"Have you seen me before, do you think?"
Olivares's question caught the captain unawares. A sixth sense, something like the sound a steel blade makes when drawn over a whetstone, warned him to display exquisite caution.
"No. Never."
"Never?"
"I have said so, Excellency." "Not even during some public function?" "Well . . ." the captain stroked his mustache, as if trying hard to remember. "Perhaps ... in the Plaza Mayor, or at the Hieronymite convent . . . someplace like that." He nodded with what passed as thoughtful honesty. "That is possible, yes."
Olivares held his eyes, impassive. "No other time?"
"No, no other time."
For a very brief instant the captain believed he glimpsed a smirk in the favorite's thick growth of beard. But he was never sure. Olivares had picked up one of the files on his table and was leafing through the pages distractedly.
"You served in Flanders and Naples, I see here. And against the Turks in the Levant, and on the Barbary coast. A long life as a soldier."
"Since I was thirteen, Excellency."
"Your title of captain is, I imagine, unearned?"
"Not officially. I never rose above the rank of sergeant, and I was relieved of that after a . . . scuffle."
"Yes, that is what it says here." The minister kept riffling through the documents. "You quarreled with a lieutenant—in fact, you ran him through. I am surprised that you were not hanged for that."
"They were going to, Excellency. But that same day in Maastricht our troops mutinied. They had not been paid for five months. I myself did not join them, fortunately, so I had the opportunity to defend Field Marshal Miguel de Orduna from his own soldiers."
"You do not approve of mutinies?"
"I do not like to see officers murdered."
His questioner arched an eyebrow peevishly. "Not even those who intend to hang you?"
"One thing is one thing, and another, another."
"To defend your field marshal, it says here, you put away another two or three with your sword."
"They were Tudescos, Excellency. Germans. And the field marshal told me, 'Devil take it, Alatriste. If I am going to be killed by mutineers, at least let them be Spanish.' I agreed with him, lent a hand, and that won my pardon."
Olivares was listening attentively. From time to time he looked at the papers and then at Diego Alatriste thoughtfully.
"I see," he said. "There is also a letter of recommendation from the former Conde de Guadalmedina, and a draft from Don Ambrosio de Spinola signed in his hand, granting eight escudos extra pay for your good service in battle. Did you collect that?"
"No, Excellency. Generals give an order, and secretaries, administrators, and scribes execute it in their own manner. When I went to claim my escudos, they had been reduced to four, and even those I have not seen to this day."
The minister dipped his head slightly, as though he, too, had had bonuses or salaries withheld. Or perhaps he was approving the reluctance of the secretaries, administrators, and scribes to release public monies. He kept leafing through papers with the meticulousness of a clerk.
"Discharged after Fleurus because of a serious, and honorable, wound," Olivares continued. Now he focused on the bandage on the captain's head. "You have a certain propensity for getting wounded, I see."
"And for wounding, Excellency."
Diego Alatriste stood a little straighter, twisting his mustache. It was obvious that he did not like for anyone— not even the person who could have him immediately executed—to take his wounds lightly. Olivares noted the insolent spark in the captain's eyes, and then turned back to the document.
"So it seems," he concluded. "Although the references to your adventures apart from service to the flag are less exemplary than your military record. I see here a fight in Naples that involved a death. Ah! And also insubordination during the repression of the Moorish rebels in Valencia." He frowned. "Perhaps you did not agree with the decree of expulsion signed by His Majesty?"
The captain hesitated before answering. "I was a soldier," he said after a bit. "Not a butcher."
"I imagined you to be a better servant of your king."
"And I am. I have served him even better than I have God, for I have broken God's commandments, but none of my king's."
Again the favorite crooked an eyebrow. "I always believed that the Valencia campaign was glorious."
"Then you were ill informed, Excellency. There is no glory whatsoever in sacking houses, violating women, and cutting the throats of defenseless civilians."
Olivares's expression was impenetrable. "All of them enemies of the true religion," he pointed out. 'And unwilling to renounce Mohammed."
The captain shrugged. "Perhaps," he replied. "But that was not my fight."
"Come now"—the minister raised both eyebrows, with feigned surprise. "And to do murder for another party is?"
"I do not kill the young or the old, Excellency."
"I see. Which was why you left your company and enlisted in the galleys of Naples."
"Yes. Given the task of goring infidels, I preferred to do so against men who could defend themselves."
For a long moment, the once masked man sat without saying a word. Then he shifted his gaze to the papers on the table. He seemed to be turning Alatriste's last words over in his mind.
"Regardless of your record, however, it seems that there are men of quality who defend you," he said finally.
"Young Guadalmedina, for example. Or Don Francisco de Quevedo, who, just yesterday, in his usual bizarre behavior, decided to set his verbs in the active voice—although you know that associating with Quevedo can be a help or a hindrance, according to the ups and downs of his fortunes." Olivares paused—a significant pause. "It also appears that young Buckingham believes he is in your debt." An even longer pause followed. "And the Prince of Wales as well."
"I know nothing of that." Again Alatriste shrugged, his expression unchanged. "But yesterday those gentlemen did more than repay a debt, real or imaginary."
Slowly, Olivares shook his head. "Apparently not." He seemed vexed. "This very morning, Charles of England was interested enough to inquire about you and your fate. Even our lord and king, who is still stunned over what took place, wishes to be informed of the outcome." He abruptly pushed the file to one side. "This creates a troublesome situation. Very delicate."
Now Olivares looked at Diego Alatriste as if wondering what to do with him. "A shame," he went on, "that those five bunglers did not carry out their assignment better. Whoever paid them was on the right track. In a certain way, that would have solved everything."
"I am sorry that I do not share your regrets, Excellency."
"I shall take note of that. . ." The minister's gaze had changed; now it was even harder and more unreadable. "Is it true what they say, that a few days back you saved the life of a certain English traveler when a comrade of yours was about to kill him?"
Alarm. Sound the alarm with drumrolls and trumpets, thought Alatriste. This sudden shift was more dangerous than a night raid by the Dutch when an entire Spanish tercio was laid out snoring. Conversations like this could lead straight to having one's neck in a noose. At that moment he would not wager a pittance on his neck.
"Your Excellency must be mistaken. I do not remember such a happening."
"Well, it would be to your benefit to remember."
The captain had been threatened many times in his life, and in addition he was sure he would not emerge unscathed from this contest. So being lost in either case, he did not flinch. But that did not stand in the way of his choosing his words with great care.
"I do not know whether I saved anyone's life," he said after thinking a moment. "But I do recall that when I was hired for a certain service, my principal employer said that he did not want any deaths."