I can't.'

"'Very good! If you make so many difficulties, I know to whom I can
go. I'll ask your officer if he'll come with me to Dorotea's. He looks
good-natured, and he'll post a sentry who'll only see what he had better
see. Good-bye, canary-bird! I shall have a good laugh the day the order
comes out to hang you!'

"I was weak enough to call her back, and I promised to let the whole
of gipsydom pass in, if that were necessary, so that I secured the
only reward I longed for. She instantly swore she would keep her word
faithfully the very next day, and ran off to summon her friends, who
were close by. There were five of them, of whom Pastia was one, all well
loaded with English goods. Carmen kept watch for them. She was to warn
them with her castanets the instant she caught sight of the patrol. But
there was no necessity for that. The smugglers finished their job in a
moment.

"The next day I went to the _Calle del Candilejo_. Carmen kept me
waiting, and when she came, she was in rather a bad temper.

"'I don't like people who have to be pressed,' she said. 'You did me a
much greater service the first time, without knowing you'd gain anything
by it. Yesterday you bargained with me. I don't know why I've come, for
I don't care for you any more. Here, be off with you. Here's a douro for
your trouble.'

"I very nearly threw the coin at her head, and I had to make a violent
effort to prevent myself from actually beating her. After we had
wrangled for an hour I went off in a fury. For some time I wandered
about the town, walking hither and thither like a madman. At last I went
into a church, and getting into the darkest corner I could find, I cried
hot tears. All at once I heard a voice.

"'A dragoon in tears. I'll make a philter of them!'

"I looked up. There was Carmen in front of me.

"'Well, _mi payllo_, are you still angry with me?' she said. 'I must
care for you in spite of myself, for since you left me I don't know what
has been the matter with me. Look you, it is I who ask you to come to
the _Calle del Candilejo_, now!'

"So we made it up: but Carmen's temper was like the weather in our
country. The storm is never so close, in our mountains, as when the sun
is at its brightest. She had promised to meet me again at Dorotea's, but
she didn't come.

"And Dorotea began telling me again that she had gone off to Portugal
about some gipsy business.

"As experience had already taught me how much of that I was