowed. "True... But Zorro, it wasn´t my fault that the señorita was arrested! Someone else must have dropped the word to the alcalde; I haven´t said a thing!"

"Don´t worry, sergeant. I believe you. I know you are far too honourable a man to cause the señorita any harm."

Sergeant Mendoza grew with unexpected pride. "Honourable, yes. That´s what I am. I would never harm a single hair on the señorita´s head."

"Exactly." Zorro nodded in approval. "Now I need to talk to the alcalde in private to rescue señorita Escalante. So I need those lancers out of the way. Now listen carefully: I will create some havoc at the back here. When you hear it, I want you to call all your lancers together. Make them think you´ve seen Zorro running off into the desert, and take all of them to pursue me away from the town. Make sure they do not return for at least half an hour, and the señorita will be in safety. Thanks to you."

Mendoza swallowed. "But if the alcalde finds out I helped you, he´ll hang me on the spot!"

Zorro smiled and put his hand on the sergeant´s shoulder. "Now why would I let that happen to my friend..."

Mendoza swallowed again, this time with emotion.

"Now go," Zorro urged him. "And keep your ears open for our little diversion."

He dodged back into the darkness and Mendoza returned to his rounds. But he wasn´t paying as much attention to his men as he had been before. For a radiant smile shone from his face, and over and over again he mumbled to himself: "I´ve got a friend who trusts me to help him!"

The idea was so wonderful to him that he would have missed Zorro´s little diversion entirely if it hadn´t been for the sudden nervousness of the lancers. He remembered just in time what Zorro had asked him to do as the rustling sound in the dry thistles of the prairie already faded away. He jumped up, ran a few meters into the darkness and then he cried out: "Zorro! Lancers, after him!!" He stumbled away over the uneven prairieground with all the lancers in tail.

From his hide-out behind a barn Zorro watched them disappear into the night. "I owe you one, sergeant," he mumbled.

xxxxx

When the lancers were out of earshot, he stepped out of the shadows and calmly walked over to the alcalde´s office. The door wasn´t even locked, and within a second he was inside, facing two pistols aimed at him by a nastily smiling alcalde.

"Buenas tardes, señor Zorro," he sneered. "I heard you gave my lancers the slip. But let me assure you that I am not so easily deceived." His face hardened. "Prepare to die, Zorro."

"Now why would I want to do that?" Zorro enquired casually. He dived quickly to the ground as the alcalde pulled the trigger on both pistols at once, but bounced back on his feet again before the alcalde had had the chance to throw aside the pistols and draw his sword. The bullets had harmlessly hit the door.

Zorro needed only three steps to come up to the alcalde and grab his wrist to prevent him from drawing his sword. "I´m here to talk this time, alcalde. Not to fight."

"Talk! Ha!" The alcalde snorted. "Well, Zorro, I am not here to talk. I am here to kill!"

Zorro sighed. "Talking is always better than fighting, señor. But if we´re going to be stubborn about it..." With one swift move he unsheathed his sword and held it over the alcalde´s throat. With his other hand he undid the alcalde´s belt with the sword and cast it away to the other side of the room. "There. If you are more comfortable talking this way, that´s fine with me. Though I must say I hate all forms of hostility."

"Yeah, sure..." the alcalde growled. "I shall see you hang, Zorro... even if it´s the last thing I do on this earth!"

"That´s old news, alcalde. Now let´s get to the point, shall we? My patience is wearing rather thin tonight. On what ground have you arrested señorita Escalante?"

"Ha! Haven´t you heard, outlaw? By getting the señorita in the family way you have finally made the kind of fatal mistake I have always waited for."

"Since when is having an illegitimate child a reason to throw a woman in jail?" Zorro demanded sternly. "Not even a mistress of the king himself is treated that way. Unless you regard me higher than the king of course?"

The alcalde snorted. "I regard you as the scum of the earth, Zorro! And that´s why I put the señorita behind bars, if you hadn´t figured that one out on your own. Having been intimate enough with you to get in the family way, she must know your identity. And I´m going to keep her here until she reveals that secret to me."

"You are mistaken, alcalde. The señorita does not know my identity, so there is nothing for her to reveal. And what makes you so sure that I am responsible for her present state?"

"Well, that´s rather obvious, isn´t it?" De Soto chuckled. "Everyone knows of her affair with you, so it´s just putting two and two together."

"Wrong again, alcalde!" Zorro´s voice was turning to ice. "Two and two does not always make four. Apparently you´re only interested in the town´s gossip and social intercourse when it suits your evil schemes! Otherwise you would have been well aware of the señorita turning her attention elsewhere!"

The alcalde laughed in disbelief. "You mean to tell me that the señorita has finally come to her senses and jilted you?"

"Señorita Escalante has been longing for years to get on with her life and have a family and children," Zorro told him in that same icy tone. "And thanks to you and your predecessor, alcalde, I was unable to give her that. And since there is not the slightest indication of your improvement by ending your cruelty and greedy oppression, I decided to let her go so that she finally may have a chance of seeing her dream come true. At first she refused, but in the end she agreed. My love for her is still as strong as it ever was, but since that day I have not had any private encounters with the señorita until last night, when I heard about that horrid gossip-story."

"My, my, how chivalrous of you," the alcalde commented mockingly. "But you see, Zorro, that still doesn´t change my facts. The declaration of an outlaw such as yourself does not carry any weight with me whatsoever."

"Then ask the señorita and the child´s father!"

The alcalde could barely hold back a smile. "And who might that be, if it´s not you?"

"Don Diego de la Vega." There, it was out.

