"Listen," he said, staring about him. "To-morrow we come to the city of Madrid. There I have friends, and you will meet them. I will give you the time and place of meeting. There you shall learn how money can be earned, and with such a spice of adventure about it that you will be charmed. Look for me to-morrow, then."
"On the track at last," murmured Alfonso breathlessly when the man was gone. "You think he is one of the gang, Tom?"
"Certain. Can't say, of course, that he has had anything to do with Wellington's papers; but I guess that's the case. However, we shall soon know that. Still, this is equally certain: whatever this work may be, and spying has something to do with it, it's the merest toss-up that it can have any connection with our governors. Oporto's a long cry from Madrid; Badajoz ain't much nearer."
Late on the following evening the troops reached the outskirts of Madrid, where Tom and his cousin parked their carts and secured their mules in the mule lines.
"You will look after things while we are gone," said Tom, addressing one of the men with them. "We have information which takes us into the city to-night perhaps. That information might possibly keep us absent from the camp for some days, so do not be alarmed if we do not return. Carry on as if we were still present."
An hour later the rascally-looking muleteer put in an appearance, and promptly cast his eyes upon the bottle of wine nestling in a corner of Tom's cart.
"A fine evening, one on which you will pave the way to a fortune," he leered. "But hot, infamously hot; these August days are always sultry in this country."
Tom poured him out a glass, and watched with feelings of loathing as the fellow gulped down the fluid. He was a scoundrel, of that he was sure, a thick-headed scoundrel to be so easily duped. For here he was about to introduce two comrades, of whom he had but little knowledge, to a group of conspirators perhaps, and in any case to someone able and willing to pay for work not as a rule performed by muleteers. What was that work?
"Spying—dirty work anyway," our hero growled to himself, for the thing was as foreign to his open-air, straightforward character as it could be. "But for the time being, at least, I'm prepared to be as great a spy and conspirator as any."
"You are free to come?" leered the fellow, looking askance again at the bottle. Tom took the hint and refilled the glass.