"Good morning, Alcalde!" the Count greeted the following day as he descended his cart in front of the white-haired man's office, just as he was exiting to head for the tavern.
"Your Excellency," he greeted politely. "Is there something I might do for you?"
"Perhaps… I have been robbed and I was hoping you might help me recover what was stolen from me."
"I am sorry to hear that. Of course, my men are at your disposal."
"Thank you, Alcalde… I will have my mayordomo come by your office to give you all the details. As soon as I find him, that is... You haven't seen him recently, have you?"
"No, I can't say I have… But it is very strange that he dssapeared at the same time you were robbed." De Soto said, suspiciously.
"Not really... He suffers from a strange disease, you see. Sleepwalking. Twice I found him on the roof, and several times he had somehow managed to walk for miles and only returned the following evening, his feet full of blisters. Besides, he has had countless opportunities to rob me and never did. In fact, having served me for more than a decade now, I imagine he must be quite rich himself. I pay him over 50,000 peso a year, and he needs not spend a cent of it. Anyway… I will find him, no doubt, and send him to your office when I do…" he then uttered and headed for Victoria's establishment, leaving De Soto to wonder why a man in posession of more than half a million pesos would serve another.
Moments later, Ignacio instructed his men, in an effort to maintain appearances, to search for Rafael Montoya.
ZZZ
It was just about an hour before lunch when a coach, followed by ten guardsmen, entered the pueblo, stopping before the tavern.
De Soto hurriedly exited his office at being informed about it, and headed for the coach he easily recognized, Mendoza trailing him.
"Your Excellency!" he exclaimed as the Governor himself descended from the vehicle. "I was not informed you were coming today or I would have…"
"Yes, I'm sure you would have prepared me a proper welcoming, De Soto," the high-ranking official said as he glanced at him, then signaled to his men, who descended their horses. "Arrest him!" He ordered, pointing at De Soto.
"Arrest me, Your Excellency? Why?" Ignacio asked in confusion after first glancing back in the hope there was someone else there.
"News reached me of how you have truly used your office here. Imposing unlawful taxes, sentencing to death those who couldn't pay their dues," the high-ranking official said as people started exiting the tavern, curious to find out what was going on, "releasing dangerous criminals and using them in your plots to hurt the good citizens of Los Angeles…"
"Retaining illegally-collected funds, unlawfully forcing a man to buy back his own land while withholding his property deeds," Zorro added from a nearby roof as he threw down a notebook, right at the governor's feet, "and, most recently, robbery, I believe…"
"Zorro, I assume?" The Governor asked after a few moments spent in awe at seeing the black-clad man.
"Indeed, Your Excellency," he answered as the crowd now gathered there cheered.
"He's an outlaw! He wants to frame me!" De Soto pointed out.
"That would hardly be necessary!" The masked outlaw answered with a smile. "Your Excellency, the notebook there is the diary kept by the Alcalde's predecessor, Luis Ramone. I suggest you glance at pages 45 and 89." Saying that, the masked man saluted then disappeared from view, no lancer making a move to go after him.
The Governor took the diary and opened it to the pages indicated. "It says here that Ramone had used the local bank to steal over 15,000 pesos from the people of Los Angeles, and the money is hidden in his office, under the planks in his bedrooms' western corner," he uttered, then turned to page 89, "and that he was the one to steal Don Alejandro de la Vega's property deed from the Devil's Fortress, which is also hidden in his office," saying that, he glanced at De Soto.
"I… I have never seen that in my life!" The Alcalde said.
"But you, yourself, told me you had found the former alcalde's diary, just after you arrested Don Alejandro, the night of my fiesta, this past October," the Count uttered as he joined the people on the tavern's terrace.
"Your Excellency!" the high-ranking official uttered as "hello".
"Governor," the Count greeted.
"It is true, then? He knew about this journal?"
"I distinctly remember him telling me so," the Count confirmed, ignoring the hate-filled glance De Soto gave him.
"I see… So, all this time, while I was praising you for your work, you were, in fact, doing your best to swindle the people here," the enraged official reproached Ignacio. "Take him to jail! I will check for myself to see how much truth is in these pages…"
"No, Your Excellency, please!" De Soto begged.
