I Spoke To Him Of His Ill-Fated Accomplice Candelas;
Whereupon His Face Assumed A Horrible Expression.
"I hope he is in
torment," exclaimed the robber.
The friendship of the unrighteous
is never of long duration; the two worthies had it seems quarrelled
in prison; Candelas having accused the other of bad faith and an
undue appropriation to his own use of the corpus delicti in various
robberies which they had committed in company.
I cannot refrain from relating the subsequent history of this
Balseiro. Shortly after my own liberation, too impatient to wait
until the presidio should afford him a chance of regaining his
liberty, he in company with some other convicts broke through the
roof of the prison and escaped. He instantly resumed his former
habits, committing several daring robberies, both within and
without the walls of Madrid. I now come to his last, I may call it
his master crime, a singular piece of atrocious villainy.
Dissatisfied with the proceeds of street robbery and house-
breaking, he determined upon a bold stroke, by which he hoped to
acquire money sufficient to support him in some foreign land in
luxury and splendour.
There was a certain comptroller of the queen's household, by name
Gabiria, a Basque by birth, and a man of immense possessions: this
individual had two sons, handsome boys, between twelve and fourteen
years of age, whom I had frequently seen, and indeed conversed
with, in my walks on the bank of the Manzanares, which was their
favourite promenade. These children, at the time of which I am
speaking, were receiving their education at a certain seminary in
Madrid. Balseiro, being well acquainted with the father's
affection for his children, determined to make it subservient to
his own rapacity. He formed a plan which was neither more nor less
than to steal the children, and not to restore them to their parent
until he had received an enormous ransom. This plan was partly
carried into execution: two associates of Balseiro well dressed
drove up to the door of the seminary, where the children were, and,
by means of a forged letter, purporting to be written by the
father, induced the schoolmaster to permit the boys to accompany
them for a country jaunt, as they pretended. About five leagues
from Madrid, Balseiro had a cave in a wild unfrequented spot
between the Escurial and a village called Torre Lodones: to this
cave the children were conducted, where they remained in durance
under the custody of the two accomplices; Balseiro in the meantime
remaining in Madrid for the purpose of conducting negotiations with
the father. The father, however, was a man of considerable energy,
and instead of acceding to the terms of the ruffian, communicated
in a letter, instantly took the most vigorous measures for the
recovery of his children. Horse and foot were sent out to scour
the country, and in less than a week the children were found near
the cave, having been abandoned by their keepers, who had taken
fright on hearing of the decided measures which had been resorted
to; they were, however, speedily arrested and identified by the
boys as their ravishers.
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