"But how on earth came you here?" was the unspoken question in the eyes
of both of us; and, each reading the reflection of his own, we both
broke out together into a laugh--though my kinsman's was all but
inaudible--and after it he lay back on his pillow (an old knapsack) and
panted.
"My story must needs be the shorter," said I; "so let us have it over
and get it out of the way. I come from watching Caffarelli in the
north, and for the last four days have been taking a holiday and
twiddling my fingers in camp here, just across the Zapardiel.
Happening this afternoon to stroll to this amazing rock, I fell in with
the reverend father here, and most incautiously told him my name: since
which he has been leading me a dance which may or may not have turned my
hair grey."
"The reverend father?" echoed Captain Alan.
"He has not," said I, turning upon my guide, who stood apart with a
baffling smile, "as yet done me the honour to reciprocate my weak
confidences."
Captain Alan too stared at him. "Are you a priest, sir?" he demanded.
He was answered by a bow. "You didn't know it?" cried I. "It's the one
thing he has allowed me to discover."
"But I understood that you were a scholar, sir--"
"The two callings are not incompatible, I hope?"
"--of the University of Salamanca: a Doctor, too. My memory is yet
weak, but surely I had it from your own lips that you were a Doctor?"
"--of Moral Philosophy," the old man answered with another bow.
"Of the College of the Conception--now, alas! destroyed."
"The care with which you have tended me, sir, has helped my mistake: and
now my gratitude for it must help my apologies. I fear I have, from
time to time, allowed my tongue to take many liberties with your
profession."
"You have, to be sure, been somewhat hard with us."
"My prejudice is an honest one, sir."
"Of that there can be no possible doubt."
"But it must frequently have pained you."
"Not the least in the world," the old Doctor assured him, almost with
_bonhomie_. "Besides, you were suffering from sunstroke."
My kinsman eyed him; and I could have laughed to watch it--that gaze
betrayed a faint expiring hope that, after all, his diatribes against
the Scarlet Woman had shaken the Doctor--upon whom (I need scarcely say)
they had produced about as much effect as upon the rock of Rueda itself.
And I think that, though regretfully, he must at length have realised
this, for he sank back on the pillow again with a gentle weariness in
every line of his Don Quixote face.
"Ah, yes, from sunstroke! My cousin"--here he turned towards me--"this
gentleman--or, as I must now learn to call him, this most reverend
Doctor of Philosophy, Gil Gonsalvez de Covadonga--found me some days ago
stretched unconscious beside the highroad to Tordesillas, and in two
ways has saved my life: first, by conveying me to this hiding-place, for
the whole _terrain_ was occupied by Marmont's troops, and I lay there in
my scarlet tunic, a windfall for the first French patrol that might
pass; and, secondly, by nursing me through delirium back to health of
mind and strength of body."
"The latter has yet to come, Senor Capitano," the Doctor interposed.
And I: "My cousin, your distaste for disguise will yet be the death of
you. But tell me, what were you doing in this neighbourhood?"
"Why, watching Marmont, to be sure, as my orders were."
"Your orders? You don't mean to tell me that Lord Wellington knows of
your return!"
"I reported myself to him on the nineteenth of last month in the camp on
San Christoval: he gave me my directions that same evening."
"But, Heavens!" I cried, "it is barely a week ago that I returned from
the north and had an hour's interview with him; and he never mentioned
your name, though aware (as he must be) that no news in the world could
give me more joy."
"Is that so, cousin?" He gazed at me earnestly and wistfully, as I
thought.
"You know it is so," I answered, turning my face away that he might not
see my emotion.
"As for Lord Wellington's silence," Captain Alan went on, after musing a
while, "he has a great capacity for it, as you know; and perhaps he has
persuaded himself that we work better apart. Our later performances in
and around Sabugal might well excuse that belief."
"But now I suppose you have some message for him. Is it urgent?
Or will you satisfy me first how you came here--you, whom I left a
prisoner on the road to Bayonne and, as I desperately thought, to
execution?"
"There is no message, for I broke down before my work had well
recommenced; and Wellington knows of my illness and my whereabouts, so
there is no urgency."
He glanced at the Doctor and so did I. "The reverend father's behaviour
assuredly suggested urgency," I said.
"And was there none?" asked the old man quietly. "You sons of war chase
the oldest of human illusions: to you nothing is of moment but the
impact of brutal forces or the earthly cunning which arrays and moves
them. To me all this is less hateful than contemptible, in moment not
comparable with the joy of a single human soul. Believe me, my sons,
although the French have destroyed my peerless University--fortis
Salamantina, arx sapientia--I were less eager to hurry God's avenging
hand on them than to bring together two souls which in the pure joy of
meeting soar for a moment together, and, fraternising, forget this
world. Nay, deny it not: for I saw it, standing by. Least of all be
ashamed of it."
"I am not sure that I understand you, holy father," I answered.
"But you have done us a true service, and shall be rewarded by a
confession--from a stubborn heretic, too." I glanced at Captain Alan
mischievously.
My kinsman put up a hand in protest.
"Oh, I will prepare the way for you," said I: "and by and by you will be
astonished to find how easy it comes." I turned to the Doctor
Gonsalvez. "You must know, then, my father, that the Captain and I,
though we follow the same business and with degrees of success we are
too amiable to dispute about, yet employ very different methods.
