“Well, that means you are getting better,” said the smuggler; and the boys scanned the speaker’s handsome, manly-looking face.
Just then fresh steps were heard upon the ladder, and the pleasant-countenanced priest appeared, carefully bearing a large bowl of water, and with a long strip of coarse linen hanging over his arm.
He smilingly nodded at the two lads, and then knelt by the side of the bowl and watched attentively while Pen’s wound was dressed and carefully bandaged with the coarse strip of linen, after which a few words passed in Spanish between the priest and the smuggler, who directly after addressed Pen.
“He was asking me about getting you down to breakfast, but I tell him that you will be better if you lie quite still for a bit, perhaps for a few days, I don’t think the French will come here again. They are more likely to forget all about you, for they are always on the move; but you could do no good if you came down, and I shall not stir for some days yet, unless my friends come, and I don’t expect they will. It would be too risky. So you lie here patiently and give your wound a chance to get well before I try to take you through the pass. Besides, your friends are a long way off, and they will be sure to come nearer before long. You can make yourself very comfortable here, can’t you, and eat and drink and sleep?”
“But it is not fair to the father,” said Pen, “and we have no money to pay him for our lodging.”
“You Englishmen are brave fellows,” said the smuggler with a merry laugh. “You like to pay your way, while those French thieves plunder and steal and ill-use every one they come near. Don’t you make yourself uncomfortable about that, my lad. As you hinted just now, the holy father is poor, and it may seem to you hard that you should live upon him; but you English are our friends, and so is the father. Make yourselves quite comfortable. You are very welcome, and we are glad to have you as our guests.—Eh, padre mio!” he continued, relapsing into his own tongue. “They are quite welcome, are they not?”
The priest nodded and smiled as he bent down and patted both the lads on the shoulder, Punch contenting himself with what he did not understand, for it seemed very friendly, while Pen took the hand that rested on his shoulder and raised it to his lips.
Then the old man slowly descended, and the smuggler turned and continued talking pleasantly to Pen.
“I have told him,” he said, “that I am going to have breakfast with you here, as my men have gone up to the mountains with the mules, and I don’t want to show myself and get a shot sent after me, for some of the Frenchmen are down in the village still. Be quiet for a day or two, and if my friends come before you are able to march we will get you on one of my mules. Hallo!” he added, “the father’s making a fire to cook us some breakfast. I shouldn’t wonder if he bakes us a cake and makes us a cup of good fragrant coffee. He generally contents himself with bread and herbs and a glass of water; but he knows my weaknesses—and I know his,” added the smuggler, laughing. “He never objects to a glass of good wine.”
The smuggler’s surmises were right, for before very long the old man paid several visits to the loft, and ended by seating himself with the others and partaking of a roughly prepared but excellent breakfast, which included newly made cake, fried bacon and eggs, with a capital bowl of coffee and goat’s-milk.