where it had taken the impression of cart wheels and of animals'
hoofs, could perceive by this that it was sometimes traversed.

And, presently, we observed something else, something that told us
plainly enough that we were now in the direct way for Lugo, observed
that there branched into the road we were travelling an even broader
one than it--causing, too, our own road to broaden out itself as it
ran further north; a road in the middle of which was a huge stone
column or pedestal, with arms also of stone upon it, pointing
different ways, and with, carved on them, words and figures.

And of these arms one pointed west and bore upon it the words: To
Vigo; another pointed north with, on it, the words: To Lugo.

And seeing all this by the aid of a tinder box and lantern which we
carried amongst our necessaries--seeing it, too, by craning our necks
and standing up in our stirrups--we knew that we had now struck the
route along which those must have come who had fled from Vigo after
the taking of the galleons.

CHAPTER XVII.

MY GOD! WHO IS HE?

All that night we rode, yet slowly, too, for the sake of the horses,
and in the morning--which broke bright, clear and frosty, the sun
sparkling and shining gaily amongst the leafless branches and trees of
the forests through which we passed--reached a little town, or
village, about half way 'twixt the frontier and Lugo, a place called
Chantada, and not far from another town named Orense, which, because
it had a large population--as we gathered from a sight of its roofs
and spires, all a-shining in the morning sun, as we could see very
well from the mountains as we passed along them--we avoided. Also, we
avoided it because it lay not so much upon our direct route, by some
three or four leagues, as Chantada itself.

"Now, come what may," said I to Juan, as we drew near this place, "and
even though we should be pursued from the border--which is not very
like--we must stop here for some hours. We require rest ourselves; as
for the beasts, they must have it; otherwise they will have to be left
behind and others found. And that would be a pity--they are better
than might have been looked for!" As, indeed, they were, especially
considering the haphazard manner in which we had come by them, both
having kept on untiring on the road, while, as for the jennet which
Juan bestrode, it was, possibly because of his light weight, as fresh
as on the hour we set out.

Then, turning to him, I said, even as I noticed that he showed no
signs of fatigue--at which I marvelled somewhat!--and that his
handsome face was as bright and full of colour as it had ever been:

"You must be a-weary, Juan? Three or four hours' sleep will do you a
world of good. And you shall have it, my lad, even though I sit at
your door with a drawn sword in my hand to prevent interruption."

As usual, he smiled that gracious, winsome smile upon me--a smile
which was always forthcoming in response to any simple little kindness
I evidenced to him--and said:

"I could ride on for hours thus--feel no fatigue. Maybe 'tis the
brightness of the morning that heartens me so; perhaps the crisp
coolness of these mountains--Heavens! how different 'tis from aught we
know of in the Indies!--that makes me insensible to it! Yet, Mervan,"
and he gave me a glance from his eyes, under the dark and now
dishevelled curls that hung almost over them, "there is one thing I
long to do now. Mervan, do not refuse. I have earned the right!"

"What is it, child?" I asked, wondering what strange request he might
be about to prefer.

"Let me sing and play a little. 'Twill do no harm, and--and--you
know--the viol is here," and he touched lightly the valise strapped in
front of his saddle.

"Sing, if you will," I said, yet casting a glance around and ahead of
me to see if there were any about whose curiosity might be attracted
by the music--though in sober truth it would not much have mattered
had there been. In such a land as this--though I scarce knew it
then!--for a traveller to pass along on his way singing for
cheerfulness and for solace was no strange thing, but rather, instead,
the custom. "Sing, if you wish--I shall be glad enough to hear a merry
note or so. For audience, however, there will be no other."

"I want none," he replied, "if you are content." And by now, having
got out the little viol d'amore, he struck a few notes upon it and
began to sing.

At first his song was, as I understood and as he told me afterward, a
love-ballad addressed by a youth to his mistress; the words--as he
uttered them--soft and luscious as the trill of the nightingale on
summer night. And his marvellous beauty added also to the effect it
had on me, made me wonder how many dark, tropic beauties in the lands
he came from had already lost their hearts to him. Nay, wondered so
much that, as the last sweet tones of both his voice and viol died
upon the crisp morning air, I asked him a question to that effect.

"Ho! Ho!" he laughed, yet softly as he had just now sung. "None! None!
None! In the Indies I am nothing; all are as dark as I except when
they are golden--fair--and--and--Mervan, _mon ami_, no woman has ever
said a word of love to me."

"Humph!" I said, doubting. "Nor you, perhaps, a word of love to them."

"Nor I a word of love to them. Never, never. _Le grand jamais!_"

"Nor ever loved?" with a tone of doubt so strong in my voice now that
he could not fail to understand it.

"Nor ever loved," he repeated. "Yes--yes--I love now. Now!" Then,
impetuously, as he ever spoke--like a torrent let loose from mountain
side--he went on:

"Love! Love! Love! With heart and soul, and brain on fire. Love! so
that for the creature I adore--have learnt to worship, I would--ah!
what would I not do? Cast my body beneath that creature, plunge
through fire or water--Oh!" he exclaimed, breaking off as suddenly as
he had begun, "Oh! I am a fool! A fool! A fool!"

"But, surely," I said, "surely, with such as you are, that love does
not go unrequited. If you have spoken to the object of this passion,
told of this love you say you bear--and are believed--it must be
returned. Such love as yours would not be simulated, must therefore be
appreciated."

"Simulated!" he exclaimed. "Simulated. It cannot be simulated, not
assumed like a mountebank's robe ere he plays a part. Any one can
paint a flame, any tawdry daubster of an inn signboard, but not even
Murillo himself could paint the heat. And my love is heat--not--not
flame."

"And the lady? The lady?" I asked almost impatiently. "Surely she
does--she must--return this love."

Volatile as he was, and, changing his mood again in a moment, he
looked slyly at me under the dark locks, twanged the viol again and
burst into another song, different from the one he had but recently
finished, the song which I had previously known him to sing:

         "Oh! have you heard of a Spanish lady,
           How she wooed an Englishman?"

"I am an Englishman now, you know, Mervan," interrupting the song.
Then going on:

         "Garments gay and rich as may be,
           Decked with jewels, she had on."

"Did she woo you, then?" I asked, as he paused a moment.

For answer he sang again:

         "As his prisoner fast he kept her,
           In his hands her life did lie;
          Cupid's bands did tie them faster
           By the twinkling of an eye----"

He stopped abruptly and pointed ahead of him with the little viol,
then wrapped it up again in his valise and said:

"See, _amígo_, there is the village--what was its name cut on the
pedestal? Now what are we? Eh? And whence come we if any questions are
asked?"

"You are a young Spanish gentleman," I said, repeating a lesson I had
hitherto in our ride tutored him in, "from Vigo. I am a Frenchman. We
are on our way to Bayonne to join the French forces. Also, we neither
of us know English."

"_Bon, pas un mot_," he replied, catching me up brightly. "_Et nous
parlons Anglais comme une vache parle Espagnol. N'est-ce fas, mon
ami?_"

"_C'est ça. En avant_," I replied, and with a laugh we each touched
our horses with the heel and cantered down into the village of
Chantada.

'Twas a poor place enough for any travellers to see, consisting of a
long, but very wide street, with a fountain in the midst of a wide
open square, around which there lay a number of grunting swine--lean
and repulsive--and also some score or so of geese, all basking in the
morning sun.

Yet next in importance to the church, which was on one side of this
_plaza_, was that which we most sought for, an inn, and, perhaps
because of the road being one of importance 'twixt both Portugal and
Vigo to France, it was a large, substantial-looking house, long, and
with many rooms on either side the great porte, as well as in the two
stories beneath its sloping and serrated Spanish roof; also, it looked
prosperous--a huge gilt coronet hung out over the unpaved street. For
name it had painted along all its front, the words "Taverna Duquesa
Santa Ana."

Under the great archway we rode in, seeing that in a vast courtyard
there stood a travelling coach on which, although there were no horses
attached to it, some baggage was still left piled up beneath some
skins; hearing also the stamping of several horses in their stables.

"Ask," said I to Juan, speaking in French--as agreed between us, there
was to be no more English spoken unless we were certain no ears could
overhear us--"ask if we can be accommodated for some hours, say, until
night. Then we must resume our journey. Ask that."

Obedient to my behest, the youth turned to a man who came out from the
door giving entrance to the inn itself and, in Spanish, made his
demand, whereupon the fellow, after bowing politely, said:

"There is ample accommodation for--for more--alas!--than travel these
roads."

Then, because I addressed a word or so in French to him, he continued
in that language, which, however, he had exceedingly badly:

"Messieurs will stay here till night, then push on to Lugo? _Bon_,
they will be there by morning. So! So! Yes, in verity, they can have a
good meal. There are geese, fowls, meat, also some wine of excellence.
Messieurs may refresh themselves in all ways."

Our horses put in the stable, therefore, we sat down half an hour
later in a vast _sala_--in which a great banquet might have been given
with ease--to a dish of veal, a fowl, and an _olla-podrida_, all of
which would have been good enough had they not been flavoured so much
with garlic that--to my taste, at least--all pleasure was destroyed;
also we had some most excellent chocolate and some good spirituous
liquor to follow--at which latter Juan turned a wry face. Then
ordering another meal to be ready ere we set out--with strict
injunctions that the flavouring should on this occasion be omitted--we
betook ourselves to the rooms above, where we were to get a few hours'
rest.

Yet, as we passed along the whitewashed corridor, the windows of which
gave on to the stable yard, the travelling coach standing there caught
our eyes, and I said to the host:

"You have at least some one else here besides us. Some great
personage, I should suppose, by his equipage," and I directed my
glance to where the great carriage was.

"Ho!" said the man with the true Spanish shrug of the shoulder, which
is even more emphatic than the French one, more suggestive, as it
seems to me; "a personage of wealth, I should say, but no grandee--of
Spain, at least."

"Of what land, then?" I asked. "And why a personage of wealth, yet no
grandee?"

"Oh! well, for that," the man said, with again the inimitable shrug,
"his deportment, his conduct is not that which our nobility permit
themselves. Though I know not--perhaps it may be so--he is a nobleman
of--well--possibly, England. He drinks heavily--name of a dog! but he
drinks like a fiend, _un enragé_--cognac, cognac, cognac--also he
sings all the night, sometimes so that even the fowls and the dogs are
awakened, also all our house. Yet he pays well--very well!"

"Doubtless," I replied, quietly, "an English nobleman. Such is their
custom, according to the ideas of other nations. Well, let us to
rest," whereon Juan and I turned each into a room which the landlord
indicated, and, so far as I was concerned, I slept calmly and
peacefully until awakened by him at three of the afternoon.

Now, when I descended to where our other repast was prepared for us,
which would probably be the last one of a substantial nature which we
should be likely to get ere reaching Lugo, I found Juan there walking
up and down the great _sala_, his sword swishing about against his
left leg as he turned backward and forward petulantly. Also, I could
see that something had ruffled his usually sweet disposition--that
his colour was a little higher than in general, and that the soft
velvet-looking eyes were sparkling angrily.

"Why, what is it?" I asked, even as the landlord brought in the first
cover, "what is it, my boy? You are ruffled."

"Be very sure I am!" he exclaimed, speaking rapidly, and of course in
French, so that the man heard and understood all he said. "I have been
insulted----"

"Insulted!"

"At least rebuffed, and rudely, too; and by, of all men, a filthy
blackamoor--a--a--_por Diôs!_--a slave! Oh! that I had him in the
Indies! He would insult no white one again, I tell you!" and he
fingered the hilt of his weapon and stamped his shapely foot on the
uncarpeted floor till his spurs jangled.

"Come," I said, "you can afford to despise the creature. How did it
happen?"

"Happen! Happen!" Juan replied, still angry. "How?"

"Monsieur saw the black man preparing the luggage on the great coach,"
the landlord said, as he removed the dish-cover from a course of pork
and raisins, "and asked which way his master went. And the fellow was
surly, rude--said that was their business, not the affair of
strangers. Also, they sought no companions, if--if the young señor
meant that----"

"Who never offered our company," Juan broke in again. "Curse him! I
wish I had him in the Indies!" he repeated.

"Come," I said again, "come. This is beneath you, Juan--to be angry
with a slave! As well be vexed with a dog that yaps and snaps at you
when you go to pat it. Sit down and eat your meal. We have a long ride
before us."

Perhaps he saw some sense in my suggestion, for he flung himself into
a chair and began to eat; and meanwhile the host, who was still
hovering about, handing us now a dish of mutton dressed with oysters
and pistachio nuts, and now some stewed pomegranates, chattered away
at one side, telling us that the negro's master was not well--that he
had been drinking again; but yet he was determined to set out at once.

"Though," said he, "but an hour before the caballeros rode in he had
resolved to stay until to-morrow. I know not why he has changed his
mind so swiftly. Oh!--the drink, the drink, the drink!" and he wagged
his head.

That the dissolute man whom the landlord considered to be, in
consequence, an English nobleman, was about to depart there could be
no possibility of doubt. From where we sat at table, and because
curtains to the windows seemed to be things of which those who kept
the inn had never thought, we could see out into the courtyard quite
plainly. Saw first the horses brought out--four of them--and harnessed
to the huge, lumbering vehicle--the nobleman would have proved himself
a kinder-hearted man if he had used six!--saw their cloths taken off
their backs by the postillion, and observed the latter make ready to
mount the near side leader. Also we saw the _facchinos_ on ladders
strapping tight the baggage which had been brought down and hoisted on
top, then heard the landlord, who had now left serving us to attend to
his parting guest, give orders that the noble traveller should be
informed that all was ready for his departure. Upon which we quitted
our seats at the table and walked over to the window, Juan's curiosity
much excited at the chance of seeing this drunken English _milor_, as
he called him. We had not long to wait. For presently we heard a
considerable trampling on the stairs and some mumbled words--to my
surprise the deep, guttural tones seemed familiar!--and then we saw a
wrapped figure carried out between two of the _facchinos_ and lifted
up into the carriage.

