Yet I was firm; forced myself to be so. In my turn, bade her remember that I was a soldier, that soldiers could not skulk and run away when there was naught to fear.
"For," I said, whispering also many other words of love and comfort in her ear, "it may be true that the king has joined with us. For months it has been looked for, expected. And if 'tis not even so, these people hate Spain and all in it with a deep hatred. They cannot harm us, certainly no half dozen can. 'Twould take more than that. Let me go, sweetheart."
And gently I disengaged her arms from my neck and went away amidst her prayers and supplications for my safety; amidst also the mutterings of the landlord to the effect that the Inglés seemed to fear neither devil nor man.
'Twas not many moments to the border 'twixt the two countries, and I soon was there--seeing, however, as I hurried toward it, to the priming of my pistols, and that my sword was loose enough in its scabbard for easy drawing forth--and there I perceived that a harangue was going on between the Spanish and Portuguese frontiermen, while, on the side of the former, were also the half-dozen Spaniards, of whom the inn keeper had spoken. And amongst them I recognised two or three of those who had captured us in the inn garden at Lugo.
"Ha!" one of them called out as I approached. "Ha! See, there is one, the second of the brigands, though not the worst. Assassinator!" he shrieked at me, "we must have you back at Lugo."
"Best take me, then," I replied, as I drew close up, "yet 'twill cost you dear," and as I spoke I whipped my sword from out its scabbard.
There was to be neither fight nor attempt to capture me, however; in truth, as you have now to see, my weapon had done its last work in either Spain or Portugal, since the men on this side meant not that the Spaniards should have their way.
"Back, I tell you," shouted the Portuguese chief, "or advance at your peril. We are at war; 'tis known over all our land the Inglés are our allies. You have come on a bootless errand."
Now this, as I learnt later, was not the case in absolute fact, since Portugal joined not with us till the next spring had come, yet it served very well for my purpose; for these Spaniards did doubtless think that they would have got me--and, I suppose, Juana, too--bloodlessly, and have been able to hale us back to Lugo and its accursed braséro. But now they found out their mistake; they would have to fight to get me, and as, I think, they feared my sword as much as the four or five others of my new-found Portuguese friends, they very wisely desisted from any attempt. And so, after many angry words exchanged on both sides, in which I took no part, I went back to the inn, feeling sure that, unless I ever ventured into Spain again, I was free of its clutches.
* * * * * * * * *