but to the gentleman in question I must object; he is the most evil disposed of the whole of this family, and would most assuredly breed a funcion either in your apartment or in the corridor, by an attempt to escape.  Cavalier, me pesa, but I cannot accede to your request.  But with respect to any other gentleman, I shall be most happy, even Balseiro, who, though strange things are told of him, still knows how to comport himself, and in whose behaviour there is something both of formality and politeness, shall this day share your hospitality if you desire it, Cavalier.”

Of Balseiro I have already had occasion to speak in the former part of this narrative.  He was now confined in an upper story of the prison, in a strong room, with several other malefactors.  He had been found guilty of aiding and assisting one Pepe Candelas, a thief of no inconsiderable renown, in a desperate robbery perpetrated in open daylight upon no less a personage than the queen’s milliner, a Frenchwoman, whom they bound in her own shop, from which they took goods and money to the amount of five or six thousand dollars.  Candelas had already expiated his crime on the scaffold, but Balseiro, who was said to be by far the worst ruffian of the two, had by dint of money, an ally which his comrade did not possess, contrived to save his own life; the punishment of death, to which he was originally sentenced, having been commuted to twenty years’ hard labour in the presidio of Malaga.  I visited this worthy and conversed with him for some time through the wicket of the dungeon.  He recognized me, and reminded me of the victory which I had once obtained over him, in the trial of our respective skill in the crabbed Gitano, at which Sevilla the bull-fighter was umpire.

Upon my telling him that I was sorry to see him in such a situation, he replied that it was an affair of no manner of consequence, as within six weeks he should be conducted to the presidio, from which, with the assistance of a few ounces distributed among the guards, he could at any time escape.  “But whither would you flee?” I demanded.  “Can I not flee to the land of the Moors,” replied Balseiro, “or to the English in the camp of Gibraltar; or, if I prefer it, cannot I return to this foro (city), and live as I have hitherto done, choring the gachos (robbing the natives); what is to hinder me?  Madrid is large, and Balseiro has plenty of friends, especially among the lumias (women),” he added with a smile.  I spoke to him of his ill-fated accomplice Candelas; whereupon his face assumed a horrible expression.  “I hope he is in torment,” exclaimed the robber.  The friendship of the unrighteous is never of long duration; the two worthies had it seems quarrelled in prison; Candelas having accused the other of bad faith and an undue appropriation to his own use of the corpus delicti in various robberies which they had committed in company.