And behind that figure walked a negro, his head also enveloped in a
rich red shawl--as though the black creature feared the cold night
air, forsooth!

But, even as they lifted the debauched man into his carriage, the
wrappings about his face became disturbed and fell back on his
shoulders, so that I could see his face--and I started as I did so.
Started even more, too, when, a second later, I heard Juan exclaim in
a subdued voice:

"My God, who is he? Almost I could swear----"

While in my excitement I interrupted him, saying:

"That an English nobleman! That!--Why, 'tis the drunken old ruffian
who came from Rotterdam with me in the ship."

"And his name? His name?" Juan asked, breathlessly. "His name?"

"John Carstairs."

Even as I spoke the postillion cracked his whip, and the great
carriage rolled out of the courtyard, the lamps twinkling and
illuminating our faces as it passed before the window. Showed, too, as
they flashed on Juan's face, that he was once more deathly pale and
all his rich colouring vanished--as I had seen it vanish more than
once before.

CHAPTER XVIII.

BETRAYED.

"His name is Carstairs? Humph!" Juan said to me when the last sound of
the wheels had died away, and we no longer heard the rumbling of the
great Berlin upon the stones of the roughly paved street outside.
"Carstairs!"

"That is the name under which he was entered as a passenger in the
papers of _La Mouche Noire_," I answered. Then continued, looking at
the boy as a thought came to my mind. "Why! have you ever seen him
before, Juan, or have you any reason to suppose it is anything else
than Carstairs?"

For the thought that had come to me, the recollection which had
suddenly sprung to my mind, was the memory of the words Captain Tandy
had used when first we discussed the old man. "'Tis no more his name
than 'tis mine or yours."

Also I recalled that he had said, after meditation, that he was more
like to have been one Cuddiford than anybody else.

And now it seemed as though this stripling who had become my
companion, this boy whose years scarce numbered eighteen, also knew
something of him--disbelieved that his name was Carstairs.

"Do you think," I went on, "that it is something else? Cuddiford,
say?"

"Nay," he replied. "Nay. Not that. Not that. I have heard of
Cuddiford, though. I think he was brought to London and tried.
But--but--oh!" he exclaimed, breaking off, "it cannot be!"

"What cannot be?"

"If," he said, speaking very slowly, very gravely now, "if it were not
eight years since I last set eyes on him, when I was quite a child; if
he had a beard down over his chest instead of being close shaven, I
should say, Mervan, that this was the ruffian I have come to England
to seek; the villain who robbed me of the fortune my father left
me--the scoundrel, James Eaton."

"James Eaton!" I exclaimed. "The man you asked me about; thought I
might be like to know?"

"The same."

"Had he, this Eaton, been a buccaneer? for I make no doubt
that man has." I said. "The captain of _La Mouche Noire_ thought
so--and--and--his ravings and deliriums seemed to point that way."

"I know not," Juan said. "Eaton was a villain--yet--yet--I can scarce
suppose my father would have trusted him with a fortune if he had
known him to be such as that."

"Who was your father, Juan?"

"I--I," he answered, looking at me with those clear starry eyes--eyes
into which none could gaze without marvelling at their beauty--"I do
not know."

"You do not know!--yet you know he bequeathed a fortune to you and
left it in the man Eaton's hands."

"Mervan," he said, speaking quickly, "you must be made acquainted with
my history--I will tell it you. To-night, when we ride forth again;
but not now. See, our horses are ready, they are bringing them from
the stables. When we are on the road I will tell you my story. 'Twill
not take long. Come, let us pay the bill, and away."

"I will pay the bill," I said; "later we can regulate our accounts.
And as you say, we had best be on the road. For if that old man has
seen me, or if his black servant has done so--it--it--may be serious."

"Serious!" he repeated. "Serious! For _you_, my friend?" And as he
spoke there was in his voice so tender an evidence that he thought
nothing of any danger which could threaten him, but only of what might
befall me, that I felt sure, now and henceforth, of the noble,
unselfish heart he possessed. "Oh! not serious for you."

"Ay," I replied. "Ay. Precious serious! Remember, he knows I went
ashore in Lagos bay, that I sailed in the English fleet to Vigo. What
will happen, think you, if he warns them at Lugo that such a one as
I--an Englishman--who assisted at the taking of the galleons, is on
the road 'twixt here and there?"

"My God!" the boy exclaimed, thrusting his hand through the curls
clustering over his eyes--as he always did when in the least excited.
"It might mean----"

"Death," I said, "sharp and swift; without trial or time for shrift;
without----"

"But--whether he be Eaton--or--Carstairs--he is English himself."

"Ay, and so he is." I answered, "But be sure he has papers--also he
can speak Spanish well, will doubtless pass for a Spaniard. Also,
unless I am much mistook, had a cargo in one of those galleons--for
what else has he followed up here? For what--but the hopes of getting
back some of the saved spoil which has been brought to Lugo? That
alone would give him the semblance of being Spanish--would earn him
sympathy. Meanwhile, what should I be deemed? A spy! And I should die
the spy's death."

"What then to do next?" Juan asked, with a helpless, piteous look.

"There is but one thing for _me_ to do," I replied. "One thing alone.
As I told you ere we set out from Viana, my task is to ride on
straight, unerringly, to my goal--on to Flanders, through every
obstacle, every barrier; to crash through them, if heaven permits, as
Hopson crashed through that boom at Vigo--to reach Lord Marlborough or
to fall by the wayside. That is my duty, and I mean to do it."

"Mervan! Mervan!" he almost moaned.

"'Tis that," I went on. "But--think not I say it unkindly, with lack
of friendship or in forgetfulness of our new found _camaraderie_--for
you the need does not exist."

"What!"

"Hear me, I say, Juan. I speak but for your safety. For you there is
no duty calling; the risk does not exist. You are free--a traveller at
your ease."

"Silence!" he cried--his rich, musical voice ringing clear through the
vast _sala_ in the midst of which we now stood once more; and as he
spoke he raised his hand with a gesture of command. "Silence, I say!
By the body of my dead and unknown father, you do not know Juan
Belmonte. What! Set out with you and turn back at the first sign of
danger, and that a danger to you alone! Oh!" he exclaimed, changing
his tone again, emotional as ever. "Oh! Mervan, Mervan."

"I spoke but for your sake," I said, sorry and grieved to see I had
wounded him. "For that alone."

"Then speak no more, never again in such a strain. I said I would
never quit your side till Flanders is reached; no need to repeat those
words. Where you go I go--unless you drive me from your side."

And now it was my turn to exclaim against him, to cry: "Juan! you
think I should do that!" Yet even as I spoke, I could not but add:
"The danger to you as well as me may be terrible."

"No more," he said. "No more. We ride together until the end
comes--for one or both of us. Now, let us call the reckoning and
begone. The horses are there," and he strode to the window and made a
sign to the stable-man to be ready for us. Yet ere the landlord came,
he spoke to me again.

"Remember," he said, "that beyond our _camaraderie_, of which you have
spoken--ay! 'tis that and more, far more--beyond all this, I do
believe the old man whose face I saw as the great lamps shone full
on it is James Eaton. I have come to Europe, to this cold quarter of
the world, to find him. Do you think with him not half a league ahead
that I will be turned from the trail? Never! I follow that man to
Lugo--since his beard is gone I cannot pluck him by that, but I can
take his throat in my hands, thrust this through his evil heart," and
he rapped the quillon of his sword sharply as he spoke. Then added:
"As I will. As I will."

"You do not think he has recognised you, too? Seen you, though unseen
himself, while we have been in this house, passing through these
passages and corridors? as I doubt not either he saw me, or that negro
of his."

He thought a moment after I said this, then suddenly emerged from his
meditation and laughed a bright, ringing laugh, such as I had learnt
to love the hearing of.

"Nay," he replied. "Nay," and still he laughed, "He has not--could not
recognise me. No! No! No! When I present myself to him he--will--he
will be astonished."

And once more he laughed.

What a strange creature it was, I thought. As brave as a young lion;
as emotional and variable as a woman.

In answer to our pealing at the bell, to our calls also, the
landlord came in at last, not hurrying himself at all, as it seemed
to us, to bring the bill. Indeed, we had observed him, as we looked
forth from the window, engaged in a conversation with two of the
townspeople--shrouded in the long cloaks which Spaniards wear--their
heads as close together as if they were concocting a crime, though,
doubtless, talking of nothing more important than the weather.

"The bill," I said, "the bill. Quick. Our horses await us, and we have
far to ride."

"Ay," he replied. "Ay," and flinging down a filthy piece of paper on
the table, added: "There is the bill"; and he stood drumming his
fingers on the table while I felt for the coins with which to pay it.
Yet, even as I did so, I noticed that the fellow's manner was quite
changed from what it had been hitherto. His obsequiousness of the
morning had turned to morose surliness, which he took no trouble to
conceal. And, wondering if Juan, who was standing by, fastening his
spur strap, had observed the same thing, I glanced at him and saw his
eyes fixed on the man.

"There are two pistoles," I said, flinging them on the table. "They
will more than pay our addition; give the rest to the servants."

"Ay!" he replied. "Ay!" but with no added word of thanks.

"Is't not enough?" Juan asked.

"It is enough." Then he turned to me and said: "You are riding to Lugo
to-night?"

"That is our road," I replied, feeling my temper mount at the man's
changed manner. "What of it? Does that route displeasure you, pray?"

"Ho!" he grunted; "for that, it makes no matter to me." Then added:
"The horses are there," in so insolent a tone that I had a difficulty
in restraining myself from kicking or striking him. But I remembered
that, before all else, our safety had to be consulted, and that naught
should be done to cause delay to our progress; wherefore, I swallowed
my ire as best I might.

Yet, as we rode out of the courtyard, I saw at once that Juan's own
thoughts tended exactly in the same direction as mine, since he said
to me:

"That fellow has been told something by the old man--doubtless, that
you are English--that we both are. _Por Diôs!_ Suppose he has informed
him that you were in the English fleet!"

"I have no doubt that the man has been told so," I replied. "But no
matter. If it were not for you I should not care a jot."

Then once more I saw the dark eyes turned on me, and wished that I had
held my tongue--at least as regarded the latter part of my speech.

It seemed as if the town had gone to bed already. The great square was
deserted--except that the geese and pigs were still in it, huddled
together around the fountain, and severally cackled and grunted as we
trotted by them; down the long street, as we rode, we saw no signs of
any one being outside the doors.

Yet, as we neared the extremity of both the town and the street, and
came to where the latter ended off into a country road stretching
along a dreary-looking plain, over which the moon had risen, we saw
that such was not precisely the case. At the end of the street, that
which was the last building was a little, low, whitewashed chapel;
above its black door there was a figure in a little niche, with,
burning in front of it, a candle in a miserable red-glassed lantern;
and, feeble as were the rays cast forth from this poor, yet sacred,
lamp, they were sufficient to show us three men on horseback, all
sitting their steeds as rigidly as statues.

Judging by their long black cloaks and the tips of steel scabbards
which protruded beneath them, and which were plainly enough to be
seen, even in that dim, cloudy light, I imagined these men to be the
town gendarmerie--though doubtless they had some other name to
denominate them--and supposed this was a comfortable position which
they probably selected nightly. Also, the position was at both an exit
and an entrance to the place, therefore a natural one.

"A fine night, gentlemen," one remarked, and next I heard him say
something to Juan, which he replied to; in both of their remarks the
name of Lugo being quite distinct to my ears. But, beyond this,
nothing else passed, and, a few moments later, we were riding at a
smart trot across the dreary, moor-like plain.

"They asked," Juan said, in answer to my question, "if our destination
was Lugo. That was all."

"So I thought I heard," I said. And added: "Until we were past them I
felt not at all sure they might not be on the lookout for us. Might,
perhaps, intend to stop us. If Carstairs, or Eaton, or whatever his
name is, blew upon me to the landlord, he would be as like to do it to
the authorities also. However, we are in the open now, and all is well
so far."

By this time the moon was well up, and we could see the country along
which we were riding; could perceive that 'twas indeed a vast open
plain, with, however, as it seemed to me, a forest or wood ahead of
us, into which the road we were on trended at last. Could see, too,
the snow lying white all around, as far as the moor stretched, and
looking beneath the moonbeams like some dead sea across which no ship
was trying to find its way.

"A mournful spot," I said to Juan, as, half an hour later, we had
almost reached the entrance to the great forest, which we had observed
drawing nearer to us at every stride our beasts took; "'tis well we
made a full meal ere we set out. We are not very like to come across
another ere we reach Lugo."

I spoke as much to hearten up my companion as for any other reason,
since I feared that, in spite of his bravery and firm-fixed
determination to never leave my side, he must be very much alarmed at
the thoughts of what might happen to us ere we had gone many more
leagues.

But, remarking that he made no answer to my idle words, I glanced
round at him and perceived that his head was turned half way back
toward whence we had come, and that upon his face was a look of
intense eagerness--the look of one who listens attentively for some
sound.

"What is it, Juan?" I asked.

"Horses' hoofs on the road behind us," he said, "and coming swiftly,
too. Hark! do you not hear?"

And even as he spoke I did hear them. Heard also something else to
which my soldier's ears had made me very well accustomed: The clank of
steel-scabbarded swords against horses' flanks.

"It is the men we passed by the chapel," I said, "following us now.
Yet, if 'tis us they seek, why not stop us ere we left the town? They
could do as much against us there as here."

