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But that scar on the cheek-bone doesn't help your looks a bit, my boy. Still, you mustn't kick about that, I reckon, for if that slice of rock had come along an inch or so farther to the right you'd have been tuerto now. Not that your eyes are anything to be stuck up about, though; they're neither brown nor green, nor any other recognized color; just a sort of mixture like Pedro's estofados.
I'd go at once, only I'm too well known at Gibraltar. El Tuerto said: "'I'm well known there too. I've played so many tricks on the crayfish* and as I've only one eye, it is not overeasy for me to disguise myself. * Name applied by the Spanish populace to the British soldiers, on account of the colour of their uniform.
We shall not, however, venture to decide the nice question which oscillates between an obliquity and a loss of vision. The Spanish word "tuerto" means, ordinarily, "blind of one eye."
"'Do you know, said she, 'now that you're my rom for good and all, I don't care for you so much as when you were my minchorro! I won't be worried, and above all, I won't be ordered about. I choose to be free to do as I like. Take care you don't drive me too far; if you tire me out, I'll find some good fellow who'll serve you just as you served El Tuerto.
The muleteer had been ordered to go no farther than was necessary to get a view of the convent, and that, El Tuerto affirmed, he would obtain within a few hundred yards of the mountain-top. The Mochuelo argued favourably from his prolonged absence, which proved, he said, that Baltasar's party were still at the convent, and that Paco was watching their movements.
A queer-looking personage was he also, but very different in most respects from his companion, being shorter by a head at least, and less complete by one eye, for the left orb of vision was closed, leaving him, as the Spaniards style it, tuerto; he, however, far outshone the other in cleanliness of turban, haik, and trousers.
Divesting themselves of their belts and muskets, El Tuerto and Paco now approached a lofty tree growing at a short distance from the cascade, and whose upper boughs reached to the top of the precipice, and to the astonishment of Herrera and Torres, and indeed of all who were sufficiently near to distinguish their movements, began to climb its knotty and uneven trunk.
Already a brightness was visible in the eastern sky, and the stars in that quarter of the heavens began to fade and disappear. A word from the Mochuelo brought his men to their feet, and, slinging their muskets on their backs, they ascended the water-course. Meanwhile the horses were stripped of their equipments, and, taking hold of the halters, Paco and El Tuerto led them into the wood.
The Mochuelo, after ascertaining by the report of his sergeants that all the men who had left Pampeluna with him were present, still stood with Herrera at the foot of the water-course, waiting for El Tuerto and Paco, who in a few minutes made their appearance. "You have disposed of the horses?" said the Mochuelo. The answer was in the affirmative.
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