Jack turned away; there was a mist before his eyes. Then suddenly the woman's tone changed from grief to rage. Her next words seemed to bite into Jack's soul.
"Stay, Señor!" she cried; "stay, Tio Jorge! I call you to witness what I teach my Juanino. Yes, I teach him; he will never forget; it is for a mother to teach her son his duty. He shall be a scourge to all the accursed race. He shall kill, kill, kill, knowing no rest till he join his father--his father whom the French have killed!"
The boy looked up in her face with eyes of terror.
"Put your hands together," she continued, "and swear that henceforth, in war or peace, at home or abroad, in the street or in the field, you will kill every Frenchman you may meet, kill without mercy or ruth, and thus avenge me and all your house. Swear, Juanino!"
Jack shuddered as he heard the little fellow, whose age was perhaps seven years, repeat the terrible oath his frantic mother demanded of him. At that moment the horrors of war were brought home to Jack's mind more forcibly than ever before; nothing in the terrible retreat to Corunna had been so terrible as the picture of the young widow's desolate grief and passionate longing for vengeance.
He passed on, with Tio Jorge and Pepito, into a small plaza out of which several narrow streets radiated. The place was familiar to him, and a few steps farther on he recognized the Casa Alvarez, and remembered, what he had forgotten till now, that the house of his old friend stood almost within a stone's-throw of the Santa Engracia convent.
"This was the head-quarters of Don Hernando," said Tio Jorge. "You had better make it yours also, Señor."
"Yes. But let us go on to the ramparts now. I want to see the position, and the men. Do you know, by the by, what has become of the family of Don Fernan Alvarez? The old Señor himself is dead."
"I cannot tell you, Señor. He was a good man, was Don Fernan. He had one daughter; was it not so? But they were far above a poor man like me, and I know nothing about the Señorita."
Jack felt a curious pleasure in knowing that the Casa Alvarez was in his own district, and would actually be his head-quarters. Hastening down the street towards the walls, he enquired whether the ramparts were manned in force at night in anticipation of attack during the hours of darkness. Tio Jorge informed him that the French had not risked a night attack in force since the beginning of the siege. They continued their mining operations, but they had found it so difficult to make headway above-ground, even in the daylight, that actual assaults and fighting seldom or never occurred between dark and dawn. The ramparts were therefore guarded by a sufficient number of sentries, but not occupied in force, the defenders being only too glad to recruit their overtaxed energies with sleep. When Jack arrived at the wall he found sentries posted at intervals of a few yards. He learnt from Tio Jorge that his command extended from the Santa Engracia convent some fifty yards to the north, where it adjoined the Porta Quemada district under the charge of a personal friend of Palafox, Don Casimir Ulloa. It happened that Don Casimir was making a round of his sentries before leaving for the night, and to him Jack was introduced by Tio Jorge at the point where their commands met. Tio Jorge then took his leave, promising to call at the Casa Alvarez on the way back, and see that a room was arranged for the Señor's occupation.