"They were but three then," the lad answered, calmly as though he
were counting guineas into his palm instead of the hoof-beats of those
on-coming horses; "now there are more--half a dozen, I should say. If
'tis us they follow, they have waited to be reinforced."

And I felt sure that he had guessed right, since the very thought
which he expressed had already risen in my own mind.

CHAPTER XIX.

THE SECOND FIGHT.

We had entered the forest five minutes later, and be very sure, we
wasted no more time in waiting for those behind to come up, since, if
'twas us they followed, we might as well be in its shadow as in the
open. For if we were outnumbered the trees themselves would afford us
some shelter, make a palisade from behind which we might get a shot at
them if 'twas too hot for a hand-to-hand encounter. At any rate, I had
sufficient military knowledge to know that 'tis best to fight against
unequal odds with a base, or retreat, to fall back on, than to be
without one.

Yet as we rode into this forest I loosened my blade in its sheath, and
felt with my thumb to see that the priming of my pistols was ready;
also bade Juan do the same; likewise to keep behind me as much as
might be.

"For," said I, "if they mean attack I will give them no chance of
beginning it. The first hostile word, and I force my horse between
them, cutting right and left, and do you the same, following behind
me. Thereby you may chance to take off those whom I miss."

And I laughed--a little grimly, perhaps--as I spoke, for I thought
that if there were, indeed, six men behind us, my journey toward
Flanders was already as good as come to an end. Yet, all the same, I
laughed, for, strange though it may seem to those who have never known
the delights of crossed steel, a fight against odds had ever an
exhilarating effect upon me; which was, perhaps, as it should be with
a knight of the blade.

Juan, however, did not laugh at all, though he told me he would follow
my orders to the utmost, and, indeed, was so silent that I asked him
if his nerves were firm. To which he replied that I should see when
the moment came.

And now upon the crisp night air we heard the clang of those on-coming
hoofs ringing nearer and nearer; a rough or deadened kind of sound
told us the iron shoes were on the fallen leaves which covered all the
track from where the wood began; the scabbards of the riders flapped
noisily now against spur and horses' flanks; bridles jangled very
near.

Then they were close upon us--five of them!--and a voice called out:

"Halt, there! You are Englishmen--one a sailor and a spy passing
through the land."

"You lie!" rang out Juan's voice, in answer. "We are not Englishmen."

That his reply in fluent Spanish--the Spanish, too, of a gentleman,
and not of a common night patrol--astonished them, I could see. The
leader, he who had spoken, glanced round at his four comrades, and, an
instant after, spoke again:

"Who are you, then, and why does not the big man answer?"

"He speaks French. I am Spanish. Molest us not."

"Molest! _Cuerpo di Baco!_ We are informed you are English. Produce
your papers!"

"We have none. They are lost."

"Ho! ho! ho!" the leader replied. "Very well, very well. 'Tis as I
thought. That man is English; he is denounced this night. As for you,
the accursed English have many possessions wherein our tongue is
spoken. We understand."

And he gave, as I supposed, some order, since all advanced their
animals a few paces nearer, while, as they did so, Juan whispered to
me in the French: "Be ready, but do nothing yet."

"You will return to Chantada with us," the spokesman said, sitting his
horse quietly enough, yet with the blade of his drawn sword glistening
in the moonbeams as it lay across the creature's neck--as, I observed,
did the blades of all the others. "That finishes our affair. For the
rest you will answer to the Regidór."

"We shall not return. Our way lies on."

"So be it. Then we must take you," and, as he spoke, I saw a movement
of his knee--of all their knees--that told me they meant to seize us.

And I knew that the time had come.

"At them!" cried Juan at the same moment. "Advance, Mervan!"

A touch to the curb, and my beast fell back--'twas a good animal,
that! had, I believe, been a charger in its day, so well it seemed to
know its work--then a free rein and another touch of the heel, and I
was amongst them, my sword darting like lightning around. Also, at my
rear, came the jennet's head; near me there flashed the steel of
Juan's lighter weapon; and in a moment we had crashed through
them--they fell away on either side of us like waves from a ship's
forefoot!--fell away for a moment, though closing again in an instant.

"Return and charge!" I cried to Juan, still in French. "At them again!
See, one has got his quietus already!" As, indeed, he had, for the
great fellow was hanging over his horse's neck, in a limp and listless
fashion, which showed that he was done for. But now those four closed
together as we went at them, Juan stirrup to stirrup with me in this
second charge, and our tactics had to be changed. We could no longer
burst through them, so that it was a hand-to-hand fight now; they had
pistols in their holsters, but no chance to use them; they could not
spare a hand to find those holsters--could not risk our swords through
their unguarded breasts; wherefore we set to work, blade to blade.

We should have won, I do believe. Already I had thrust through and
through one man's arm--as luck would have it, 'twas not the sword
arm--already they backed before our rain of blows and cuts and
thrusts, when, by untoward fate, my horse stumbled on the frosty road
and came down; came down upon his haunches, slipping me from the
saddle over the cantle and so to the earth; then regained its hind
legs once more and dashed out from the fray.

And now our position was mighty perilous. Above I saw Juan on the
jennet fencing well with two of the men; over me were the two others
cutting down at my head, though, since by God's mercy I had retained
my weapon, their blows were up to now unavailing. Yet I knew this
could not be for long--nor last--wherefore I cried:

"Save yourself, Juan, save yourself; disengage and flee."

Under my own blade, under those two others that beat upon it so that I
wondered it shivered not in my hand, I saw the boy manfully holding
his own--once, too, I saw him rip up the jerkin of one of his
opponents, and heard the latter give a yell of pain--then, "Great
God!" I thought, "what has happened now?"

For there was a fifth man upon the scene. A man, tall and stalwart,
mounted on a great, big boned, black horse, who had suddenly sprung
from out a chestnut copse by the side of the track; a man in whose
hands there gleamed a sword that a second later was laced and entwined
with those attacking Juan; a man who hurled oaths in Spanish and
French at them--I heard _carambas_ and _por Diôs's_ and other
words--which sounded like the rolling of some great cathedral organ as
they came from his deep throat--_tonneres_, _ventre-bleus_ and
_carrognes_ I heard.

Heavens! who was this man who beat back those others as a giant might
push back a handful of children; whose sword--even as with one hand he
grasped Juan round the waist--went through an adversary's neck so that
he fell groaning upon me, his blood spurting as if from a spigot? Who
was he who laughed loud and long as, with one accord, all those still
alive turned and fled back upon the road they had come? Fled, leaving
us, thanks be to God and this new arrival, the victors of the fray.

He sat his horse calmly now, looking after their retreating figures,
his great sombrero slouched across his face, wiping his blade upon the
coal-black creature's mane; then, as their figures disappeared from
our view, he said in French:

"Warmer work this, Señor Belmonte, than twanging viols and singing
love songs, _n'est-ce pas?_" and from his throat there came again that
laugh.

Glancing up, I saw that which caused me to start, even as I heard Juan
say: "You! You here! And in this garb!"--saw that which made me wonder
if I had gone demented. For this man who had so suddenly come to our
rescue, this _fine lame_ whose thrusts had won the fray for us, was
none other than the monk I had seen on board _La Sacra Familia_, the
holy man known there as Father Jaime.

And swiftly as I gazed up at him there came to my recollection old
Admiral Hopson's suspicions as to having seen him before, also the
imitation pass he had made across the table with the quill at his
brother-admiral, and his words:

"'Twas not always the cowl and gown that adorned his person--rather
instead the belt and pistols--the long, serviceable rapier, handy."

What did it mean?

Ere he answered either Juan's startled enquiries or my stare of
amazement, which he must very well have seen in the moon's rays as I
regarded him, he cantered off after my horse, which was standing
quietly in the forest side by side with that other animal on whose
neck the first wounded man had fallen--he was now lying dead upon the
ground!--and brought both back to where we were, leading them by their
reins.

"You will want your horse, monsieur," he said, "to continue your
journey. _Bon Dieu!_ you both made a good fight of it, though they
would have beaten you had I not come up at the moment."

"Believe us, we both thank you more than words can express," I said,
while Juan sat his jennet, still breathing heavily from his exertions,
yet peering with all the power of those bright eyes at the man before
him, "but your appearance is so different from what it was when last
we met that--that I am lost in amazement. You were, sir, a holy monk
then."

"_Cucullus non facit monachum_," he replied, in what I recognised to
be very good Latin, then added, with a laugh: "In journeying through
dangerous places we are not always what we seem to be. To wit:
Monsieur was either an English soldier or sailor when I saw him
last--an enemy to Spain and France--hating both, as I should suppose.
Yet now he is a private gentleman, and, I imagine, desires nothing
less than that his real position should be known."

"But you--you," Juan interposed, "you were monk from the first moment
I set eyes on you, from the hour when we left Hispaniola. Are you not
one?"

"My boy," he said, and as he spoke he touched Juan on the sleeve as
they both sat their horses side by side--I being also mounted again by
this time--"my boy, I replied to your companion just now with a
proverb. I answer you with another: 'Look not a gift horse in the
mouth.' I have saved your life, at least, if not this gentleman's.
And----"

But Juan stammering forth some words of regret for the curiosity he
had shown, he stopped him with still another touch on the sleeve, and
said:

"Briefly, let me tell this: I had reasons to be in Spain, to quit the
Indies and accompany the galleons, get a passage by some means. It
suited me to come disguised as a monk; there was no other way. For,
rightly or wrongly, both Spain and France are my enemies; in my own
proper character I could never have reached here. Being here, I am
still in danger if discovered; to avoid that discovery I have now
doffed the monkish garb, so that all traces of me are lost. Enough,
however; I am on my road to Lugo. Does your way lie the same road?"

We both answered that it did, whereon he said, speaking quickly and,
as I noticed, in the tone of one who seemed very well used to issuing
orders, as well as accustomed to deciding for himself and others:

"So be it. Let us ride together--and at once. Every moment we tarry
here makes our position more dangerous. Those men will no sooner have
returned to Chantada than every available soldier will be sent forward
to arrest us, even though we be in Lugo itself. You will be recognised
without doubt if you stay an instant in the town. Your one chance is
to get into it and out again as soon as may be.

"And you?" I asked, as now we put spurs to our horses and dashed along
the forest track. "And you? If any of those who were in this affray
return with the soldiers you speak of, it will be hard for you, too,
to escape recognition. Your form cannot be disguised."

"It will be disguised again," he answered very quietly, "when I have
once more resumed the monk's garb. I have it here," and he tapped the
great valise strapped on his horse's back. "It has not been worn since
I got ashore at Vigo, and that's far behind this by many leagues.
There are none here like to recognise me."

"You stay, then, in Lugo?"

"I must stay. I have affairs."

He said this so decidedly that we neither of us ventured to ask him
any more questions, though, a moment or two afterward, he volunteered
to us the statement that, if another horse he had previously bought
when he landed at Vigo had not broken down, he would long ere this
have been in Lugo. Only the finding of a fresh animal--the one he now
bestrode--had taken him some time, and thereby caused him to be late
on his road, which, as we said gratefully enough, was fortunate for
us.

"Ay," he replied, "it was; and also that I was breathing my animal in
the forest at the time those others overtook you. But, _nom d'un
chou!_ I have been a fighter in my day myself, and, since I could not
see two men set upon by five, my old instincts were aroused; though,"
he added, with extreme _sang froid_, "had it been an even fray, I
might have left you to it."

And now it seemed to both Juan and myself as though this man's
assistance to us necessitated us showing some confidence in him;
wherefore, very briefly, we gave him some description of why we were
travelling together, and of how, because Juan had naught else of much
importance to do at the outset of his arrival in Europe, he had
elected to be my companion as far as Flanders.

"Humph!" he exclaimed at this, "he is a young knight errant, as I told
him oft enough in the galleon, when he talked some rhodomontade about
being on his way to Europe to seek out and punish a villain who had
wronged him. Well, sir, even if he finds not the man, he is likely
enough to meet with sufficient adventures in your company ere he
reaches Flanders."

"He thinks he has found him already," I said quietly, in reply.

"What!" and he turned his great eyes on both of us. "Found him. Here
in Spain!" and he laughed incredulously.

"He thinks nothing of the kind," Juan cried hotly, roused more, I
thought, by that scornful laugh than by my doubting words. "He is sure
of it!"

And then he told the whole story of our having seen the old man's
coach in the inn, of the black's insolent reply, of his departure at
night, and of the little doubt there could be that he it was who had
betrayed us to the people of Chantada; also he added:

"But I have him. Have him fast. He is but a league or so ahead of us,
must stop some hours, at least, in Lugo. And then--then, James Eaton,
look to yourself!"

As he uttered those words the black horse which the other bestrode
plunged forward, pricked, as I thought, by some unintentional movement
of the rider's spur, while that rider turned round in his saddle and
gazed at Juan, his face, as it seemed to me, livid beneath the
moonlight.

"Who? What name is that on your lips?"

"The name of a damned villain. The name of James Eaton."

"James Eaton. James Eaton--what is he to you, then? What evil has he
done to you?"

"What evil?" Juan replied, with a bitter laugh. "What evil? and what
is he to me? Only this: He was left guardian to me by my dead father,
and--and--he ill-treated and robbed me. No more than that!"

"You! You! You!" this mysterious man said, his hand raised to his
eyebrows, his dark, piercing eyes gleaming beneath that hand--upon his
face a look I could not fathom. "You!"

CHAPTER XX.

"THE COWL DOES NOT ALWAYS MAKE THE MONK."

