“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 served my sentence, and, on coming out, was put on sentry outside the colonel’s door, like a common soldier.  It was a terrible humiliation.

“While I was on duty I saw Carmen again.  She was dressed out like a shrine, all gold and ribbons, and was going in one evening with a party of gipsies to amuse the colonel’s guests.  She recognised me, and named a place where I could meet her next day.  When I gave her back the gold piece she burst into laughter, but kept it all the same.  Do you know, my son,’ she said to me when we parted, ’I believe I love you a little.  But that cannot last.  Dog and wolf do not keep house together long.  Perhaps, if you adopted the gipsy law, I would like to become your wife.  But it is nonsense; it is impossible.  Think no more of Carmencita, or she will bring you to the gallows.’

“She spoke the truth.  I would have been wise to think no more of her; but after that day I could think of nothing else, and walked about always hoping to meet her, but she had left the town.