Evidently the fleeing Guards had scurried around a corner into a cross-street shortly after Dolores and Mother Jenks had seen them gallop past, for the firing down the Calle San Rosario had ceased entirely by the time they reached it. They stood a moment at the corner, gazing up the street at the dead--man and beast--with the wounded crawling out of the shambles to the sidewalk.
Mother Jenks nodded approvingly as triumphant shouts from the north gate told her the Ruey men were pouring into the palace; with their arms about each other the two women watched and waited--and presently the national flag on the palace came fluttering down from its staff, to be raised again with the red banner of revolution fluttering above it, the insignia of a nation reborn.
“My lamb,” Mother Jenks said softly to Dolores, “the war is over. Wot's the matter with goin' in the south gate an' wytin' on the palace steps for the provisional president to make his grand ountray? If we 'esitate five minutes they'll have a bloomin' guard on both gates, arskin' us 'oo we are an' wot we want.”
“But Mr. Webster will come to that back street looking for me; I must go back and wait there for him.”
“Wyte, nothink!” Mother Jenks overruled the girl's protest roughly. “'E'll 'ave gone into the palace with the crowd for a look-see; we'll meet 'im there an' syve 'im the trouble o' 'untin' for us. Come!” And she half dragged the shrinking girl toward the gate, a block distant, where only a few minutes before Webster and Don Juan Cafetéro had made their ineffectual stand.
“Don't look at the blighters, honey,” Mother Jenks warned Dolores when, in approaching the gate, she caught sight of the bodies strewed in front of it. “My word! Regular bally mess--an' all spiggoties! Cawn't be. Must 'ave been some white meat on this bird, as my sainted 'Enery uster s'y. Hah! Thought so! There's a red-headed 'un! Gawd's truth! An' 'e done all that--Gor' strike me pink! It's Don Juan Cafetéro.”
Mother Jenks stepped over the gory corpses ringed around Don Juan and knelt beside him. “Don Juan!” she cried. “You bally, interferin' blighter, you've gone an' got it!”
She ran her strong old arms under his dripping body, lifted him and laid his red head on her knee, while with her free hand she drew a small flask of brandy from her dress pocket.