We were drawing very near to Lugo now, as the wintry morning gave
signs of breaking; already the great spurs and cañons of the mountains
that flanked the east side of the river Minho began to shape
themselves into something tangible and distinct from the dull clouds
at their summits, and their peaks and crags to stand out clearly.
Also, we noticed that villages were scattered about at the base of
these mountains; observed lights twinkling in the windows of cottages,
and passed a bridge which spanned the river and carried on a road that
led from that east side to the western one; a road with, on it, a
great pedestal of rock, serving, as others which we had passed had
served us, as milestones and finger-posts; a road leading, as we
learnt, from another Viana, different from the one in Portugal at
which Juan and I had landed from the English fleet.

We were drawing very near.

For the last two or three hours we had ridden almost in silence, knee
to knee, all wrapped in our long cloaks, and with nothing breaking in
upon that silence but, sometimes, the hoot of an owl from out the
beeches and tamarisks which fringed the road, and sometimes the scream
of an eagle far up in the mountains, roused, perhaps, from his eyrie
by the clang of our animals' hoofs upon the hard-bound, frosty earth.

Yet some words had been spoken, too, ere we lapsed into this silence;
for, as our friend and deliverer had exclaimed, "You! You!" on hearing
that James Eaton had robbed Juan of whatever might have been left in
his care by the lad's dead father, Juan himself had quickly exclaimed:

"Is he known also to you, then?"

"He was once, long ago--ay, long ago!" Then he paused, as though
unwilling to tell more, though, a moment later, he said:

"And now you think he is ahead of us?--that we shall find him in
Lugo?"

"Without doubt," Juan and I answered, both speaking together, while
the former went on:

"He must halt for some time in Lugo, if only to get a change of
horses."

"'Tis my belief," I struck in, "he will do more than that. Judging
from what I learnt of him in the ship which brought us both from
Holland, Lugo is his destination, the end of his journey."

"Wherefore?" the man who had been "Father Jaime" asked.

"Because," I replied, "he was on his way to Cadiz, where, he thought,
as all did, that the galleons were going in. And he told me in a
frenzy, when he learnt that the English fleet was about in those
waters, that he had a fortune on board two of the galleons. Be sure,
therefore, he would follow them up to Vigo as soon as he could, after
being put ashore at Lagos and learning that much of the treasure had
been set ashore and then forwarded on to Lugo----"

"Would follow them here?" the other said. "Ha! Well, then, we shall
surely meet," and he laughed a little, very quietly, to himself. "Must
meet! And I--I shall have something to say to James Eaton--shall
recall myself to him. He will be pleased to see me!" and again he
laughed--though this time the laughter sounded grimly.

"I also shall have something to say to him," exclaimed Juan. "To----"

"Recall yourself to him also," the other broke in.

"Perhaps," the boy replied, "perhaps. We shall see, though it may not
be just at first."

"At first," said the other, taking him up, "let me present myself. I
assure you 'twill be best. Let me put in my claim to his attention.
Then you can follow suit."

"And I," I exclaimed, speaking now. "I, too, have something to settle
with Mr. James Eaton, if that be his name. I owe it to him that my
journey to Flanders has been interrupted by that scene upon the road,
owe it to him that I ran a very fair chance of never continuing that
journey further than a couple of leagues this side of Chantada.

"I believe, too, that it was he who drew the attention of a French ship
of war to the vessel which was carrying me and my intelligence to
Cadiz, as then supposed."

"How?" asked the ex-monk, "and why?"

"The reason wherefore," I replied, "might be because he suspected my
mission in some way. The manner in which he let the French ship know
of our whereabouts was probably by leaving open the dead light of his
cabin when he lay drinking, while all the others were closed so as to
avoid her. Oh! be sure," I continued, "when you two have done with him
I shall have an account also to make."

"We are three avengers," the other replied, with still that grim laugh
of his. "James Eaton will have other things to think of besides
getting back his treasure at Lugo, if it is there; for, when Señor
Belmonte and myself and you have finished with him--sir," he said,
breaking off and regarding me, "I do not know your name, how to
designate you. What may it be?"

"My name," I replied, "is Mervyn Crespin. May I ask by what we are to
address you? At present, at least, you do not style yourself 'Father
Jaime,' I apprehend."

"Nay," he said. "Nay--not until I don the cowl again. But, see, none
of us, I should suppose, are desirous of travelling through this
hostile country, entering this town of Lugo, which may bristle with
dangers to all of us, under our right names. Therefore--though even
thus 'tis not desirous that these names should be spoken more often
than needs--I will be Señor Jaime. There are Jaimes for second names,
as well as first."

"And," exclaimed Juan, entering at once into the spirit of the matter,
"there are Juans for second names as well as first, also. Therefore I
will be Señor Juan."

"And I," I said, "since I pretend to speak no Spanish, but am supposed
to be a Frenchman, will be Monsieur Crespin. That is a French name, as
well as English. There are scores of Crespins in Maine and Anjou--'tis
from there we came originally. 'Twill do very well."

So, this understanding arrived at, we rode on afterward in that
silence which I have told you of.

But now it was full day, cold, crisp and bright, with the sun topping
the mountains to our left and sending down fair, warm beams athwart
the river, which served to put some life into us, as well as a little
extra heat besides that which the motion of our horses and the glow of
their bodies had hitherto afforded us.

Also, we had left the forest now and entered a great plain which
rolled away to the west of those mountains, and of the river which
brawled and splashed at their base; a plain that in summer was,
doubtless, covered with all the rich vegetation for which the north of
Spain is famed, but that now stretched bare as the palm of a hand, and
recalled to my mind the fair Weald of Kent when winter's icy grip is
on it. Yet 'twas well covered with villages, some close together, some
a league or two leagues apart, and, under where the last spurs of the
Cantabrian mountains swept round directly to the west, we saw rise
before us the high walls of a town, with above them an incredible
amount of towers--we making out between twenty and thirty of these as
each stride of our animals brought us nearer to them.

"That," said Señor Jaime--as he was now to be called--though God only
knew what his right name was!--while our eyes regarded it from still
afar, "must be Lugo. Now let us decide for our plan of action. And,
first, as to getting into it."

"Do you make your entry," I asked, "as a gentleman travelling through
the land, or as priest--monk?"

"As monk!" he replied. "So best! I have other affairs here, besides
the desire of meeting my old friend, Eaton. Now, observe, this is what
I propose: You shall go first together--you will have no difficulty in
getting in, seeing that there is no frontier to cross. Nor will you be
asked for papers, since, once in, you will not get out again unless
you appear satisfactory to those who are there."

"We must get out again after a short rest, after a few hours," I
replied. "I make no manner of doubt that by now we are followed from
Chantada--if those who are behind us reach Lugo ere we have quitted
it, we shall be stopped beyond all doubt."

Señor Jaime paused a moment ere he answered; pondering, doubtless, on
this being the case. Then, speaking slowly, he said:

"If--if--'twere possible that you," looking at me, "and you,"
regarding Juan, "could also enter the town disguised; could appear as
something vastly different from what you are, you would be safe; we
would remain together. And--and--that would please me. We must not
part, having met as we have done," and his eyes rested particularly
upon Juan as he spoke, so that I felt sure he would far less willingly
part with him than with me; that it was of this bright, handsome boy
he was thinking most.

"I," exclaimed Juan, "would, above all other things but one--that one
the not parting company with Mervan, my friend!"--how softly he
murmured those words, "my friend!"--"stay here. For I am resolved to
bring to bar that villain, James Eaton. But how--how to do it? How to
enter the town disguised? We do not travel with masks and vizards, nor
could we assume them an we did. Also, how to change our appearance
sufficiently to be unrecognised by any of those behind?"

"For him," said Señor Jaime, addressing Juan, but looking at me, "'tis
easy enough. I can help him to change himself in a moment. I have
here," and he tapped the great valise strapped on to his horse's back,
"a second monk's gown, of another order than the one I wore--that was
a Carmelite's and, as you know, brown; the second is a Dominican's,
and white. The object which brings me to Europe--later you shall know
it--if it prospers, forced me to provide myself with more than one
disguise."

Then after pausing a moment, perhaps to judge of the effect of this
announcement on us, he went on: "Well, Monsieur Crespin! What do you
say? Will you be a monk and stay with Juan till he has seen his
beloved friend, James Eaton, or will you insist on his abandoning his
interview with that personage and riding post-haste to Flanders? Only
remember, if he and you do so, or if you do this alone, the chance is
also missed of your having a reckoning with that old man also."

Now I was sorely posed by this suggestion of his--sorely. For,
firstly, there was something bitterly distasteful to me, a soldier
and, I hoped, a brave one, in masquerading in any such guise as this
suggested. Also, I knew that it ill became me to tarry on my journey
back for any cause whatever, let alone a new formed friendship for
Juan Belmonte. My place was with the Cuirassiers, and with them I
ought to be--both the earls having hinted that there would be some
hard fighting ere long--while, as for revenging myself on the villain
whose name now seemed for a certainty to be Eaton, well! that might
easily be left to Señor Jaime and Juan. If they did not between them
very effectually confound that hoary-headed scoundrel, I should be
much astonished.

On the other hand, there were many things that made for my disguising
myself ere I entered Lugo, and, rapidly enough as I sat my horse
deliberating, those things ran through my mind. To begin with, it
would be full of Spanish and French soldiers and sailors, the runaways
from Vigo, who, undoubtedly, would have followed the bulk of the
treasure which had been removed from the galleons and transported
here; and it was possible that there might be some who would recognise
me, since I had played a pretty prominent part in the attack. It
might, therefore, be best that--little as this disguising of myself
was to my taste--I should do as Señor Jaime suggested.

Yet, all the same--and in the next moment--I decided that I would not
do this thing; for, besides that it was too repugnant to me, I knew
that it would be useless. And, knowing this, I said so, in spite of
the pleading, pitiful glances which Juan cast at me--glances which
plainly enough implored me to adopt the monk's dress, and thereby be
enabled to stay in Lugo until vengeance was wrought upon James Eaton.

"No," I said, turning to Señor Jaime, who sat quietly on my horse
awaiting my answer, while I studiously avoided Juan's gaze. "No, I
will not do it. I am a soldier, and as a soldier--at least as a man,
and not a monk--I will get through Spain and France. Besides, the
disguise would be useless."

"Wherefore?"

"In reply to that," I said, "let me ask you a question: What do you
intend to do with your horse? Monks do not ride, as a rule--in
Flanders I never saw one on horseback; also, your boots and great
steel spurs beneath the gown would betray you."

Now, he seemed very fairly posed at this, and for a moment bent his
head over his animal's mane, as though lost in thought. Then suddenly
he burst out into one of his deep, sonorous laughs, and exclaimed:

"Body of St. Iago! I never thought of that. Though, for the boots, it
matters not; I have the monkish sandals with me. And--and--perhaps the
horse can be smuggled into the town somehow, and with it the boots!
Ha! I must think!"

And again he became buried in thought; yet, a moment later, he spoke
once more:

"If you enter Lugo as you are," he said, "you will be taken for a
certainty. There are--there must be--many coming after us from behind,
from Chantada--they will describe you. Remember, you were not only
seen under the moon's rays during the fight in the wood, but in the
town previously. And, if you are taken, there is no hope for you!
Eaton has told that you are English--fought against the galleons at
Vigo. God! it means the garrote for both of you. You understand what
that is? An upright post, a hasp of iron around your neck and it, a
wheel to screw that hasp tight to the post--with your neck between
them!--and--and--your eyeballs out of your head--your tongue half a
foot long. That is what awaits you if you are taken."

"I will never be taken," I said, between my teeth, "to suffer that.
Bah! If I cannot, if we cannot, get out of the town again on the other
side, have I not this, and this?" and I touched my pistol holsters.
"They will be in my belt then."

After saying which I turned to Juan to ask him if he agreed with me,
and saw that Señor Jaime's ghastly description of the garrote had made
him as pale as death.

"What think you, comrade?" I asked. "Is it not best that you and I
forego our vengeance on this man, Eaton, and push on as fast as may
be, leaving him to our friend here, who also seems to have a reckoning
to make--who appears, also, one who can extort it? Or will you
disguise yourself and stay behind?"

"Nay. Nay," he answered. "Where you go, I go. And--God knows I am no
poltroon--yet--yet--I could not suffer that. I have seen it in the
Indies--oh!" and he put his hands to his eyes, letting his reins fall.
"Not that, not that!"

"Will you push on with me, then, foregoing your vengeance?"

"Yes. Yes, since my vengeance risks such death as that. But," turning
to the other, "you proposed a disguise for me. Was I to be a monk,
too?"

"Nay," he said. "Nay. But you are a brave, handsome lad--I thought
that in some way we might have transformed you into a woman. You would
make a presentable one."

"A woman!" he echoed, looking mighty hot and raging at the suggestion.
"A woman!--I, who have fought by Mervan's side! Never. Also," he
added, after somewhat of a pause, "it is not as a woman that I intend
to meet James Eaton, if at all; but as a man demanding swift justice.
A woman would be like to get none of that from him."

CHAPTER XXI.

A NARROW ESCAPE.

That evening--or rather afternoon, when already the wintry night was
at hand--Juan and I were in Lugo and once more making preparations to
continue our journey--to go on west now, through the Asturias,
Santander and Biscay, as our chart showed us, toward St. Sebastian and
Bayonne, which would bring us into France. But also we hoped that,
after we had passed by the former of these provinces, on reaching the
sea, which we should then do, our journey by land might be at an end;
that we might find, by great good fortune, at some seaside town a
vessel, either English or Dutch, which would take us north to where we
desired to go.

But, alas! 'tis useless to write down all the plans we concocted in
the dirty parlour of the inn we had rested in--an inn dignified by the
name of the "Pósada del Gran Grifon," since 'twas not to be our lot to
make that journey, nor to set out upon it.

