"Alto a la Guardia Civil!" thundered Montara, springing back and jerking his carbine to his shoulder.
"Down, you apelike one!" commanded the aged sergeant. "Can't you see? It is the hidalgo doctor, Don Jaime de Torreblanca y Moncada!" And he swept his tricorn hat off his close-clipped white head.
Don Jaime reined in his horse to a quick stop. He disdained altogether the mortified Montara. He looked down at the bared white head, the knife-sharp white beard, and the lean and haughty face of the aged sergeant.
It was, then, as if he looked down upon a singular edition of himself. Don Jaime was a grandee by birth and breeding, and these things amount in Spain; but the old sergeant was no less grand with adamantine adhesion to principle, with eagle-sternness and eagle-haughtiness. They eyed each other with mutual recognition and respect. They were both of the same old Spanish imperial school, unforgiving of injury, inexorable to avenge.
Said the doctor, "Peace be to you, mi sargento."
"And to you peace, Don Jaime of my soul."
"But what is this scheme I hear you hatching?"
"It is a way we have of keeping the peace of Spain."
"Cannot you drag down the Wolf-Cub without the aid of this blood-hound, Ferou?"
"We of the Guardia Civil are not podencos that can drag down the Wolf in the open. Senor Don Dios! we have tried and each time failed!"