Tom would have laughed at his stupid vanity at another time. But there he was, all strung up for the struggle which he knew to be inevitable, waiting and waiting. And how can a man, or a youth for the matter of that, conjure up an easy smile under such circumstances?
"Yes, it is always the man himself who makes the running," said this fellow. "But I will take food to your comrade, and then for the rest."
He was wool-gathering, this spy. Even spies, we suppose, have their amorous moments and their gentler passions. This man was so taken up with the thought of the outing he was to have that he was actually pulling the door open and leaving without a thought as to the condition of his prisoner. Of what use food and drink when a man's hands were supposed to be fast bound behind him?
The reader can imagine the temptation Tom felt to let him go without a murmur; for then the struggle, inevitable no doubt, would be deferred for a while. He would have a longer breathing space; he would, perhaps, be better prepared in the course of a few minutes.
"Funking, eh?" he asked himself severely. "Wanting to put it off, you brute. Hi!" he called. "Thanks for the food and all that is to follow, but permit me to point out that I am unable to touch it. After all, even were I a four-footed animal, I could hardly manage the task with two of my limbs tied. No doubt the thought of this friend drives such trivial matters out of your head."
A roar escaped the jailer. This was quite the best joke he had come across in many a long day's march. How his comrades would cackle when he told them; for of course he would do that. It would add zest to their chaffing.
"Indeed it is a pretty compliment I am paying a certain person, and so I shall tell her," he giggled. "To think that I who am so careful should go about with my wits so flying. She will smile and be pleased. Hola! Then this is a true sign of my feelings for the minx."
"Quite a decent fellow in some ways, though a traitor," thought Tom, eyeing the fellow narrowly. "Makes one feel rather a sneak to upset this meeting. But then, business comes first, eh? Yes, I'm sorry for him, but it can't be helped."
He staggered to his feet as the man came towards him, still with his hands behind his back. And then he lunged swiftly, catching the jailer neatly between the eyes with a fist the knuckles of which were now hard after months of strenuous campaigning. The man rose bodily from the floor, his feet kicked spasmodically forward, and in a moment the Spanish hero, the spy and traitor who with his comrades made a living by selling the stolen secrets of those who had come to deliver their country, was crashing upon the floor.