"Your Excellency," the Count uttered as Ignacio was already out of sight, "yesterday a box containing some of my most valuable precious stones disappeared from my hacienda. You don't suppose the alcalde also had something to do with that, do you?"
"I don't know... But, at this point, I would not be surprised. Perhaps we should find out! If you'd be so kind as to accompany me…"
As they entered the office together, the Governor opened the diary again, checked the annotations, then headed for one of the corners of the room where he found a fake mantle concealing a hiding place. Reaching inside, he took out a rolled-out document, then reached again and took out a box.
"That's it!" The Count exclaimed.
"Your box?" The Governor asked, opening it. He stared at its content for a few moments, dazzled, then handed it to the nobleman, no doubt in his mind that he was its true owner, for who else around there could possess such a fortune? "Would you make sure they are all there?"
The young man took the box and started counting. "There's a round, 28 carat diamond missing. The rest of them are here." He replied after he finished his inventory.
Just a few moments later, strange noises started being heard from outside, and they both exited to see a gagged-up Lozano, tied to the bench of his wagon, make his way to the plaza. On his shirt, covering a big Z carved in it, was a paper. On it, Mendoza read "The Alcalde's accomplice in robbing the Count". A large diamond was also hanging by a thin string around his neck.
The governor headed towards him, had a look at the man, then got the diamond, heading for the Count. "Do you recognize it, Your Excellency?"
"Yes," he said after studying it in the light for a few moments. "My missing diamond. 28 carats, round cut," he said with a smile, just as the lancers led Lozano to jail.
ZZZ
"You wanted to see me, Don Sebastian?" Don Alejandro asked at entering the house later that afternoon. The elderly man did not expect to find there, beside the Count, Victoria and the Governor. Yet there they were, in the library, waiting for him.
"We all wanted to see you, Señor," the Governor answered instead.
"Your Excellency," the don said.
He had met the man about a year earlier, when he had visited Monterey to ask his relatives there for a loan due to help him buy back his hacienda, but the official had made a very bad impression on him.
"Don Alejandro, the Alcalde was arrested!" Victoria hurried to say, a wide smile on her lips.
"De Soto? Arrested? Why?" The caballero asked.
"Because of the crimes he has committed," the Count answered. "Amongst them, besides releasing from jail the thugs who have robbed you of your remaining fortune a while back, withholding this from you." As he said that, he took a rolled, thick paper from a nearby table, and handed it to Don Alejandro.
The elderly man opened to read it, instantly realizing what it was. "My property deed!" He exclaimed.
"I am sorry for all the harm that man caused you, Don Alejandro." The Governor said. "I understand the past cannot be changed but, nevertheless, this also belongs to you," he continued, handing the man another paper. "It is not the entire sum you were forced to pay for your hacienda a year ago, unfortunately. De Soto confessed to spending most of it. What is left, however, a little over nine thousand pesos, I already deposited into your bank account and that is proof of it. The sale of De Soto's own fortune and goods back in Spain will compensate for the rest, I am sure, but it will take a while… I'm just sorry I cannot return to you the money those bandits stole. No matter how much I tried to find out what they had done with it, they continue to insist that the money had been taken by Zorro."
"It has. He said so, himself!" Victoria replied.
"He also promised he'd return it to me as soon as he'd find a safe way to do so." The elderly don said with a smile.
"That is, indeed, good news… if he keeps his promise! The man surely is a very strange kind of outlaw." The official remarked.
"He's only an outlaw because De Soto made him one." Victoria replied. "But, were it not for him, who knows what might have happened to this pueblo…"
"Well, I suppose we should celebrate!" The Count suggested, ringing a bell, and two of his men came bringing glasses filled with champagne and several plates of ordeours.
ZZZ
"There must be something you can do!" De Soto pleaded with the so-called "doctor" a while later, as they were both awaiting in the prison's cells. "We must get out of here!"
"How? How are we supposed to get out of here if there's no guard to let us out?" The man asked.
De Soto considered his words for a few moments, then started calling for Mendoza.
