Now, in my youth, amongst many other experiences of great and little value, I campaigned in Spain with the Duke of Berwick—a good lord and a man of honor, albeit a bastard—and I have some lingering knack with the Spanish tongue. So I called back to her.
"Not Spaniards, but Englishmen!"
Her arrow wavered from one to the other of us.
"Espanya," she repeated uncertainly.
I took a step forward, but instantly the arrow steadied, and for the blink of an eye I thought she would loose.
"We are friends," I said.
"Stand," she ordered in broken Spanish, with a strange accent such as I had never heard. "What are English? You are Spanish! Go away!"
At that there came a yelp from the squat bowmen on our trail, and a squad of them rained arrows on us from the cliffs overhead. She looked up more startled than ever.
"We are friends," I insisted. "The bowmen pursued us here."
"Awataba," she murmured, almost to herself.