"That may not be easy: nevertheless, I can try. Your Excellency, by the way, will allow me to promise that future reports are not for publication?"
Wellington smiled grimly, doubtless from recollection of a recent interview with Silveira and the Portuguese Ministry. "You may rest assured of that," said he; and added: "There may be some delay, as you suggest, in finding fresh correspondents: and it is very necessary for me to know quickly how Salamanca stands for stores."
"Then I must pick up some information on my own account."
"The service will be hazardous——"
"Oh, as for that——" I put in, with another shrug.
"—and I propose to give you a companion," pursued Wellington, with a half-turn toward the man in the recess of the window. "This is Señor Fuentes. You are not acquainted, I believe?—as you ought to be."
Now from choice I have always worked alone: and had the General uttered any other name I should have been minded to protest, with the old Greek, that two were not enough for an army, while for any other purpose they were too many. But on hearsay the performances of this man Fuentes and his methods and his character had for months possessed a singular fascination for me. He was at once a strolling guitar-player and a licentiate of the University of Salamanca, a consorter with gypsies, and by birth a pure-blooded Castilian hidalgo. Some said that patriotism was a passion with him; with a face made for the love of women, he had a heart only for the woes of Spain. Others averred that hatred of the French was always his master impulse; that they, by demolishing the colleges of his University, and in particular his own beloved College of San Lorenzo, had broken his heart and first driven him to wander. Rewards he disdained; dangers he laughed at: his feats in the service had sometimes a touch of high comedy and always a touch of heroic grace. In short, I believe that if Spain had held a poet in those days, Fuentes would have passed into song and lived as one of his country's demigods.
He came forward now with a winning smile and saluted me cordially, not omitting a handsome compliment on my work. You could see that the man had not an ounce of meanness in his nature.
"We shall be friends," said he, turning to the Commander-in-Chief. "And that will be to the credit of both, since Señor MacNeill has an objection to comrades."
"I never said so."