Let me not, however, anticipate, but write down all that now befell
us; also let me now begin to tell of the strange marvels that I was
destined to behold the unravelling of, as also the dangers which from
this period encompassed me.

We were alone, had entered Lugo alone, Señor Jaime having bidden us
ride ahead of him and leave him to find his way into the town by
himself.

"And," he said, "be very sure I shall do it. Fear not for me. Only, if
I come not by the time four o'clock has struck, believe that either I
have fallen into the hands of the enemy or that, for some reason, I
have not been able to get face to face with Eaton. Therefore, ride on
without me. Remember my disguise will save _me_. You have both refused
to be disguised. By consequence, look to yourselves. We shall meet
again. I know your road."

And now four o'clock had struck from the cathedral hard by, and he had
not come. Yet, why not? we asked each other. A peasant whom we had met
on the road when but a league between us and Lugo had mentioned this
inn as one where good accommodation for man and beast could be
obtained, and ere we parted from Jaime we had determined that it
should be our meeting place.

And still he had not come. And it was four o'clock and past.

"We must go," I said to Juan, "we must go. 'Tis courting frightful
danger to remain here. Already I have observed half a dozen French and
Spanish sailors pass this window, whom I saw on board some of the
ships and galleons; also some officers. If I meet them face to face,
and they remember me, as I do them, there will be----"

"What?" asked Juan, his face full of terror.

"Well--no Mervyn Crespin a few hours hence! that's all."

"Oh, come, come, come," he exclaimed, catching at my arm. "For God's
sake, come! Why, why did we ever enter this town! 'Twas madness. We
should have remembered they had fled hither."

"There is no other high road to France and Flanders," I said, "that
justifies the risk. Yet, Juan, remember, even now it is not too late
for you to part from me, if you choose. Your coming on here means
nothing. _You_ did not fight against the galleons; therefore you are
in no danger----"

"Silence!" he said again, as he had said once before. "Silence! I will
hear no word about leaving you."

Then suddenly he came away from the window, at which he had been
standing, and crossed the room to me.

"Look," he said. "Look from out that window into the street; then say
if it is not too late for us to part--if my danger is not as great as
yours. Look, I say!"

Glancing first at him, in wonderment at his exclamation, and what the
meaning of it might be, yet with some sort of understanding mounting
to my brain also, I stepped across to the dirty, unwashed window and
looked out into the street.

And then I understood.

Through the dim light cast on the now darkened street by oil lamps,
swung across it at intervals, and also by the candles burning in.
_relicários_, set into the walls, as well as by the feeble glare which
emerged from curtainless and unshuttered windows, I saw a band of men
slowly passing, their drawn swords in their hands, or with musketoons
upon their shoulders.

And ahead of all this body, which was composed of perhaps a dozen,
there marched two of those with whom we had fought on the road between
Chantada and this place--the leader who had addressed us, and another.
As they passed along they gazed at each man whom they encountered;
halting opposite our window, they looked at an inn which faced ours
directly, a little place on which was painted the name, "Pósada Buena
Ventura."

"Open the window a crack," I said to Juan--doing so myself, however,
as I spoke--"and let us listen. Hear what they say. Softly," and
following my words we placed our ears to the inch-wide orifice.

And then we heard every word as it fell from their lips.

"That house opposite," the leader said, "is the last to be examined
except this and another"--while Juan whispered: "I cannot catch its
name--It sounds like the San Cristobal. Yes. Yes. 'Tis that. Ha! And,
see, they enter the house opposite. Yet some remain in the street."
And we both peered from behind the side of the window at them as they
stood there in the road, a crowd of urchins gathered round.

"We are trapped," I said, "trapped. We can never get out. The horses
are in the stables behind--also, the gates are shut."

"God!" exclaimed Juan, suddenly, even as I spoke, "they have finished
there already--are coming here. Another five minutes and they will be
in this room."

"What shall we do?" he wailed a moment later.

"Escape while there is time--from this room, at least. Loosen your
sword in its sheath--follow me," and I drew him back from the window.

"But where? Where to go to?"

"Out of the house, at least. Come. The stairs lead down to the back
part of the house; there is the yard and the stables--also a garden. I
observed it when the horses were put up. Come. There is a wall at the
end of the garden which separates it from another. If we can get over
that we can at least escape into the town. By God's grace, there may
be some way out of it besides the gates. And we have the cloak of
night to help us."

All the time I was speaking I had been drawing Juan toward the door;
also I had seen that my papers and money were bestowed about me
safely--I doubted if we should ever see our valises again!--or, for
the matter of that, our horses. It would be heaven's providence now if
we ever got out of this town alive, and even that I deemed unlikely.
And at this crisis that was all we had to hope for, if so much.

"Lift your _porte epée_ by the hand," I whispered. "If the scabbard
clanks on the stairs we are undone. Follow me."

In another instant we were outside the door of the room. For
precaution and as a possible means of gaining time I drew the key from
the inside of the lock, then placed it in the keyhole outside, made a
turn and, again withdrawing it, dropped it into my pocket. This would
take up some moments, while they clamoured without, bidding us open.
It would take some few more to break down the door, which they would
very probably do. They might be precious moments to us.

It was quite dark outside in the corridor, but at the farther end
there glimmered a faint light from an oil lamp set upon a bracket,
though its rays scarcely reached here, namely, to the head of the deep
oak stairs opposite where the door of the room we had just quitted
was. But from below, which was a stone-flagged passage running from
the front of the house to the back, there was another light--thank
God, 'twas nearer the street than the exit to the yard!

We descended seven steps, then the stairs turned sharply from a small
landing--we ourselves did not dare, however, to turn them.

For below, in that cold stone corridor, we heard and recognised the
voice of the man who had challenged us in the forest ere the fight
began, a night ago.

"Here, are they?" we heard him say. "Here--so the birds are caught.
The one, big, stalwart, brown--that is the English _demonio_--the
other, younger, dark, handsome, might play the lover in one of Vega's
spectacles. Ha! And the third who joined in the murder--an elder one,
swart and grimy, black as the devil himself--is he here, too?"

"Nay," said the woman, whose voice told us she was the landlady,
"there are but two, the bronzed one and the youth. You will not hurt
him! Nay! Nay! _Diôs!_ he is young and beautiful."

"Have no fear. _We_ will not hurt either, if they do not resist. If
they do, we shall cut them down. But--otherwise--no! no!" and he
laughed a fierce, hard laugh. "Oh, no. There are others to hurt
them--the governor, the Regidórs, the judges. Ho! They will hurt them
through the garrote--or--or--the flames. The brasero! The wheel! Now
lead up to them. Where is the room they harbour in?"

"I will fetch another lamp," the woman said. "This one is fixed.
Wait." And we heard her clatter down the corridor on her Spanish
pattens. Yet she paused, too, a moment, and turned back, saying:

"Spare him--the young one. Heavens! his lips and eyes are enough to
madden an older woman than I am."

"Quick, then, quick," the other answered. "They sleep in the prison
to-night, and our supper waits at the gatehouse. Quick."

"Shall we dash through them?" Juan whispered; and now I noticed that,
as before in the hour of danger, his voice was firm and steady. "One
might escape even though the other is taken." And I heard him mutter,
in even lower tones: "Pray God it is you."

"No," I said. "No. We go together. Together escape or--die."

Then, even as I spoke, I saw what I had not observed before, owing to
the dim light in which all was surrounded; saw that opposite to us on
the landing--where the stairs turned--there was a door. Closed tight
into its frame, 'twas true, yet leading doubtless into some room
opening off the stairs which led up to the other one we had quitted.

I was near enough to put my foot out quietly and touch it with my toe
and--God be praised!--it yielded, opened inward.

"Into it," I said in Juan's ear, "into it. They will pass it as they
go up to where we have come from. When they have done so we may creep
down. In!"

A moment later we had entered that room, had quitted the stairs--and
the woman had come back and rejoined the men, was leading them up
those very stairs, across the very spot where a few instants before we
had been standing.

Yet our hearts leapt to our mouths--mine did, I know!--when we who
were standing on the other side of the door heard him stop outside it,
and, striking the panel with his finger--the rap of his nail upon it
was clearly perceptible to our eager ears--say to the woman:

"Is this the room--are they here?"

The woman gave a low laugh in answer; then she said:

"Nay. Nay. 'Tis mine. By the saints! what should they do there! That
handsome _Inglés_, devil though he be!--or that lovely boy? Heavens,
no!" and again she laughed, and added: "Come. They are here. Up these
stairs."

Even as we heard their heavy, spurred feet clatter on those stairs we
were seeking for some mode of escape, and that at once.

Alas! 'twas not to be out of the door again and down into the stone
passage, as we had thought.

For one glance through a great crack, and we saw, by peering down
below, that these Spanish alguazils had some method in their
proceedings. They had left two of their number behind; they stood in
the passage waiting for what might happen above; waiting, perhaps, to
hew down the two fugitives whom those others were seeking for, should
they rush down; waiting for us. There was no way there!

Then, for the room--what did that offer?

It was as dark as a vault--we could distinguish nothing--not even
where the bed was--at first. Yet, later, in a few moments--while we
heard, above, the rapping of sword hilts upon the door of the chamber
we had just quitted--while we heard, too, the leader shouting: "Open.
Open--_Bandidos! Assassinatóres! Espias!_ or we will blow the lock
off"--we saw at the end of the room a dull murky glimmer, a light that
was a light simply in contrast to the denser gloom around--knew there
was a window at that end.

Was that our way out?

Swiftly we went toward it--tore aside a curtain drawn across a
bar--the noise the rings made as they ran seemed enough to alarm those
men above, must have done so but for the infernal din they themselves
were making--opened the lattice window--and, heaven help us!--found
outside an iron, interlaced grate that would have effectually barred
the exit of aught bigger than a cat!

We were trapped! Caught! It seemed as if naught could save us now!

"Lock the door," I whispered to Juan. "They will come here next. The
moment they find we are not in the other room!--ha! they know it now,
or will directly."

For as I spoke there rang the report of a musketoon through the empty
passages of the house. They were blowing the lock off!

Desperately, madly, exerting a force that even I had never yet
realized myself as possessing, I seized the cross-bars of that iron
grating; I pushed them outward, praying to God for one moment--only
one moment--of Samson's strength. And--could do nothing! Nothing, at
first. Yet--as still I strained and pushed, as I drew back my arms to
thrust more strongly even than before--it seemed as if the framework,
as if the whole thing, yielded, as if it were becoming loosened in its
stone or brick setting. Inspired by this, I pushed still more, threw
the whole weight of my big body into one last despairing effort--and
succeeded! The grate was loosened, torn out of the frame; with a
clatter of falling chips and small _débris_ it fell into the yard ten
feet below.

My prayer was heard!

"Quick, Juan," I said, "quick, come. Out of the window, give me your
hands. I will lower you. 'Tis nothing."

From Juan there came in answer a cry, almost a scream of terror.

"Save me! Save me!" he shrieked, "there is another man in the room!"
and as he so cried, I heard a thump upon the floor--a thump such as
one makes who leaps swiftly from a bed--a rush across that floor. Also
a muttered curse in Spanish, a tempest of words, a huge form hurled
against mine, two great muscular hands at my throat.

In a moment, however, my own hands were out, too, my thumbs pressing
through a coarse beard upon a windpipe. "Curse you," I said in
Spanish, as I felt that grasp on me relax. "Curse you, you are
doomed," and drawing back, I struck out with my full force to the
front of me.

Struck out, to feel my clenched fist stopped by a hairy face--the thud
was terrible even to my ears!--to hear a bitter moan and, a moment
later, a fall--dull and like a dead weight!--upon the floor.

"Come, Juan, come," I cried. "Come."

CHAPTER XXII.

WHO? GRAMONT?

As he scrambled through the window--as I let him down by his hands, so
that, with the length of his arm and mine together, his feet were not
more than a yard from the ground--I heard those others outside the
door. Heard also the woman shriek:

"There is none in here, I tell you--pigs, idiots! If they have
escaped, 'tis to the street or to the roof. Search those rooms first.
This is my chamber. _Diôs!_ Are you men to enter thus a woman's
apartment!"

"So be it," the leader said. "We will. But, remember, if we find them
not we will search this room. Remember!" and we heard him and the
others striding off to some other part of the house.

By this time I was myself half out of the window. From the creature I
had felled to the floor there came no sound; but from the door outside
I heard the woman whisper:

"Renato, come forth. Quick, I say! If they find you here you are lost.
You will be taken--sent to the colonies. Come forth!"

Then I waited to hear no more, understanding clearly enough that the
woman had herself been sheltering in her own room some malefactor,
probably some lover. And, doubtless, he had thought we were seeking
for him, had found him in that darkened room--that we were the
alguazils. His presence was explained.

Taking Juan by the hand, I passed rapidly by the stables as we went
away from the street and up into the garden beyond--a small place,
neglected and dirty, in which I had noticed, when we arrived, numbers
of enormous turnips growing--vegetables much used in the country.

Then, a moment later, we were close by a low, whitewashed wall--'twas
not so high as my head--over which I helped Juan, following instantly
myself.

"Heaven knows," I said, "where we are now, except that we have left
the inn behind. This may be the garden of some great _residéncia_, or
of another inn. Well, we must get through somehow into the street
beyond."

"And afterward?" Juan asked, his face close to mine, as though trying
to see me in the dark of the night. "Afterward?"

"God knows what--afterward! We shall never get out of the gates, 'tis
certain. There are five--all are doubtless warned by now. Pity 'tis we
did not follow our friend's suggestion and disguise ourselves. That
way, we might have been safe. I as a monk, you as a woman, we should
never have been recognised."