The alcalde gasped; then he snorted a disdainful laugh. "Young De la Vega, eh? That spineless good-for-nothing would be able to romance the fiery señorita...? Excuse me, Zorro, but that seems highly unlikely to me."

Zorro sighed with regret. "Yes. Love does move in mysterious ways, does it not? But ask them yourself, if you don´t believe me."

The alcalde snorted once again. "Ask De la Vega?! Why, everyone knows he has always had a soft spot for the señorita." Zorro could only just keep himself from wincing. Perhaps Felipe did have a point? But the alcalde went on: "No doubt he will try to protect her in his own stupid way. But I´m sure he would never dare to do anything that would get her - or himself - in trouble!"

Zorro grabbed him by the neck. "Not that it is any of your business, but I myself have paid young De la Vega a visit this evening. I, too, was well aware of his ´soft spot´ for the señorita, and he had no trouble convincing me of his sincere love for her. He also admitted that indeed he is the father of the child she is carrying, and that he intends to marry the señorita within the month."

"Ha! Humbug! He´s just covering for you, that´s what! This whole town is against me, as always!"

Zorro´s grip tightened. "Now why would a wealthy, well-respected caballero with bloodlines to the Spanish throne wish to tarnish his reputation and disgrace his family for a child that is not even his?!"

To his surprise, De Soto remained silent. He seemed to weigh the odds of that last statement, and Zorro began to suspect that his referring to Diego´s status was carrying far more weight with the alcalde than he had expected.

After a few tense moments the alcalde nodded. But with a shrewish expression he asked: "And how do I know it´s not Diego de la Vega behind that mask?"

Zorro merely chuckled. "Really, alcalde, your suppositions never cease to amaze me."

He tried not to hold his breath as he watched him with invisible intensity. And to his relief the alcalde sighed with resignation. "Yes, that would be a bit too much to ask, I suppose. But it still does not change the fact that the señorita is carrying an illegitimate child."

"Alcalde, that is the señorita´s private business. There is and never has been a governmental law forbidding women to get in the family way without being married, not even in the darkest era of the middle ages. If so, the jails would be full of expecting women, for you know as well as I do that this sin is quite widespread. But that is a matter for the church, not for the government. So you have no right whatsoever to keep señorita Escalante in jail for this as long as padre Benitez doesn´t ask you to. And we both know that he would never ask such a thing."

But in the meantime, the alcalde had refound his self-confidence. "But still, that child is a perfect bait to catch you, señor Zorro! I know what a softie you are... So either you turn yourself in, or that child will be dead the moment it is born!"

Zorro´s mouth tightened to a thin line as he squeezed the alcalde´s neck even harder and pressed the sabre even tighter to his throat. "You blackhearted villain!" he hissed furiously. "Have you no honour at all? To kill an innocent child...! I warn you, alcalde! I will guard this child as if I were its guardian angel. And if any harm comes to the child, this angel will turn into an avenging one. And I will not rest until I find you and make you pay for every hair you harmed the child. And that, señor, is an oath by God!"

He almost winced at his own words. Hadn´t he just given away a little too much of his personal feelings towards that child?

The alcalde chuckled. Rather constrained though, with Zorro´s hand squeezing his neck and Zorro´s sword pressing up against his throat. But it send the shivers down Zorro´s spine. Did he...?!

He had to call upon all his self-control to prevent a sigh of relief as he heard the alcalde say: "You can swear all you want, Zorro, but you don´t frighten me. I know you never kill anyone."

"Perhaps not." Zorro sounded very calm all of a sudden, but the alcalde couldn´t miss the dangerous undertone in his voice. "But there are other, more subtle ways to make people like you suffer. I might prefer those."

His tone was so grave, so full of threat, that the alcalde shuddered involuntarily. Hastily he looked into Zorro´s eyes. It took but an instant for him to realize that his archenemy was deadly serious in his threat, and he shrunk under the fire of hateful contempt that flashed from the dark eyes behind the mask.

"Allright, allright," he hurried to stammer.

"Now get the señorita out of there, and don´t you ever bother her or her child again!" Zorro demanded. He took away his sword and pushed the alcalde towards the door to the jail. De Soto fumbled for the keys, and finally they stood in the humid darkness of the adjoining prison.

Victoria jumped up from the plank bed. "Zorro! I knew you would come!"

But Zorro raised his hand to warn her as De Soto started to unlock the cell-door. "Don Diego told me everything. I must say I had not expected you to throw yourself so drastically in his arms that you´d get yourself in trouble again right away."

Victoria winced at the hint of reproach and regret in his voice, but then she understood and quickly had to keep her smile in check. "I know," she confessed. "I was a bit hasty, wasn´t I?"

He nodded sadly. "You can say that again." He winked at her behind the alcalde´s back, and she almost grinned back at him. In the meantime the alcalde had opened the cell-door and Victoria quickly stepped out.

"And now, alcalde," Zorro announced, "a taste from your own medicine. In you go, if you please!"

The alcalde was flabbergasted. "What?! But I...!?"

Zorro didn´t waste time: he grabbed him by his coat, pulled him up in front of the open doorway and with a simple punch on the jaw he knocked him out on the cellfloor. "There," he said satisfied. "Your chickens come home to roost again, Ignacio!"

He locked the cell-door and casted the keys in a dark corner. Then he turned to Victoria. "Are you allright?"

She nodded and cuddled up against his chest. "Thank you."

Quickly he kissed her hair, but then he untangled her arms and hurried: "Not here. Come on, we´ve got to get out of here before Mendoza and his men return."