"
The Mexican cast a quick glance at the door and window. Paul, as
if carelessly, changed the key of the former from one pocket to the
other, and stepped before the window.
"So this is a plot to murder me! Have a care! You are not in your
own brigand California!"
"If you think so, alarm the house. They will find us quarreling,
and you will only precipitate matters by receiving the insult that
will make you fight--before them."
"I am r-ready, sir, when and where you will," said Briones, with a
swaggering air but a shifting, furtive eye. "Open--a--the door."
"Pardon me. We will leave this room TOGETHER in an hour for the
station. We will board the night express that will take us in
three hours beyond the frontier, where we can each find a friend."
"But my affairs here--my sister--I must see her."
"You shall write a note to her at that table, saying that important
business--a dispatch--has called you away, and we will leave it
with the porter to be delivered IN THE MORNING. Or--I do not
restrict you--you can say what you like, provided she don't get it
until we have left."
"And you make of me a prisoner, sir?"
"No; a visitor, Don Caesar--a visitor whose conversation is so
interesting that I am forced to detain him to hear more.
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