the doctor comes from
Pampeluna," she concluded.

She left the room as she spoke to warn the servants, who were already
astir, to do their work as noiselessly as possible. When she returned
Marcos was asleep.

"The doctor cannot be here for another hour, at least," whispered
Sarrion, who was standing by the window watching Marcos. "It is too far
for a man of his age to ride, and he has no carriage. There may be some
delay in finding one to do so great a distance at this time in the
morning. You must take the opportunity to get some sleep."

But Juanita only shook her head and laughed.

Sarrion did not persuade her, but turned to quit the room. His hand was
on the door when some one tapped on the other side of it. It was Marcos'
servant.

"The doctor, Excellency," he announced briefly.

In the passage stood a man of middle height, hard and wiry, with those
lines in his face that time neither obliterates nor deepens; the
parallels of hunger. He had been through the first Carlist war nearly
thirty years earlier. He had starved in Pampeluna, the hungry, the
impregnable.

Sarrion shook hands with him and passed into the room.

"Ah!" he said, in the quiet voice of one who is accustomed to speak in
the presence of sleep, when he saw Juanita, "Ah--you!"

"Yes," said Juanita.

"So you are nursing your husband," he murmured abstractedly, as he bent
over the bed.

And Juanita made no answer.

"How long has he been asleep?" he asked, after a few moments, and in
reply received the written paper which he read quickly, with a practised
eye, and laid it aside.

"We must wait," he said, turning to Sarrion, "until he awakes. But it is
all right. I can see that while he sleeps. He is a strong man; none
stronger in all Navarre."

As he spoke, he was examining the bottles left by the village apothecary,
tasting one, smelling another. He nodded approval. In medicine, as in
war, one expert may know unerringly what another will do. Then he looked
round the room, which was orderly as a hospital ward.

"One sees," he said, "that he has a nun to care for him."

He smiled faintly, so that his features fell into the lines that hunger
draws. But Juanita looked at him with grave eyes and did not answer to
his pleasantry.

Then he turned to Sarrion.

"It was only by the kindness of a mere acquaintance," he said, "that I
was enabled to get here so soon. My own horses were tired out with a hard
day yesterday, and I was going out