Plot: Sergeant Garcia receives a letter in the mail from Captain Toledano. There's also one to the Captain's wife, and as the sergeant delivers it, he reveals the contents of his: The Toledanos are returning to Spain, and Garcia is to remain as acting Commandante. Raquel does not take the news well, and dashes to the tavern to confer with Quintana. She's observed by Diego, who visits Garcia, hoping he can convince the sergeant to beware of Raquel. He opts to feign a familiarity with tarot, and uses it to predict the sergeant's fortune, warning him of a dark-haired woman and a king of cups who mean Garcia harm. The sergeant is duly impressed, and begins to reconsider Zorro's warning about Quintana.
Meanwhile, Raquel and the rest of the Eagle's lackeys discuss their plans, though she doesn't mention she's due to leave. The attacks on the cuartels throughout California will take place in only a few days, but first, Raquel feels they must eliminate the sergeant. She returns to the compound and tells him her letter from her husband was of a secret mission for Garcia. He is to ride alone towards Capistrano, and meet Toledano on the way. Garcia starts out, but before even leaving the square, sees a single cup, and remembering Diego's warning to watch out for just such a sign, hightails it back into the cuartel. Inside, he tells Raquel he knows of her plot against him, though he doesn't know why she would seek to harm him.
Hearing that, Raquel decides maybe it's best to leave California after all, but her packing is discovered by Quintana, who takes her with him to the winery, where they stashed the hidden gunpowder. Fortunately, Diego had left Bernardo in the square so he could return home and put on the Zorro outfit, and he follows them in (after sending Tornado back to Bernardo with his cape as a signal). Inside, Quintana and the others have decided to eliminate Raquel, who has learned the Eagle always planned to kill her husband, rather than elevate him to a higher position. Zorro keeps her from being killed with a terrible Donkey Kong impression (he hurls a small cask, but only to get their attention, he doesn't hit anyone with it), then Raquel returns the favor in a more conventional fashion, and the two wind up trapped in the same storeroom as all the gunpowder. So Zorro threatens to blow everyone up if they don't leave. The baddies buy, try to escape, and a caught by a bunch of lancers. Then Zorro claims Raquel was merely an innocent in all of it, and Garcia ends up with a medal for recovering the gunpowder.
Quote of the Episode: Diego - 'To see a cup standing by itself is an ill omen, a sign to beware!'
Times Zorro Marks a "Z": 0 (13 overall).
Other: Garcia called Reyes a "baboso" twice this week.
I feel bad for Bernardo. He had to sit in the carriage in the square all day. They were there when Raquel first left to speak to Quintana, and while Diego was running around pulling card tricks on Garcia and changing to Zorro, Bernardo's just stuck there. I guess it beats working, and at least the carriage has a top to provide shade, but still seems pretty dull.
Raquel makes a face turn about the time Quintana catches her trying to catch the first stage out of town, but I'm not sure I buy it. I'm not sure I'm supposed to, though. She spews a lot of stuff about the price of the Eagle's success being too high, costing more lives than she'd thought it would, but she was sending Garcia to his death just hours ago. It's an incredibly unconvincing lie, but maybe she was counting on Quintana to dismiss it as some inherent weakness of hers, due to her being a woman? He wasn't happy about taking orders from a lady, anything that would give him a chance to feel superior would probably make him happy.
Even so, what did she expect to gain? That he'd feel bad and let her leave, even with all she knows of their plans? She'd have been better off admitting her husband had been ordered home and she was leaving with him. Toledano's an intelligent, dedicated, and worst of all for the Eagle, honest officer. Him being assigned to somewhere far from California ought to be a good thing, if only for making the takeover a little easier. And then they wouldn't have risked killing her because if there's one thing that would make Toledano disobey orders from his King, it would be the safety of Raquel. At that point, if you're Quintana your best bet is to let her go, but make sure she knows she and her husband will be implicated as accomplices if they suspect she's ratted them out.
And again, Zorro lets a lady villain off easy, just as he did in "Sweet Face of Danger". I suppose it was considered chivalrous, preserve the lady's honor or something, but it's more than a little patronizing. The idea these women aren't as committed to their deeds as the men, that they're never able to be as ruthless, that they're always on the cusp of switching sides. I guess it would be one thing if it was shown as being a self-interested streak, them recognizing Zorro's going to wind and switching to the winning side, but it's not usually.
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