A Castle in Spain Part 37

"By-the-bye," said Brooke, at last, "I should like to tell you something, Talbot, in case you should ever happen to meet with a certain friend of mine--you might mention how you met with me, and so on."

"Yes," said Talbot, in a low voice.

"This friend," said Brooke, "is a girl." He paused.

"Yes," said Talbot, in the same voice.

"It was in Cuba that I met with her. Her name is Dolores."

"Dolores--what?"

"Dolores Garcia."

"I shall remember the name."

"I was correspondent there, in just such a country as this, between two hostile forces. One evening I came to a place where a gang of insurgent Cubans were engaged in the pleasing task of burning a house. As it happened, I was wearing the dress common to the insurgents, and pa.s.sed for one of themselves. Pressing into the house, I found two ladies--a young girl and her mother--in an agony of terror, surrounded by a howling crowd of ruffians. In a few words I managed to a.s.sure them of my help. I succeeded in personating a Cuban leader and in getting them away. Then I pa.s.sed through the crowd outside, and, getting horses, I hurried the ladies off.

Eventually we all reached Havana in safety.

"I learned that an attack had been made on the plantation, that Senor Garcia had been killed, and that as I came up the gang was plundering the place and threatening to destroy the women.

"Grat.i.tude had the effect of making this young girl Dolores most devotedly attached to me. In the course of our journey she evinced her affection in a thousand ways. She was very young, and very beautiful, and I could not help loving her. I was also deeply moved by her pa.s.sionate love for me, and so I asked her to be my wife, and she consented. After reaching Havana, Spanish manners did not allow of our seeing much of one another. Shortly afterward I had to return to the seat of war to finish my engagement, and bade her good-bye for two or three months. I expected at the end of that time to return to Havana and marry her.

"Well, I went away and heard nothing more from her. At the end of that time I returned, when, to my amazement, I learned that she had gone to Spain, and found a letter from her which gave me the whole reason for her departure. I had told her before that I myself was going to Spain in the course of another year, so she expressed a hope of seeing me there. The place to which she was going was Pampeluna.

I've already tried to find her there, but in vain. The fact is, things have been so disturbed about here that people have changed their abodes, and can no longer be traced; and so I have never come upon the track of Dolores. And I mention this to you, Talbot, so that if you should ever, by any chance, happen to meet her, you may tell her that you saw me, and that I had been hunting after her all through Spain. I dare say it will soothe her, for she loved me most pa.s.sionately, and must often have wondered why I never came for her.

In fact, she was so gentle, so delicate, so sensitive, and yet so intense in her feelings, that I have often feared that the idea of my being false might have been too much for her loving heart, and may have cut short her young life."

After the conclusion of this story Talbot asked many questions about Dolores, and the conversation gradually changed, until at length it came round to the cross-questioning of Lopez which Talbot had undergone.

"I have never told you," said she, "about my own errand here in this country; and as this may be our last conversation, I should like very much to tell you all."

Thus this confidence of Brooke's led to a similar act on the part of Talbot, who now related to him her own history. As this has been already set forth from the lips of Harry Rivers, it need not be repeated here. Brooke listened to it in silence. At the close he merely remarked:

"Well, Talbot, we've now made our final confessions. This is our last interview. And I feel sad, not, my lad, at the thought of death, but at the thought of leaving you among these villains. My only thought is, what will become of you."

"It's strange," said Talbot, in a musing tone, "very strange. All this that I have been telling you seems now removed back away to a far, far distant past. It is as though it all happened in a previous state of existence."

"I dare say," said Brooke. "Oh yes; you see you've been having a precious hard time of it."

"Yes," mused Talbot. "Fear, hope, suspense, shame, grief, despair; then fear, suspense, and despair; then hope and joy, followed again by despair. So it has been, and all in a few days. Brooke, I tell you I am another person altogether from that girl who left her home so short a time ago. Miss Talbot--where is she? I am the lad Talbot--comrade of a brave man--fighting with him for my life, and now along with him resting in the Valley of the Shadow of Death."

"Bos.h.!.+" said Brooke, in a husky, choking voice. He muttered a few unintelligible words, and then ceased.

"Death is near, Brooke--very near; I feel it."

"Talbot," said Brooke, with something like a groan, "talk of something else."

"It's near to you."

"Well, what if it is?"

"And it's near to me."

"It's not; I tell you it's not," cried Brooke, excitedly.

"It was the old fas.h.i.+on of chivalry, upheld by all the Talbots, that the page or the squire should never survive the chief. I'm a Talbot.

Do you understand me, Brooke?"

"If they did so," cried Brooke, in stronger excitement, "they were a pack of cursed fools.

"'He that fights and runs away May live to fight another day.'

That's my motto."

"Do you think I'll survive you?" asked Talbot, taking no notice of Brooke's words.

Brooke gave a wild laugh.

"You'll have to, my boy--you'll have to."

"I'm your page, your va.s.sal," said she. "I'm a Talbot. We've exchanged arms. I've flung away the girl life. I'm a boy--the lad Talbot. We're brothers in arms, for good or evil, Brooke."

Brooke began to whistle, and then murmured some words like these:

"Non ego perfidum Dixi sacramentum: ibimus, ibimus, Utcunque praecedes, supremum Carpere iter comites parati."

"What do you say?" asked Talbot.

"Oh, nothing," said Brooke; "dog Latin--some rubbish from Horace.

Allow me, however, to remark, that all this talk about death seems to me to be cursed bad taste."

After this he began to whistle a tune.

Suddenly he held up his hand so as to display the ring.

"Who gave you this?" he asked, carelessly.

"Mr. Rivers," said Talbot, simply. "It was our engagement ring."

Brooke gave his usual short laugh, and subsided into silence.

CHAPTER XXIV.