"'Tis too late," said Juan. "Too late now. We must go on; on to the
end. Yet I wonder where that friend, Jaime, is. Perhaps taken, his
disguise seen through."

We had reached the house to which this garden belonged by now--a
different one from the neglected thing we had lately left, well cared
for, and with great tubs of oleanders and orange trees placed about it
at regular intervals, as we could now see by the rising moon, which
was peeping over the chimney tops and casting its rays along a broad
path which we had followed; were close up to the house, a great white
one, with this, its garden side, full of windows covered with
_persianas_, or jalousies, and from some of them lights streaming.

"'Tis an inn, for sure," I said, "and full of--hark! whose voice is
that?"

Yet there was no need to ask; 'twas a voice not easily forgotten which
was speaking now; the voice of the man, Señor, or "Father," Jaime.

"Ay," we heard in those rich, sonorous tones, "alive, and here to call
you to account."

And following this we heard another voice, supplicating, wailing,
screaming, almost: "No! No! No! Mercy! Pardon!"

Beneath the moon's increasing rays we gazed into each other's eyes,
then quickly, together--as if reading each other's thoughts also--we
moved toward where those sounds proceeded from.

Toward a room in the angle of the great white house, with a door
opening on to the garden in which we stood--'twas open now, though
half across it hung a heavy curtain of some thick material. It was
easy enough to guess how 'twas that curtain was thrown half back and
the door stood open.

That way Jaime had come upon his prey.

Standing behind that door, behind that heavy half-fallen curtain,
this was what we saw: The man Jaime, with in his hand a drawn
sword--doubtless he had hidden it beneath his monk's gown since he
returned to the assumption of the latter.

In front of Jaime, upon his knees, his hands clasped, his white hair
streaming behind him, was the man whose name I had deemed to be
Carstairs, or Cuddiford, but which Juan had averred was in truth James
Eaton.

"Alive!" Jaime went on. "Alive. Villain, answer for your treachery ere
I slay you. Where is my wealth--my child's wealth. Where is my
daughter?"

As he spoke I heard a gasp, a moan beside me, felt a trembling. And,
looking down, I saw Juan staring into the room, his eyes distended as
though he was fascinated.

"My child," Jaime went on. "My child. Where is she?"

"I--I--do not know," the old man muttered--hissed in a whisper. "I
do--not know. She left me--years ago. Yet--I loved her."

"Liar. I have heard of you in the Indies. You stole the wealth I left
in your hands for her--you drove her forth. Answer. Is she dead?"

"I lost all in trade," Eaton moaned again, "all, all. I thought
to double it--you were dead--they said so--would never come back.
I--I----"

"Look," whispered Juan in my ear. "Look behind you."

At his words I turned, and then I knew that we were lost, indeed. Lost
forever.

The men from Chantada, accompanied by those of Lugo, were in this
garden--had followed us over the wall, had found out our way of
escape.

We were doomed! The garrote--the stake--were very near now.

They saw us at once, in an instant--doubtless our forms stood out
clearly enough in the beams of the lamp as they poured forth into the
garden--and made straight for us, their swords drawn, the unbrowned
barrels of their musketoons and pistols gleaming in the moonlight. And
the leader shouted, as he ran slightly ahead of the others: "You
cannot escape again. Move and we fire on you!"

Yet we heeded him not, but with a bound leapt into the room where
those two were--leapt in while I cried: "Jaime, we are undone. Assist
us again."

Then swift as lightning I shut the door to, let fall the curtain and
drew my sword. "I will never yield to them," I said. "Juan and I
escape or die here together."

"Together!" Juan echoed, drawing also his weapon forth.

There was but time to see a still more frightened glance on Eaton's
face than before--if added terror could come into a man's eyes more
than had been when those eyes had glinted up at Jaime as he stood over
him, it came now as Juan sprang to my side, his hat fallen off and his
hair dishevelled--while those men were at the door giving on to the
garden. And in an instant it was burst open by them--'twas but a poor
frail thing!--they were in the room.

"Yield!" the leader cried, "yield, or you die here at once!"

But now Jaime was by our side; three blades were flashing in their
faces; we were driving them back, assisted also by a fourth--the negro
servant of Eaton, who had sprung into the room from another door. Yet
that assistance lasted but a second. Doubtless the unhappy wretch
preferred it, thinking it was his master who was in danger! A pistol
was fired by some one, and I saw him reel back, falling heavily on the
floor, dead, with a bullet between his eyes. And, as he did so, from
Eaton there came a scream, while he flung himself over the creature's
body.

With those others pistols were now the order of the day, fired
ineffectually at first, while still I and the leader fought
hand-to-hand around the room. And I had him safe. I knew if I was not
cut down from behind that he was mine. My blade was under and over his
guard. I prepared for the last lunge, when--curses on the luck!--a
bullet took me in the right forearm; there ran through that arm, up to
my shoulder, a feeling of numbness, a burning twinge; my sword fell
with a clang to the floor.

And in another moment two of them had sprung on and secured me; two
others had grasped Juan, and disarmed him, too.

And now there was none on our side to oppose himself to them but
Jaime.

"Shoot him down! Kill him!" the leader cried. Then added: "You fool,
there is naught against you, yet, if you court fate, receive it."

But, great fighter as he was, what could he do against all those? One
hung upon his sword arm, another clasped a leg, a third was dragging
at his neck from behind, a fourth holding his monkish gown.

In another moment he, too, was disarmed. We were beaten--prisoners!
The lives of all of us were at an end. None could doubt that!

The leader drew a long breath, then turned to where, at the open door
of the passage, were gathered the landlord, as I supposed; several
_facchinos_ and some trembling women servants, white to the lips, and
said:

"Observe, all you. I take these men--these _asasinos_ within your
house. I denounce these two," and he indicated Juan and me, "the one
as an English spy and a man who fought against us at Vigo, this other
one, this boy, as his comrade and accomplice. Bear witness to my
words, also to their deeds of blood."

From that crowd in the passage there came murmurs and revilings in
reply: "You should have slain them here," some said; "Better the
garrote or the flames in the _plaza da Mercado_," said others.

"As for this monk, this false monk--for such I know him now to
be--easy enough to recognise him as one of the brigands we fought with
the other night--had he not joined in this fray he had been safe. We
sought him not. Now, also, the flames or the garrote for him." Then,
breaking off, he exclaimed: "Who is this--and that black slave lying
dead there?" and he pointed to Eaton and the other. "Who are they?"

"A gentleman and his servant staying in this, my house," the landlord
said, speaking for the first time, "doubtless assaulted by the
_vagabundos_. Oh! 'tis terrible."

"Off with these three," the leader said. "To the prison in the
ramparts to-night--the judge to-morrow."

And as he gave his orders his men and the men of Lugo with him formed
round us, prepared to obey.

But, now, for the first time Eaton spoke, approaching the leader
fawningly, speaking in a soft voice.

"Señor," he said, "ere you take them away, a word. This one," looking
at me, "you knew already--at Chantada; I have told you who and what he
is. For the boy it matters not. He is but a follower."

Yet as he spoke I noticed he carefully avoided Juan's eyes, fixed full
blaze on him as they flamed from out of his now white, marble face.

"These, I say, you know," he went on. "But for this other one--this
pretended monk, this brigand of the night--you do not know him; nor
who he is and what has been. Let me tell you."

"Viper," Jaime murmured. "Villain. Thief! Yet," he continued, "I stoop
not to ask your silence. Speak. Tell all. But, James Eaton, beware.
Caged tigers sometimes break their bars and get free."

"Yours will never be broken," the leader said, looking at the same
time with a wondering glance from one to the other.

"'Tis true. 'Tis very true," Eaton went on, his voice oily,
treacherous as before. "Yet since you might break yours, I give this
gentleman a double reason for binding you faster. Sir," turning to him
whom he so addressed, "this monk, this brigand as he appears, would be
an innocent man were he that alone, in comparison with what he really
is."

"Who in the name of all the fiends is he, then? Answer quick."

"A murderer," the old man hissed now, raising his voice, "not
four-fold, but four thousand-fold. See," and he pointed his fingers at
Jaime, "see in him the man who sacked Maracaibo, Guayaquil, Campeachy;
the man who has burnt men and women alive in their houses like pigs in
a stye, sunk countless Spanish and French ships, plundered, murdered,
ravished--the arch-villain of the Caribbean Sea--not dead, but alive,
and trapped at last. The buccaneer, filibuster, pirate--Gramont!"

Amidst their voices--their shouts and cries--for all in Spain had
known that awful name, though its owner had long been deemed dead and
lost at sea--I heard a cry--it was a scream--from Juan; I saw him reel
as he stood by my left side, then stagger heavily against me,
supported from falling to the floor only by my unwounded arm around
him.

He had fainted.

And, as I held up the drooping form, I learnt the secret hidden from
me for so many days. I knew now what it was that Sir George Rooke had
earlier learnt. I penetrated the disguise of Juan Belmonte.

CHAPTER XXIII.

SENTENCED TO DEATH.

I lay within a darkened cell in the prison which formed part of the
ramparts of Lugo. Lay there, a man doomed to death; sentenced to be
burnt at the stake, as a spy taken in a country at war with my own. To
be burnt at the stake on some Sunday morning, because that day was
always a day of festival, because all Lugo would be there to witness,
because from all the country round the peasants would come in to see
the Englishman expire in the flames.

Doomed to death!

Yet not alone. By my side--his right hand nailed to an upright plank!
(so the sentence had run) to which our bodies were to be fastened by
chains--was to stand that other man, Gramont--the pirate and buccaneer
who, as Eaton had testified, had been called the Shark of the Indies.

I had been tried first by the Alcáide of Lugo and the principal
Regidór, assisted by the Bishop of the province, an extremely old
man--and had been soon disposed of. Evidence was forthcoming--there
was plenty of it in Lugo in the shape of French sea-captains and
sailors from the Spanish galleons--that I had fought with the English
at Vigo; also, that I had slain men betwixt the border and here. And,
again, there was the evidence of Eaton that I had travelled from
Rotterdam as the undoubted bearer of the news that the galleons were
approaching Spain.

Also, not content with all this, I was on my way through the land,
gleaning evidence of all that was taking place within it, so as to
furnish, as none could otherwise suppose, information to my countrymen
when I should reach them.

No need for my trial to be spun out; one alone of all these facts was
enough to condemn me, and, after a whispered conference between the
Alcáide, the Regidór and the Bishop, the latter delivered the above
sentence, his voice almost inaudible because of his great age, yet
strong enough for the purpose--powerful enough to reach my ears and
those of the small crowd within the court house; that was sufficient.

So I knew my fate, and knew, too, that it was useless to say aught, to
utter one word. I had lost the game; the stakes would have to be paid
in full.

Then began the unravelling of the history of him who stood beside
me--swarthy, contemptuous--his eyes glancing around that court,
alighting at one moment on the withered form and cadaverous face of
the Bishop, at another on the figure of the Regidór, a moment later on
the Alcáide, a younger, well favoured man, whom I guessed a soldier in
the past or present.

Gramont's condemnation was assured by the part he had played on that
night when he assisted us on the road 'twixt Chantada and Lugo. That
alone would have forfeited his life amidst these Spaniards; yet,
perhaps from curiosity, perhaps because even they doubted whether so
summary an execution, and one so horrible, was merited by that night's
work, they decided to hear the denouncement of Eaton, the story of
Gramont's past life. They bade the former speak, tell all.

And what a story it was he told!

Sitting in a chair near the Bishop, looking nearly as old as that old
man himself, he poured out horror after horror; branded the man by my
side as one too steeped in cruelty to be allowed to live another hour,
if what he said was, indeed, true.

Told how this man had ravaged all the Spanish main--had besieged
Martinique, Nombre de Diós, Campeachy, and scores of other places,
shedding blood like water everywhere--had sunk and plundered ships;
burnt them and the men in them--burnt them alive; gave instances, too,
of cruelty extreme.

"I have known him to tie dead and living together and fling them to
the sharks," he said--"dead and living _Spaniards!_ Also hang them to
the bowsprit by a cord round their waists, a knife placed in one hand,
so that, while freedom was theirs if they chose to sever the rope, a
worse death awaited them when they fell into the water--a death from
sharks, from alligators! Oh, sir, oh, reverend prelate," he continued,
stretching out his hands toward the old, almost blind man, "I have
seen worse than this. Once he and his followers besieged a monastery
full of holy fathers, governed by a bishop saintly as yourself; and
they defended it vigorously, bravely--would have driven this tiger
back but for one thing."

"What?" asked the younger of the judges, the Alcáide. And I noticed
that now, as all through this testifying of Eaton, that Alcáide seemed
less disposed to accept his evidence than the others were. Later on I
knew the reason that so urged him.

"What?" he said.

"Some of the priests had already fallen into his hands and the hands
of his crew. Then they it was whom he forced to advance first against
the monastery--to fire the brass cannon they had brought with them
against their brethren; forced them to do so, so that those brethren
should not know them, should shoot them down first.

"Also," said the Alcáide, "it might have been to prevent their firing
at all. In open war a great commander would, perhaps, have availed
himself of such a cunning ruse."

Then I knew for sure this man had been, or was, a soldier.

More, much more, was told by Eaton--'tis best I set down nothing
further--then the end came, The sentence was passed; he, too, was
doomed to die, by my side, on the Sunday that should later be
appointed.

"Break off," the Bishop said. "Justice will be done." Whereupon he
glanced down at his papers--I wondering that he could see them with
those purblind eyes--while, pausing in his attempt to rise, he "Yet
there was another. The youth"--and here I pricked up my ears, for
of Juan I had heard nothing since taken to the prison in the
ramparts--"the youth who fought by the side of this man--this
spy--this _Inglés_. How comes it he is not before us?"

