“What like is the youth?” queried Arden.

“Why, scarce a boy, nor yet a man in years; and, for all his illness, watcheth the other like any faithful dog.  English, moreover—­”

“English!”

“At times he grows light-headed, and then his speech is English, but the gowned fellow stills him with his hand, or gives him some potion, whereupon he sleeps.”

“What like is this Spanish friar?” broke in suddenly and with harshness Sir John Nevil’s voice.

“Why, sir,” Powell answered, “his cowl overshadows his face, but going suddenly on yesterday into the hut where he bides with the youth, I saw that as he bent over his patient the cowl had fallen back.  My gran’ther (rest his soul!), who died at ninety, had not whiter hair.”

“An old man!” exclaimed Sir John, and, sighing, turned himself in his chair.  Arden, rising, left the company for the window, where he looked down upon the city of Cartagena and outward to the investing fleet.  The streets of the town were closed by barricades, admirably constructed by the Spaniards, but now in English possession.  Beyond the barricades and near the sea, where the low and narrow buildings were, lay the wounded and the fever-stricken;—­rude hospital enough! to some therein but a baiting-place where pain and panic and the miseries of the brain were become, for the time, their bed-fellows; to others the very house of dissolution, a fast-crumbling shelter built upon the brim of the world, with Death, the impartial beleaguer, already at the door.  Arden turned aside and joined the group about Drake, the great sea-captain in whose company nor fear nor doubting melancholy could long hold place.

That night, shortly after the setting of the watch, Sir John Nevil, with a man or two behind him, found himself challenged at the barricade of a certain street, gave the word, and passed on, to behold immediately before him and travelling the same road a dark, unattended figure.  To his sharp “Who goes there?” a familiar voice made answer, and Arden paused until his friend and leader came up with him.

“A common road and a common goal,” spoke Nevil.

“Ay!—­common fools!” answered the other.  “Who hearing of gray geese, must think, forsooth, of a swan whose plumage turned from white to black!  And yet, God knows! to one, at least, the selfsame splendid swan; if lost, then lost magnificently....  This is an idle errand.”

“The youth is English,” replied Nevil.

“Did you speak to Powell?”

“Ay; I told him that I should visit the hospital this night.  We are close at hand.  Hark! that was the scream of a dying man.  Christ rest whatever soul hath taken flight!”

“There is a pale light surrounds this place,” said Arden.  “It comes from the fires which they burn as though the black death were upon us.  Do you hear that groaning?—­and there they carry out a weighted body.  War!...”

A group of men moved towards them—­Powell, a chirurgeon, a soldier or two.  Another minute and all were gathered before the hut of which Powell had made mention.  That worthy officer waved back their following, and the three alone entered the dimly lighted place.