"Who, or what is he?" he asked, coldly.
"A guerilla chief—Baltasar de Saldos, a personage of savage character, and very doubtful reputation."
"You recommend him badly, general."
"But truly, though."
"In what way can I assist you in the matter?" asked Cosmo, with increasing coldness of manner, as he began to fear that the unpleasant duty of opening the "communication" in question, was, perhaps, to devolve on him.
"I wish a messenger to convey a despatch from me to him—one of yours—not an officer, whose life would be too valuable; but if you have any private, a troublesome fellow, worthless, frequently in the defaulters' book—you understand me, colonel?"
"I think that I do, Sir John," replied Cosmo, whose green eyes shrunk as he inserted his glass in one, and gazed at the general, keenly; "but is the risk of delivering a message so great in Portugal, after you have cleared it of the French?"
"Stragglers, orderlies, and solitary individuals are at all times liable to be cut off, we scarcely know by whom, the country is so lawless; but this fellow, Baltasar, is somewhere among the mountains near Herreruela, beyond the Spanish frontier; and to say nothing of the wolves that infest the wild places hereabouts, there are three chances to one against any messenger returning alive, even after he has delivered our letter to Baltasar."
"A lively duty!"
"Portugal and Spain are not without traitors in the French interest ready to assassinate a redcoat; others are ready to do it merely to procure his clothing and arms, and some of the low wayside tabernas are kept by people who would cut any man's throat for the chance of finding half a vintin in his pocket. Then there are the hazards of being hanged as a spy by the French, of losing one's way among the wild, depopulated Sierras, and dying there of starvation, or being devoured by the black wolves, or by those wild dogs, of which the Duke of Abrantes strove in vain to clear the country."