“Yes.”
“One more reason for my liking you. Another glass, eh?”
“Let us proceed. Go on with the story, comrade.”
“Here goes.”
Don Gil cleared his throat, and commenced his story as follows....
CHAPTER VII
IN WHICH IS TOLD THE HISTORY OF A TAVERN ON SIERRA MORENA
TOWARD the first part of last century, upon one of the folds of Sierra Morena, stood a tavern called El Ventorro de la Sangre (Bloody Tavern). It was half way between Pozo Blanco and Cordova, in a fertile little pasture near an olive orchard.
Its name arose from a bloody encounter between the dragoons and guerillas in that spot at the time of the French intervention.
The tavern was situated on a small clearing that was always kept green. It was surrounded by tall prickly-pears, a ravine, and an olive orchard in which one could see ruins—vestiges of a fortress and a watch-tower. This land belonged to a village perched upon the most rugged and broken part of the mountain.... Its name does not at present concern the story.
The tavern was neither very large, nor very spacious; it had neither the characteristics of a hostelry, nor even of a store. Its front, which was six metres long, whitewashed, and pierced by a door and three windows, faced a bad horse-shoe road strewn with loose stones; its humble roof leaned toward the ground, and joined that of a shed which contained the stables, the manger, and the straw-loft.