The Sergeant entered a couple of minutes later. "Will you keep it down? The Governor is already upset with you, Alcalde!" He said.
"Where is he? I need to talk to him!"
"He left earlier for the Count's hacienda to take the property deed back to Don Alejandro. Why did you take it, Alcalde? Don Alejandro lost his hacienda because of you!"
"That is not for you to understand, Sergeant. I had my orders!" De Soto replied, silently cursing Zorro and Risendo at the same time. "Can you, a least, bring us some food? We're starving."
The poor Mendoza was quite upset with him, but he never was one to refuse feeding another, especially considering how being left without food made him feel.
So, after ordering his men to be alert, he headed for the tavern, and returned with two plates of tamales. He opened the door to Lozano's cell to offer him one of the plates, then opened the one to De Soto's, who, sensing his opportunity, punched Mendoza, causing him to impact with the bars and hit his head.
"I'm sorry, Sergeant, but I have no intention of ending my days in this maldito pueblo!" He said as he was about to leave.
"How about me?" Lozano asked.
Ignacio hesitated, but ended up taking Mendoza's key and letting him out, certain he had better chances to escape with the man's help.
They were lucky enough as to catch the guards by surprise, rendering them unconscious rather easily. Their way clear, they both headed for the stables, taking two of the horses there, and making their escape.
A few miles down the road, as their absence was just noticed at the garrison, Lozano decided he'd rather travel by himself than with a man like De Soto, so they parted ways, the "doctor" heading east and De Soto heading west, towards the port.
ZZZ
"Sergeant Mendoza, what happened?" The Governor asked as the man entered the hacienda about an hour or so later.
"I'm sorry to tell you, Your Excellency, but Alcalde De Soto and Doctor Lozano have both escaped. My men and I are in pursuit, but I thought I should let you know as soon as possible."
"Escaped? How?"
"I… I was taking them some food, you see, and the Alcalde attacked me… I was hurt pretty badly…"
"If you can ride, it can't have been that bad," the official remarked. "Go find them, Sergeant! Do not return without them or I might be forced to think you helped you former commander!"
"Si! Si, Your Excellency! I will bring them back!"
"Mendoza is a good man. Not the sort to conspire with a man such as De Soto!" The Count said as the lancer headed away. Moments later, he faked a headache and sat down.
"Are you alright, Don Sebastian?" Don Alejandro inquired worriedly.
"Yes… Yes. I suppose I might be a little tired. I could hardly sleep for the last two nights. Perhaps I should head to bed early today."
"Yes… Of course. And I should leave…" The Governor said, realizing it was only polite that he'd return to the pueblo and allow his host to take some rest. "Señorita, if you wish to join me, you are more than welcome…"
Victoria hesitated, her instinct telling her to stay with the Count. The man, however, was soon surrounded by worried servants, so she realized he presence there was not actually needed. "I will. Thank you, Your Excellency." She, thus replied, then took her goodbye from the nobleman and from the man she considered her surrogate father.
ZZZ
"Good evening, Don Alejandro!" Zorro saluted as he found the don in the courtyard just about ten minutes later.
"Zorro!" the man said, baffled. "I was just talking about you with the Governor. What can I do for you, Señor?"
"Actually, it is not a matter of what you can do for me but on the contrary, of what I can do for you."
"I'm not sure I understand. Am I in danger?"
"Constantly, as long as Gilberto Risendo remains in Los Angeles. But that is not why I am here," the masked man replied, dismounting. "I am here to fulfill a promise I had made you, and to give you these," saying that, he took out from his sash some papers and handed them to Don Alejandro. "I have taken the precaution of depositing most of your money in three banks – the ones in San Francisco, San Diego, and Santa Barbara. Part of the money, more precisely, 15,000 pesos, is currently in the safe you have in your room."
"In my room? But how…" the man stopped himself at remembering who he was talking to, then shook his head. "Thank you, Señor!" Don Alejandro uttered, as he took the papers from Zorro.
"I leave you, now. There are a couple of escaped prisoners to find." The masked man said, returning to Tornado and soon guiding him west.
"God be with you, Señor!" Don Alejandro muttered, already wondering whether the Count might be willing to sell back his hacienda.