Purity of Blood by Arturo Pérez-Reverte Page B

attention to a small door, locked from inside, in the brick wall that was ten feet tall at that point. He also took note of a carriage guard at the corner that would make it possible for someone with sufficient agility to leap over the top. I watched as his keen eyes studied the little door as if he were searching for breaches in an enemy wall. I knew he was interested because he was making that gesture so typical of him: stroking his mustache with two fingers, a sign that usually—reflectively or angrily—preceded putting a hand to his sword when someone was beginning to try his patience. It was at this juncture that the elder son of don Vicente de la Cruz, his hat pulled low on his forehead, caught up with us, though he gave no sign of recognizing us. I observed, however, by the way he was walking and guardedly looking around, that he too was inspecting Las Benitas’s walls.
    At that moment a small incident occurred that I relate here because it is a good example of Diego Alatriste’s nature. We had paused a moment as the captain pretended to be adjusting his belt in order to examine the lock of the door, when we were overtaken by a foursome leaving mass: a pair of foppish young men accompanying two rather common, but beautiful, women. One of the men, the one wearing a velvet doublet with slashed sleeves, a multitude of ribbons and bows, and a silver-embroidered band around the crown of his hat, bumped into me and then, ill-humoredly, shoved me aside, calling me a little pissant. I was not as yet carrying a dagger, because of my youth, but a few years later that discourtesy would have cost him, however well dressed he might be, a stab in the groin with the dagger. Soon, in Flanders, I would carry one as if I’d never been without it.
    But at that time I still had no choice but to eat insults without seasoning and without recourse, unless Captain Alatriste determined to take my defense upon himself. Which is precisely what he did, and I must tell you that his actions led me to consider that, despite his often surly ways and silences, the captain held me in esteem. And if Your Mercies will forgive me, I will say that he had good reason, pardiez, considering certain pistol shots I had fired on his behalf some time ago at the Gate of Lost Souls.
    The fact is that when he heard this dandy debase me, the captain turned, slowly, serenely. On his face was the look of glacial calm that those who know him consider fair notice that it is advisable to take three steps back.
    “By God, Íñigo”—the captain seemed to be speaking to me, although he was staring hard at the offender—“I do believe that this caballero has confused you with some rogue of his acquaintance.”
    I said nothing, not a word, for it was obvious what was happening. The coxcomb, hearing himself addressed, had stopped, and his companions with him. He was the kind of man who uses his own shadow as a kind of mirror. At the captain’s “By God,” he had placed a white hand displaying a large gold and diamond ring upon the guard of his sword, and with the evident sarcasm of that “caballero,” his fingers drummed a tune on the pommel. His arrogant eyes looked Diego Alatriste up and down. When he had completed the inspection, however—after noting the captain’s sword with the guard scratched and nicked from other blades, the battle scars on his face, the cold eyes beneath the broad-brimmed hat—the arrogance was not quite as noticeable as it had been.
    Even so, he replied. “And what happens,” he said disagreeably, “if I am not confused and if I am certain of what I say…eh?”
    His answer had sounded firm, which was in the man’s favor, although that final hesitation had not escaped me, nor the swift glances he threw toward his companion and the two ladies. In those days, a man might well let himself be killed for the sake of his reputation, and the only things that could not be forgiven were cowardice and dishonor. After all, honor was