He, for instance, scorns disguises, while I pride myself upon mine.
And, by the way, as a Professor of Moral Philosophy, you are doubtless
used to deciding questions of casuistry?"
"For twenty years, more or less, I have presided at the public
disputations in the Sala del Claustro of our University."
"Then perhaps you will resolve me the moral difference between hiding in
a truss of hay and hiding under a wig? For, in faith, I can see none."
"That is matter for the private conscience," broke in Captain Alan.
"Pardon me," suggested the Doctor; "you promised me a narrative, I
believe."
"We'll proceed, then. Our methods--this, at least, is important--were
different: which made it the more distressing that the similarity of our
names confused us in our enemies' minds, who grossly mistook us for one
and the same person: which not only humiliated us as artists but ended
in positive inconvenience. At Sabugal, in April last, after a
bewildering comedy of errors, the Duke of Ragusa captured my kinsman
here, and held him to account for some escapade of mine, of which, as a
matter of fact, he had no knowledge whatever. You follow me?"
The Doctor nodded gravely.
"Well, Marmont showed no vindictiveness, but said in effect, 'You have
done, sir, much damage to our arms, and without stretching a point I
might have you hanged for a spy. I shall, however, treat you leniently,
and send you to France into safe keeping, merely exacting your promise
that you will not consent to be released by any of the _partidas_ on the
journey through Spain.' My cousin might have answered that he had never
done an hour's scouting in his life save in the uniform of a British
officer, and nothing whatever to deserve the death of a spy.
Suspecting, however, that I might be mixed up in the business, he gave
his parole and set out for the frontier under the guard of a young
cavalry officer and one trooper.
"Meanwhile I had word of his capture: and knowing nothing of this
parole, I posted to Lord Wellington, obtained a bond for twelve thousand
francs payable for my kinsman's rescue, sought out the guerilla chief,
Mina, borrowed two men on Wellington's bond--the scoundrel would lend no
more--and actually brought off the rescue at Beasain, a few miles on
this side of the frontier. One of our shots broke the young officer's
sword-arm, the trooper was pitched from his horse and stunned, and
behold! my kinsman in our hands, safe and sound.
"It was then, reverend father, that I first heard of his parole.
He informed me of it, and while thanking me for my succour, refused to
accept it. 'Very well done,' say you as a Doctor of Morality.
But meanwhile I was searching the young officer, and finding a letter
upon him from the Duke of Ragusa, broke the seal. 'Not so well done,'
say you: but again wait a moment. This letter was addressed to the
Governor of Bayonne, and gave orders that Captain McNeill, as a spy and
a dangerous man, should be forwarded to Paris in irons. There was also
a hint that a request for his execution might accompany him to Paris.
And this was a prisoner who, on promise of clemency, had given his
parole! Now what, in your opinion, was a fair course for our friend
here, on proof of this dirty treachery?"
"We will reserve this as Question Number Two," answered the Doctor
gravely, "and proceed with the narrative, which (I opine) goes on to say
that Captain McNeill preferred his oath to the excuse for considering it
annulled, collected his escort, shook hands with you, and went forward
to his fate."
"A man must save his soul," Captain McNeill explained modestly.
"You are to me, sir, a heretic (pardon my saying it); which prevents me
from taking as cheerful a view as I could wish concerning your soul.
But assuredly you saved your honour."
"Well, I hope so," the Captain answered, picking up the story:
"but really, in the sequel, I had to take some decisions which, obvious
as they seemed at the time, have since caused me grave searchings of
heart, and upon which I shall be grateful for your opinion."
"Am I appealed to as a priest?"
"Most certainly not, but as a Professor--a title for which, by the way,
we have in Scotland an extraordinary reverence. I rode on, sir, with my
escort, and that night we reached Tolosa, where the young Lieutenant--
his name was Gerard--found a surgeon to set his bone. He suffered
considerable pain, yet insisted next morning upon proceeding with me.
I imagine his motives to have been mixed; but please myself with
thinking that a latent desire to serve me made one of them. On the
other hand, the seal of Marmont's letter had been broken in his keeping;
a serious matter for a young officer, and one which he would naturally
desire to defer explaining. At Tolosa he accounted for his wound by
some tale of brigands and a chance shot at long range. On the morrow we
rode to Irun and crossed the Bidassoa. We were now on French soil.
Throughout the morning he had spoken little, and I too had preferred my
own thoughts. But now, as we broke our fast and cracked a bottle
together at the first tavern on the French shore, I opened fire by
asking him if he yet carried the Marshal's letter with the broken seal.
'To be sure,' said he. 'And what will you do with it?' I went on.
'Why, deliver it, I suppose, to the Governor of Bayonne, to whom it is
addressed.' 'And, when asked to account for the broken seal, you will
tell him the exact truth about it and the rescue?' 'I must,'
he answered; 'and I hope my report will help you, sir. It will not be
my fault if it does not.' 'You are an excellent fellow,' said I;
'but it will help me little. You do not know the contents of that
letter as I do--not willingly, but because it was read aloud in my
presence by the man who opened it.' And, before he could remonstrate, I
had told him its purport. Now, sir, that was not quite fair to the
young man, and I am not sure that it was strictly honourable?"