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Zorro
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Part 3Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 3: “Barcelona, 1812-1814”
Part 3, Pages 167-194 Summary
After some reflections on Diego’s romantic entanglements, the narrator continues the story in 1812, with the position of the French rapidly weakening in the wake of Napoleon Bonaparte’s defeat in Russia. Eulalia de Callís sends her nephew Moncada on a business trip to the Antilles, but before leaving he announces to de Romeu his intentions to ask for Juliana’s hand upon his return. Both de Romeu and Juliana meet the news with minimal enthusiasm. Diego, happy to have his rival temporarily out of the way, tries even harder to impress Juliana.
With the end of the French occupation approaching, Moncada returns from the Antilles and formally asks de Romeu for Juliana’s hand. De Romeu conveys the proposal to Juliana, who asks for more time to consider. One day, while Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria are out in the city to do charity work, they are attacked by a group of armed robbers. There is then, however, the seemingly fortuitous arrival of Moncada, who drives the robbers away. Following this episode, Juliana begins to warm to the idea of marrying Moncada, but Isabel and Diego are suspicious. Finally, after talking to Amalia, Diego discovers the truth: that Moncada paid a few Romani to stage a robbery so that he could “save” the three women and appear heroic. When Juliana learns this, she is disgusted and tells Moncada that “not even dead would she marry him” (184).
Soon after, Bernardo hears from Moncada’s servant that Moncada is planning to have the Romani arrested. Bernardo conveys the news to Diego, who warns the Romani of the imminent danger. The Romani waste no time in fleeing Barcelona while Diego—disguised as Zorro—distracts the French troops when they arrive. He later meets Amalia in secret and gives her money to help her and her people escape.
Bernardo receives a letter one day from Mendoza, hinting that his Indigenous sweetheart Light-in-the-Night has given him a son. With Diego’s blessing, Bernardo returns to California. Before he leaves, he writes Diego a letter, warning him to be wary of Zorro, “not merely for the risk of being discovered, but also because the character would end by taking him over. ‘Never forget that you are Diego de la Vega, a flesh-and-blood person, while that Zorro is a creature of your imagination’” (193).
Part 3, Pages 194-238 Summary
Content warning: The Part 3, Pages 194-238 Summary of this section includes plot details of sexual assault.
In 1814, the French leave Spain as Napoleon is exiled to Elba. Le Chevalier leaves the city amid riots, during which Agnès is injured. The dynastic Spanish monarch Ferdinand VII returns to the throne and institutes an oppressive and repressive regime. Though Eulalia de Callís and Moncada prosper, de Romeu fears that his well-known sympathies for the French put him in danger, and he flees with his daughters to a remote property in Lerida. The new regime also targets La Justicia. Manuel Escalante is arrested, but Diego—with the help of La Justicia—carries out a daring rescue.
As Moncada decides that “the moment had come to be more autocratic with Juliana” to forcibly secure her commitment to him (211), Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria return to Barcelona and reveal to Diego that their father has been arrested for treason. Juliana begs Moncada to intercede on de Romeu’s behalf and agrees to marry him if he secures his release. When Moncada fails, Diego tries a different approach: He goes to Eulalia de Callís with Juliana and Isabel and begs her for help. Though Eulalia takes pity on the young women, she admits that she can do nothing for their father; she does, however, offer to buy their father’s property to give them the capital they need to flee Spain, for they cannot hope to remain in the country as daughters of a man convicted of treason. Eulalia also promises to arrange for them to visit their father before he is executed.
After Eulalia makes good on her promise to purchase de Romeu’s property, Diego accompanies Juliana and Isabel to see de Romeu in prison. De Romeu, knowing he is to be executed, entrusts his daughters to Diego’s care and reveals that it was Moncada who denounced him. Juliana and Isabel are bewildered since Moncada earlier tried to help free de Romeu, but their father explains that Moncada’s efforts were likely a pretense. Though Moncada may not benefit politically from de Romeu’s imprisonment, the denouncement was still a “cold calculation”: Without their father, the daughters would be vulnerable in the world and would be more likely to embrace any protection offered to them—including Moncado’s offers. The denouncement was Moncada’s scheme to secure Juliana’s dependence on him.
De Romeu then says goodbye to his daughters for the last time. Following de Romeu’s execution, Diego prepares to leave Spain immediately and to take Juliana, Isabel, and Nuria with him to California. Before they leave, Moncada approaches Juliana again, this time offering her protection if she agrees to become his mistress. When she resists, he begins to sexually assault her, but Diego and eventually Isabel rescue her. They disarm Moncada, and Nuria has the idea of locking him in a secret room to give them time to escape.
Part 3 Analysis
As Spain’s political situation grows more volatile, Diego gains a more complete understanding of the world as he continues to come into his own. Consequently, his sense of justice—and his identity, so bound up to justice—gains urgency and dimension. As the French regime in Spain comes to an end, it is replaced by an equally oppressive return to the old Spanish government, which virtually sends the country “back to the feudal era” (197). The new regime brings about the brutal suppression of many different groups and individuals, and it leads to the suspension of La Justicia’s operations and to the arrest of Manuel Escalante and Tomás de Romeu. This oppression reiterates the dynamic seen in California: As the Spanish colonists oppressed Indigenous tribes in the Americas, so the new regime oppresses its own marginalized groups in Spain. Both settings help galvanize Diego’s heroism and progress his character arc, which articulates itself through the theme of justice.
Through these political changes, power remains firmly in the hands of the traditional aristocracy. Subjugated groups like the Romani continue to suffer, regardless of whether the French or the Spanish are in control. Moncada, who increasingly typifies the corruption of the traditional European aristocracy, uses the Romani as his pawns, paying them to help him get his way whenever possible, yet he has no scruples about denouncing them to the authorities when they are no longer useful to him. Diego, increasingly juxtaposed with Moncada, helps the Romani escape when Moncada turns against them. Later, when Moncada assaults Juliana, it is again Diego who stands in his way, this time sword in hand.
Meanwhile, the character of Zorro begins to take on a life of its own. Diego makes his second appearance as Zorro when he distracts the troops who have come to arrest the Romani. Zorro comes to represent another aspect of Diego’s identity, and Bernardo even warns Diego to be careful of the character he has created. Diego also becomes more conscious of his dual personalities, “one part Diego de la Vega, elegant, affected, hypochondriac, and the other part El Zorro, audacious, daring, playful” (232). It appears that, in becoming Zorro, Diego has begun to lose track of who he is.
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