he case was clear.
I took Carmen by the arm, and bade her follow me. At the guard-house the
sergeant said it was serious, and that she must be taken to prison. I
placed her between two dragoons, and, walking behind, we set out for the
town.

"At first the gipsy kept silence, but presently she turned to me, and
said softly, 'You are taking me to prison! Alas! what will become of me?
Have pity on me, Mr. Officer! You are so young, so good-looking! Let me
escape, and I will give you a piece of the loadstone which will make all
women love you.'

"I answered her as seriously as I could that the order was to take her
to prison, and that there was no help for it.

"My accent told her I was from the Basque province, and she began to
speak to me in my native tongue. Gipsies, you know, sir, speak all
languages. She told me she had been carried off by gipsies from Navarro,
and was working at the factory in order to earn enough to return home to
her poor mother. Would I do nothing for a country-woman? The Spanish
women at the factory had slandered her native place.

"It was all lies, sir. She always lied. But I believed her at the time.

"'If I pushed you and you fell,' she resumed, in Basque, 'it would not
be these two conscripts who would hold me.'

"I forgot my order and everything, and said, "'Very well, my country-
woman; and may our Lady of the Mountain be your aid!'

"Suddenly Carmen turned round and dealt me a blow on the chest with her
fist. I let myself fall backwards on purpose, and, with one bound, she
leapt over me, and started to run. There was no risk of overtaking her
with our spurs, our sabres, and our lances. The prisoner disappeared in
no time, and all the women-folk in the quarter favoured her escape, and
made fun of us, pointing out the wrong road on purpose. We had to return
at last to the guard-house without a receipt from the governor of the
prison.

"The result of this was I was degraded and sent to prison for a month.
Farewell to the sergeant's stripes, I thought.

"One day in prison the jailor entered, and gave me a special loaf of
bread.

"'Here,' he said, 'see what your cousin has sent you.'

"I was astonished, for I had no cousin in Seville, and when I broke the
loaf I found a small file and a gold piece inside it. No doubt then, it
was a present from Carmen, for a gipsy would set fire to a town to
escape a day's imprisonment, and I was touched by this mark of
remembrance.

"But I serve