For a moment, as it seemed to me, the Alcáide hesitated, then he said:

"He is not well. He was hurt in the _mêlée_; he cannot be brought
before us for some days. Later, if necessary, he can be tried."

Although I had drawn as far away from Gramont as I could since I had
learned his true nature and character and the bloodshed of which he
had been guilty, I could not prevent myself from letting my eyes fall
on him now; and I saw that for the first time there was a look of
eagerness in his eyes, that he was watching the younger of those
judges, watching as though filled with an intensity of feeling as to
what might next be said.

"If necessary, Capitan Morales," the Regidór said, speaking now for
almost the first time, "if necessary! By all reports he is as bad as
his elder comrades. A wild cat, all say. Why should it not be
necessary?"

"He is very young," the Alcáide replied, undoubtedly confused, "very
young; also he--he--is not well. I should do wrong to produce him
before you in the state he is. As governor I must use my discretion,"
and he made a feint of being engaged with the papers before him.

Then I felt sure that he, too, knew Juan's secret, as I now did.

And I wondered to what advantage he might put that secret on behalf of
Juan. Wondered while I felt glad at the thought which had now risen to
my mind--the thought that, at last, Juan might be saved from our doom.

Again the Bishop said at this time--doubtless his worn old frame was
fatigued by the morning's work:

"Let us rise. There is no more to be done, since--since--this youth
cannot yet be brought before us," and once more he placed his white,
shrunken hands upon the desk in front of him to obtain the necessary
aid to quitting his seat.

But now the governor, whose name was Morales, made a motion of
dissent, accompanying it, however, by soft, respectful words.

"Nay, most reverend father, nay," he said, "not yet, if you will
graciously permit that we continue our examination farther," while as
he spoke the Bishop sank back again with a wearied look of assent. "I
am not satisfied."

"Not satisfied," the old man whispered, while the Regidór also echoed
his words, though in far louder tones. "What is it you are not
satisfied with, Capitan Morales?"

"With that man's testimony," he exclaimed, pointing his finger over
his desk at Eaton. "In no manner of way satisfied," and as he spoke it
almost seemed--I should have believed it to be so in any other country
but Spain, a land of notorious injustice and love of cruelty for the
sake of cruelty--as if the crowd in the court somewhat agreed with
him. Also, even as he spoke, a voice shouted from the midst of those
forming it:

"Ay! How knows he all this? Ask him that."

Glancing my eyes in the direction whence those words came, they fell
upon a man of rude though picturesque appearance, whose voice I
thought it was; a fellow bearded and bronzed, with, in his ears, great
rings of gold; a man whom, I scarce know why, I instantly deemed a
sailor. Perhaps, one of the many who had fled from the galleons or the
French ships of war.

"I am about to ask him that!" exclaimed Morales, though he cast an
angry glance toward the crowd. "It is his answer to that which I
require."

Then all eyes were instantly directed toward Eaton, one pair flaming
like burning coals from beneath their bushy brows--the eyes of
Gramont.

Looking myself at him, noticing the ashy colour of his face as he
heard that unknown voice uprise amidst the people gathered in the
court--as also he heard in reply the words of Morales--noticing, too,
the quivering of his white lips and the look as of a hunted rat that
came into his eyes--I found myself wondering if he had not thought of
how his denunciation of the man by my side was his own accusation
also.

"I ask you," went on Morales, "how you know all these things. None but
an eye-witness, a participator, could have told as much!"

Upon that muttering and gesticulating crowd, upon the shaggy,
black-bearded Asturians and Biscayans--some of them rude mountaineers
from the Gaviara and some even ruder sailors from the wild and
tempest-beaten shores of Galicia--upon the swarthy Spanish women with
knives in their girdles and babes at their bare breasts, there fell a
hush as all listened for his answer--a hush, broken only by his own
halting attempt to find an answer that should be believed--gain
credence not only with the judges, but the people.

"I have--heard--it said--heard it told," he whispered, in quavering
tones. "'Twas common talk in all the Indies--his name hated--dreaded.
Used as a means to fright the timid--to----"

He paused. For, like a storm that howls across the seas, sweeping all
before it in its course, another voice, a deeper, fuller, more
sonorous one, swept through that court and drowned his; the voice of
the lost man by my side.

"Hear me, you judges," he cried, confronting all--standing there with
his manacled hands in front of him, yet his form erect, his glance
contemptuous, his eyes fire. "Hear me. Let me tell all. I have the
right--the last on earth granted to one such as I--for one who sees
and reads his doom in all your faces. Give me your leave to speak."

"Speak!" the Bishop murmured, his tones almost inaudible. "Speak--yet
hope nothing."

"Hope!" Gramont said. "Hope! What should I hope? Nothing! in truth.
No more than I fear aught. I am the man this one charges me with
being--am Gramont. That is enough. Gramont, the filibuster--one of a
hundred of your countrymen, of Frenchmen, of Englishmen. But," and
he glanced proudly around the court, "the leader of them all, of
almost all. Yet, if I am guilty, who is there in the Indies that is
innocent? Was Morgan, the English bulldog?--yet his king made him
deputy-governor of his fairest isle. Was Basco, Lolonois--is Pointis?
Answer me that. And, you of Spain, you, one of her bishops, you, one
of her soldiers," and he glanced at each of them, "how often has one
of you blessed the ships that sailed from your shores laden with men
of my calling--how often have men of your trade," again he glanced at
Morales, "belonged to mine? Yet now I, a Frenchman, a comrade in arms
of you Spanish, am judged by the words of such as that"--and this time
his eyes fell on Eaton.

Also all in the court looked at him again.

"Now," went on Gramont, "hear who and what he is--hear, too, how he
knows all that I have done. He was my servant--my ship's steward
once--then rose through lust of cruelty to be my mate and second in
command. And he it was who first whispered that the captured monks and
priests, as he terms them, should be sent against the monastery at
Essequibo. Only--he has forgotten, his memory fails--they were not
monks and priests--but _nuns_."

"No, no, no!" shrieked Eaton, as a tumult indescribable arose within
the court, while now the mountaineers and seamen howled, "burn him and
let the other go," and the fierce dark-eyed women clutched their babes
closer to their breasts, fingering the hilts of the knives in their
girdles at the same time.

"Nuns! Holy nuns!" the Bishop gasped. "Great God!"

"Ay! Holy nuns. And hear one more word from me; it is the truth,
though it avails me nothing. I was not at Essequibo then, was far
away, was, in truth, at Cape Blanco. And he--he--James Eaton, was the
man."

There rose more tumult and more uproar--it seemed as though all the
men in the court would force the barrier that separated them from the
judges and from Eaton and us, the prisoners--would slay that villain,
that monstrous wretch, upon the spot. But at a look from the Alcáide
some of the alguazils and men-at-arms by that barrier, thrust and
pushed them back, and made a line between them and the body of the
court.

"Again listen," Gramont went on, when some silence had at last been
obtained. "It is my last word. I was not there--was gone--the band was
broken up, dispersed. From Spain had come an order from your king that
those who desisted were to be pardoned; from Louis of France came the
same news by Pointis. And I was one who so desisted, took service
under Louis, was made his lieutenant. Also I was on my way to France
when I was cast away. Cast away, after leaving my child, my wealth, in
that man's hands for safe keeping. He drove the one from him with
curses and cruelty, he stole the other. And--hear more--those galleons
coming to Cadiz were bringing that stolen wealth to him--because I
knew that it was so I came in them to Spain, hoping by my disguise to
meet him, to wrench it back from him, to call him to account for his
treatment of my girl."

On the court there had come a hush--as the calm comes after the storm;
hardly any spoke now--yet all, from Bishop downward, regarded Eaton,
trembling, shivering there.

And once more in that hush, Gramont's voice uprose again.

"For myself I care not. Do with me what you will. But, remember, I
denounce him, that man there, as pirate and buccaneer ten times more
bloodthirsty and cruel than any other who ever ravaged the Indies; I
denounce him, the denouncer, as thief, filibuster and spy. Do with me
what you will--only take heed. Spare him not. And if you seek
corroboration of my word, demand it of him who is my fellow-prisoner,
demand the truth from Juan Belmonte."

CHAPTER XXIV.

MY LOVE! MY LOVE!

The days passed as I lay in my dungeon in the ramparts, and each
morning when the jailer--who, I soon learned, was deaf and dumb--came
with a loaf of bread and jar of water, I braced myself to receive the
tidings that it was my last on earth.

Yet a week went by and I had not been summoned to the plank and
flames--I began, as I lost count of time--as I forgot the days of the
week themselves--to wonder if, after all, the sentence was one that
they did not dare to carry out. And, remembering that in Spain nothing
could be done without reference to the powers at Madrid, I mused upon
whether, if they did so dare, the sanction for the execution of
Gramont and myself must be first obtained ere the execution could take
place; also I mused on many other things, be sure, besides my own
impending fate, a fate which, I thought, would never be known to any
of my countrymen, which would be enveloped forever in a darkness
nothing could lift. I thought of Juan and of the secret which
that wild, impulsive nature had concealed from me for so many
days--wondered what would be the end of that career; thought, too, of
Gramont, the man whose blood-guiltiness had been so great, yet who, as
he stood by my side a doomed man, had seemed almost a hero by reason
of his indifference to, his scorn of, his fate.

The dungeon, as I have termed it, though in fact it was more like a
cell, was in and at the uppermost part of the ramparts of Lugo--noted
for being the most strongly walled and fortified town in all
Spain--was, indeed, a room in the great wall which sloped down
perpendicularly to the Minho beneath; a wall, smooth and absolutely
upright, or vertical, on which a sparrow could scarcely have found a
crevice in which to lodge or perch, rising from eighty to a hundred
feet from the base of the rock on which it was built and through which
the river rushed. This I had seen as we had passed under it on the
other side of the Minho when we approached the town; could see,
indeed, in the daytime as I glanced down on to the river beneath
through the heavily grated and barred window which admitted light to
my prison; also I could observe the country outside and the mountains
beyond, while I heard at night the swirl of the river as it sped by
those rocks below.

Because there was no chance of escape for any creature immured within
this cell, since none could force away those grates and bars, even had
he possessed that strength of Samson, for which I had once prayed;
because, also, had I been able to do so, there was nothing but the
jagged rocks beneath, or the swift river, into which to cast myself, I
was not chained nor manacled; was at liberty, instead, to move about
as I chose; to peer idly out all day at the freedom of the open
country beyond, which would never again be mine, or to cast myself
upon the pallet on the floor and sleep and dream away the hours that
intervened between now and my day of doom. Nay, I was at liberty, had
I so chosen, to strangle myself with my bedding, or, for the matter of
that, my belt or cravat, or end my life in any manner I might desire.
Perhaps, though I knew not that it was so, it might be hoped such
would be the end. It might save trouble and after consequences.

None came near me all the day or night, except that mute jailer, of
whom I have spoken, when he brought me my bread and water every
morning, and it was, therefore, with a strange feeling of
surprise--with a plucking at my heart, and a fear, which I despised
myself for, that my last hour was come--that one night, as I lay in
the dark, I heard footsteps on the stones of the passage outside the
cell door--footsteps that stopped close by that door, some of them
heavy, the others light. I heard, too, the clash of keys together, the
grating of one in the huge lock, a moment later.

"Remember," I whispered to myself. "Remember, you are a man--a
soldier. Be brave."

Then slowly the door opened, and a figure came in, bearing a light in
its hand, while, a second later, the door was closed and locked again
from the outside; the heavy footsteps were heard by me retreating down
the passage.

The figure was that of "Juan" Belmonte.

"You here?" I said, springing up, and then I advanced toward it, my
hands outstretched, while my companion of so many days sprang to my
arms, lay in them, sobbing as though with a broken heart.

"Do not weep, do not weep," I said, and, as I spoke, my lips touched
that white brow--no whiter now than all the rest of the face, "do not
weep. What is, is, and must be borne."

"My love, my love!" those other lips--whose rich crimson I had once
marvelled at so much--sobbed forth now, "my love, how can I help but
weep? Oh, Mervan, I have learnt to love you so, to worship you, for
your strength and courage! And now to see you thus--thus! My God!"

"Be brave still," I said; would have added "Juan"; only, not knowing,
I paused.

"What shall I call you?" I asked.

"Juana."

"Do they--the judges--know?"

"The Alcáide knows: 'Tis through that knowledge I am here."

"Why," I whispered, my arms about her as she clung to me, "why was
this disguise assumed, these dangers run? Oh! Juana, since I learnt
what you were in truth I have shuddered, sweated at the memories of
your risks. What reason had you for coming to Europe as a man? and
with such beauty, too! 'Tis marvellous it was never seen through."

"They would not give passage to women in the galleons," she answered.
"Therefore I came as I did; also I knew I might better find
Eaton--confront him, in a garb, another sex, which would prevent him
from recognising the little child he had treated so evilly." Then,
suddenly, with a wail, she exclaimed: "Oh, my God! Mervan, I have not
come to talk of this, but to be with you for our last hour; one hour
before we die. The Alcáide has granted me that--and one other
thing--on conditions;" and I felt her shudder in my arms.

"Before we die," I repeated stupidly, saying most of her words over
again. "Granted you this and one other thing--and on conditions. What
conditions? Tell me all; make me to understand. _We_ die? Not you!
They cannot slay you."

From some neighbouring church a deep-toned bell was pealing solemnly
as I spoke. Far down below, by the river banks, I heard the splash of
some fishermen's boats as they went by to their night work--always,
until my eyes close for the last time, I shall remember those sounds
accompanying her words in answer to mine--shall hear them in my
ears--her words: "I can slay myself."

"Juana!"

