"All the more, then, they deserve a lesson. Bartolomé, you will tell your tapster to bring my wine to the vacant table beyond the mulberry-tree."
"But, Señor——" As Fuentes moved off, the innkeeper put forth a hand to entreat if not to restrain him.
"Eh?" Fuentes halted as if amazed at his impudence. "Ah, to be sure, I am Don Andrea: but do not forget, my friend, that Don Eugenio used to be quick-tempered, and that in members of one family these little likenesses crop up in the most unexpected fashion." He strode away down the shadowy garden-path over which in the tree-tops a last beam or two of sunset lingered: and I, having hitched up our beasts, followed him, carrying the saddle-bags and his guitar-case.
Three tables, as he had premised, stood in the patch of garden beyond the mulberry-tree, hedged in closely on three sides, giving a view in front upon the towers and fortifications across the river; a nook secluded as a stage-box facing a scene that might have been built and lit up for our delectation. The tables, with benches alongside, stood moderately close together—two by the river-wall, the third in the rear, where the hedge formed an angle: and the two gentlemen so jealous of their privacy were seated at the nearer of the two tables overlooking the river, and on the same bench—though at the extreme ends of it and something more than a yard apart.
They stared up angrily at our intrusion, and for the moment the elder of the pair seemed about to demand our business. But Fuentes walked calmly by, took his seat at the next table, pulled out his bundle of manuscript, adjusted his spectacles, and began to read. Having deposited my baggage, I took up a respectful position behind him, ignoring—somewhat ostentatiously perhaps—the strangers' presence, yet not without observing them from the corner of my eye.
They were young: the elder, maybe, three-and-twenty, short, thick-set, with features just now darkened by his ill-humour, but probably sullen enough at the best of times: the younger, tall and nervous and extraordinarily fair for a Spaniard, with a weak, restless mouth and restless, passionate eyes. Indeed, either this restlessness was a disease with him or he was suffering just now from an uncontrollable agitation. Eyes, mouth, feet, fingers—the whole man seemed to be twitching. I set down his age at eighteen. On the table stood a large flask of wine, from which he helped himself fiercely, and beside the flask lay a long bundle wrapped in a cloak.
This young man, having drained his glass at a gulp, let out an oath and sprang up suddenly with a glare upon Fuentes, who had stretched out his legs and was already absorbed in his reading.
"Señor Stranger," he began impetuously, "we would have you to know, if the innkeeper has not already told you——"