those intimate bonds between reader
and writer are of no use to him here. I say him as though I had only
male readers, but if my reader be a lady I leave the situation
confidently to her intuition. As for the things he saw, of all of these
I am at full liberty to write, and yet, my reader, they would differ
from History's version: never a battle that Rodriguez saw on all the
plain that swept away from that circular window, but History wrote
differently. And now, my reader, the situation is this: who am I?
History was a goddess among the Greeks, or is at least a distinguished
personage, perhaps with a well-earned knighthood, and certainly with
widespread recognition amongst the Right Kind of People. I have none of
these things. Whom, then, would you believe?

Yet I would lay my story confidently before you, my reader, trusting in
the justice of my case and in your judicial discernment, but for one
other thing. What will the Goddess Clio say, or the well-deserving
knight, if I offend History? She has stated her case, Sir Bartimeus has
written it, and then so late in the day I come with a different story,
a truer but different story. What will they do? Reader, the future is
dark, uncertain and long; I dare not trust myself to it if I offend
History. Clio and Sir Bartimeus will make hay of my reputation; an
innuendo here, a foolish fact there, they know how to do it, and not a
soul will suspect the goddess of personal malice or the great historian
of pique. Rodriguez gazed then through the deep blue window, forgetful
of all around, on battles that had not all the elegance or neatness of
which our histories so tidily tell. And as he gazed upon a merry
encounter between two men on the fringe of an ancient fight he felt a
touch on his shoulder and then almost a tug, and turning round beheld
the room he was in. How long he had been absent from it in thought he
did not know, but the Professor was still standing with folded arms
where he had left him, probably well satisfied with the wonder that his
most secret art had awakened in his guest. It was Morano who touched
his shoulder, unable to hold back any longer his impatience to see the
wars; his eyes as Rodriguez turned round were gazing at his master with
dog-like wistfulness.

The absurd eagerness of Morano, his uncouth touch on his shoulder,
seemed only pathetic to Rodriguez. He looked at the Professor's face,
the nose like a hawk's beak, the small eyes deep down beside it,