"Must slay myself," she went on, "there is no other way. Can I live
without you--or, living, fullfil those conditions?" and, even as she
said this, our lips met. "But," I asked, my voice hoarse with grief
and misery, "what are they, and wherefore granted?"

"He gives me one life--his--my father's! My God! he my father!--he
will not give me yours because he thinks you are my lover--and--and
the condition is that on the night when he is set free, I fly from
Lugo with him, Morales, to Portugal. He will be safe there, he says.
'Tis rumoured the king has joined England."

"And you accept the terms?" I asked, bitterly, knowing that I loved
this girl as fondly as she loved me. Had loved her since I discovered
her sex as she reeled into my arms on that night. "You accept?"

"I accept. Nay!" she exclaimed, "do not thrust me from you--you
cannot doubt my love, my adoration. Else why am I here a prisoner in
Lugo--why, except because I could not quit your side, could not tear
myself from you?"

"How then accept?"

"Listen. I must save him. God!--he is my father--to my eternal shame!
Yet--yet, being so, his soul must not go to seek its Maker yet--'tis
too deeply drenched with crime, he must have time--time to live--to
repent--to wash away his sins. Oh! Mervan, you are my love, my love,
my first and only love--will be my last--yet--I must save him."

"At what a cost! Your own perdition!"

"No, no. Listen. Morales leaves here the day before my unhappy father
is given his chance of escape--the door of his cell will be set open
for him at night; none will bar his exit by a back way--I, too, shall
be gone. Morales will take me with him in my own proper garb, that of
a woman. Then--then--because I shall not believe in my father's
freedom until I am sure of it, know it, he will join us at the
frontier--not the one which we passed, but where the road crosses to
Braganza at a place called Carvallos--and----"

"You will keep your word!"

"Yes. To myself--not him. My father will be safe--Morales unable to do
more against him--I--I shall be dead. Once I am assured all is well
with him I shall end my life. There will be nothing more to live for."

"Suppose," I whispered, "suppose--it might be!--that I should escape,
and, doing so, find you dead! Oh, Juana, how would it be with me then?
How could I live?"

"Ah, my love," she said, whispering, too, "can you not believe I have
thought of that--believe that if all hope of your escaping was not
gone I should not have decided thus? But, Mervan, you are a brave man,
have faced death too often to fear to do so once again for the last
time. Mervan, my love, my life--there is no hope. None. He has told
me--he--Morales--that the morning after all are gone but you, you will
surely be put to death. My own, my sweet, there is no hope."

"If I could escape first----"

"It is impossible. Impossible. Oh! I have begged him on my knees again
and again to give you the same chance as he gives my father--have told
him that, since he ruins himself to set free the one, it would cost
him no more to let both go--yet, yet--he will not."

"Why not?"

"I have said. And he makes but a single answer. One is my father--the
other my lover. Laughs, too, and says he does not jeopardise his own
body--ruin for certain his own life in his own land--to fling that
lover back into my arms."

"Still, if he knows that until a few days ago I deemed you a boy----"

"Knows it!" she exclaimed. "Oh, my God! have I not told him so a
hundred times--sworn that we were but strangers thrown together scarce
a month past; had never met before. And to all my vows and
protestations he replies: 'Knowing you now to be a woman--as I have
myself by chance discovered--he must love you as I do. I will not save
him to steal you from me.'"

"Yet, with this refusal on his lips, you yield--or appear to yield."

"My father! My father!" she cried, flinging her arms madly around my
neck. "My father! My father! For his sake I must yield. Oh, my love,
my love, my love--I must."

                    *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *

I cannot write down--in absolute truth, cannot recall--our last sad
parting, our frenzied words, our fond embraces. Suffice it that I say
we tore ourselves apart at the sound of the mute's footsteps--that
Juana was borne away almost insensible.

For that we should never meet again in this world we recognised--we
were parted forever. I had found and won--although till lately unknown
to myself!--the most fond and loving heart that had ever yielded
itself up to a man--found it only as I stood upon the brink of my
grave.

Yet if there were anything that could reconcile me to my loss of her
it would be that grave, I knew; that--or the casting of my ashes to
the wind after my body was consumed by the _braséro_--would bring the
oblivion I desired. And, since she, too, meant to die the moment her
father was safe, neither would be left to mourn the other. At least
the oblivion of death would be the happy lot of both. Yet, as now the
hours followed one another, as I heard them strike upon the bells of
all the churches in this old city, and boom forth solemnly from the
cathedral tower--wondering always, yet resignedly, when I should hear
them for the last time; wondering, too, when the key would once more
grate in the lock and I should be summoned to my doom--I cursed myself
for never having penetrated Juan's disguise, for never having guessed
she was a woman. Sir George Rooke had done so, I knew now; that was
what he meant by his solemn warnings to me--fool that I was, not to be
as far-seeing as he!

There were many things, which I now recalled, that should also have
opened my eyes--her timidity, her nervousness, the strange power of
mustering up courage at a moment of imminent danger; also the frequent
change of colour; the remaining in the inn kitchen all one night; the
shriek for assistance at the barrier encounter. And yet I had been
blind, and thought it was a boy who rode by my side through all the
perils we had passed.

I might have saved her had I but had more insight--might have
refused to let her accompany me; have sternly ordered her to
travel in some other way than along the danger-strewn path which I had
come. She would have been safe now--what mattered it what had befallen
me!--would have been free, with no hideous necessity of taking her own
life to escape from the love which Morales forced upon her.

Yet, as I tossed upon my pallet, thinking of all this--thinking, too,
of how fondly I had come to love this girl, so dear to me now that we
were lost to each other forever--I knew, I felt sure, that no stern
commands issued to her to turn back and quit my side would have been
of any avail; that, as she had once threatened, she would have
followed me like a dog, have lain upon the step of the house wherein I
slept, would never have quitted my side.

For hers was the hot, burning love of the southern woman, of which I
had often read and heard told by wanderers into far-off lands--the
love that springs in a moment into those women's breasts, and, once
born, is never quenched except by death--as, alas! hers was now to be
quenched.

CHAPTER XXV.

"AS THE NIGHT PASSETH AWAY."

Still the days passed and I meditated on whether each as it came was
to be my last. Wondered as every morning I watched the opening of the
heavily clamped door, if, instead of my loaf and jar of water, that
deaf and dumb jailer had come to summon me forth to my fate; and
wondered again at what might cause the delay, since morning after
morning his behaviour was ever the same, the bread always placed on
the rough stone shelf that ran around the room, with the water by its
side. That, and nothing more.

That Juana had gone by now with the Alcáide, I thought must surely be
the case. I had taken since that night when last we met--and parted
forever--to scoring with a nail a mark daily on the whitewashed but
filthy wall, so that thereby I might keep some count of the days as
they went by, and now there were six of such marks there. Surely she
was gone--surely, too, I thought, Gramont's escape had taken place by
now--yet they came not for me. What did it mean?

In my agony at the thought that by now, perhaps, Juana was dead by her
own hand--I pictured her to myself using the small poniard I knew she
carried, or the equally small pistol of which she was possessed--I
groaned--nay! almost shrieked sometimes at my horrible picturings of
her beautiful form and face stiff with death; in that agony I came to
pray at last to God that the day or night which was passing over me
might be my last. That He, in His supreme mercy, would see fit to
inspire them with the resolve to make an end of me. Prayed that, by
the time those never ceasing clocks without had struck once more the
hour they were striking as I made my supplication, my soul might have
left my body--that that body might be no more than a heap of ashes.

For I could bear my existence no longer. My thoughts--of my beauteous
mistress lying in death's hideous grasp, of my poor old father, and
the misery which would be his--not at my falling like a soldier, but
at the mystery which would forever enshroud my death--were more than I
could support.

But still another day passed--the seventh--and still again at daybreak
there was no summons to me to go forth and meet my fate. Yet, since by
the increased pealings of the bells, and by the ringing of some
sweeter sounding ones than those usually heard, I knew it was the
Sabbath I wondered that my doom had not come. For the Sabbath was, I
remembered, the day of execution in this land, because 'tis always a
fête day, when the people are at leisure to be excited and amused.

That day passed, however, the night drew on, the dark had come; and
still I was alive; had before me another night of horror and of mortal
agony unspeakable to endure.

From my ghastly, silent warder I had tried more than once to obtain
some hint, or information, as to when I might expect my sentence to be
carried out--if I could have learnt that, I should have known also
that Gramont was gone--was free--that, my God! Juana was dead, or near
to her death. But as well might I have asked the walls of this cell in
which I was, for a word or sign. I wrote on those walls with the nail
a question--_the_ question: "When am I to die?" and he stared as
stolidly at it as though he were no more able to see than to speak or
hear. Thinking, perhaps, that he could not read, I made sighs upon my
fingers to him, at all of which he shook his head, though what he
meant to convey I know not. Yet, had my mind not been so distraught, I
should have remembered that, perhaps, if he could not understand the
one neither could he the other. Reflecting later on, however, I felt
sure that he was able to do both--it was the only way in which one so
afflicted as he was could have been made to understand his orders;
and, still later, I knew that such was the case. And now, on that
Sunday, as the horrid gloom of the winter night enveloped all the
country around, while up from the pastures and fields there rose a
vapour or fog, I took a terrible resolve, driven thereto by the misery
of my reflections.

I determined that, if my death by the hands of the executioner came
not to-morrow, I would take my own life. I could endure no longer,
could think no more upon Juana as a dead woman, as one slain by her
own hand.

"Oh! Juana, Juana," I wailed more than once, "my lost Juana." Then
added, with fierceness, "Yet--no matter. We meet to-morrow at the
latest."

Though they had taken my weapons from me ere they brought me here,
there was enough of opportunity to my hand for accomplishing my
purpose. There was the nail I had found--my sash, or belt--my
cravat--either would serve for my purpose if I was brave enough to
accomplish it.

"Brave enough--brave enough!" I found myself repeating. "Brave enough!
Or," I whispered, "cowardly enough? Which is it? Which?"

And, as still the long hours of the night went on, and I lay on my
pallet staring up into the darkness, listening to the hours told over
and over again by the bells, until my soul sickened at their sound,
watching a glint of the moon's rays on the metal roof of the
cathedral, I answered my own question, reasoned with myself that
self-destruction was the coward's, not the brave man's, act, and
resolved at last to cast that awful resolution behind me, to endure
and meet my fate like a man, as a gallant soldier should.

And so, eased--I scarce knew why--by my determination, I fell at last
into a tranquil sleep, and dreamt that I was back in England, walking
in my father's old flower garden in the Weald, with my love, Juana, by
my side.

Some unaccustomed noise awoke me from that fair dream--something to
which I was not used in the long silence of the nights--some sound
which, as I raised myself on my elbow and peered around the cell, I
could not understand; for in that cell there was no other presence, as
for a moment I had imagined when I sprang up, half asleep and half
awake; the moon, which had now overtopped the cathedral towers, showed
that plain enough. Deep scurrying clouds were passing beneath her face
swiftly--obscuring sometimes her brilliancy for some moments, 'tis
true; yet, as she emerged now and again from them, her flood poured in
and lit up the whole chamber. There was no one in it but myself!

What, therefore, was the sound I had heard? Stealthy footsteps
outside?--those of my doomsmen, perhaps!--or was it some silent
executioner about to steal in on me in the night, thereby to prevent
the publicity of a death in the market place--a death which might by
chance be reported to my own countrymen afar off, and like enough, if
the war rolled down this way, be bitterly avenged? Was that it?

Again beneath the moon there passed heavy clouds, extinguishing her
light so that for a moment my prison was once more steeped in
darkness--I found myself thinking that there would be snow ere
morning; that, if that morning brought my death, 'twould be a
bleak and wintry scene which the flames of the _braséro_ would
illuminate!--then through a break in those clouds a ray stole forth, a
ray that glinted in through the iron bars of the window grate, across
the stone-flagged floor, and onward to the heavily clamped door, then
was arrested there--one spot shining out amidst those beams with the
brightness and the dazzle of a diamond.

What was that thing, that spot on which the ray glinted so?

Creeping toward the door, as silently and lightly as I could go, I
reached it, put out my finger and touched that gleaming spark, and
found that it proceeded from the extremity of a key which was in the
lock and which now protruded by a trifle into the room. It was the
insertion of that key which had awakened me.

Yet--what did it mean, and why, when once in the lock, was it not
turned; why not followed by the entry of one or more persons into the
cell?

Were they coming back later to fall on me? Had the key been first
inserted by some who had withdrawn directly afterward, so that, if the
noise awakened me, I should sleep again shortly, when they could
return to finish their work? This must be the true explanation--I was
to be executed in the depth of the night when all were asleep in the
old town, when no cry of anguish, no scream from one being done to
death, would be heard.

"Yet," I thought to myself, "these precautions are useless. As well
here as in the flames to-morrow. What matters where or how?"

At that moment my ears caught a sound--something was passing down the
stone passage outside--something that was not the heavy tread of the
jailer. Instead, a muffled sound--yet perceptible to me. A shuffling,
scraping sound as though one who was shoeless was dragging each foot
carefully along after the other.

Then I saw the end of the key which projected through the lock turn--I
saw it sparkle in the moon's rays--once it grated harshly, creaked!
And, slowly, a moment afterward the door opened inward, leaving the
passage outside dark and cavernous. He who had so opened it with one
hand carried no light in the other.

Stepping back from it, watching what should happen next--yet, I swear
before heaven, with no fear at my heart--why should there be, since I
desired to die and join my love? yet still with that heart beating
loudly from excitement--I saw the blackness of the doorway blurred
with a deeper intensity by a form standing outside it. I saw the
moonbeams reach that form, lighting it up for a moment and glistening