We at once gave the renegade five hundred crowns to buy the vessel, and
with eight hundred I ransomed myself, giving the money to a Valencian
merchant who happened to be in Algiers at the time, and who had me
released on his word, pledging it that on the arrival of the first ship
from Valencia he would pay my ransom; for if he had given the money at
once it would have made the king suspect that my ransom money had been
for a long time in Algiers, and that the merchant had for his own
advantage kept it secret. In fact my master was so difficult to deal with
that I dared not on any account pay down the money at once. The Thursday
before the Friday on which the fair Zoraida was to go to the garden she
gave us a thousand crowns more, and warned us of her departure, begging
me, if I were ransomed, to find out her father's garden at once, and by
all means to seek an opportunity of going there to see her. I answered in
a few words that I would do so, and that she must remember to commend us
to Lela Marien with all the prayers the captive had taught her. This
having been done, steps were taken to ransom our three comrades, so as to
enable them to quit the bano, and lest, seeing me ransomed and themselves
not, though the money was forthcoming, they should make a disturbance
about it and the devil should prompt them to do something that might
injure Zoraida; for though their position might be sufficient to relieve
me from this apprehension, nevertheless I was unwilling to run any risk
in the matter; and so I had them ransomed in the same way as I was,
handing over all the money to the merchant so that he might with safety
and confidence give security; without, however, confiding our arrangement
and secret to him, which might have been dangerous.