‘Who knows?’ said the innkeeper with outspread hands. ‘Anything that his Excellency requires shall be forthcoming,’ he added grandiosely. ‘This is the dining-room, and here at the side a little saloon where the ladies sit. But at present we have only gentlemen in the hotel—it being the winter time.’ ‘Then you have other guests?’ inquired Conyngham. ‘But . . . yes—always. In Algeciras there are always travellers. Noblemen—like his Excellency—for pleasure. Others—for commerce, the Government—the politics.’ ‘No flies enter a shut mouth, my friend,’ said a voice at the door, and both turned to see standing in the doorway the priest who had witnessed Conyngham’s arrival. ‘Pardon, señor,’ said the old man, coming forward with his shabby hat in his hand. ‘Pardon my interruption. I came at an opportune moment, for I heard the word politics.’ He turned and shook a lean finger at the innkeeper, who was backing towards the door with many bows. ‘Ah, bad Miguel,’ he said, ‘will you make it impossible for gentlemen to put up at your execrable inn? The man’s cooking is superior to his discretion, señor. I, too, am a traveller, and for the moment a guest here. I have the honour. My name is Concha—the Padre Concha—a priest, as you see.’ Conyngham nodded, and laughed frankly. ‘Glad to meet you,’ he said. ‘I saw you as I came along. My name is Conyngham, and I am an Englishman, as you hear. I know very little Spanish.’ ‘That will come—that will come,’ said the priest, moving towards the window. ‘Perhaps too soon, if you are going to stay any length of time in this country. Let me advise you—do not learn our language too quickly.’ He shook his head and moved towards the open window. ‘See to your girths before you mount, eh? Here is the verandah, where it is pleasant in the afternoon. Shall we be seated? That chair has but three legs—allow me! this one is better.’ He spoke with the grave courtesy of his countrymen. For every Spaniard, even the lowest muleteer, esteems himself a gentleman, and knows how to act as such. The Padre Concha had a pleasant voice, and a habit of gesticulating slowly with one large and not too clean hand, that suggested the pulpit. He had led the way to a spacious verandah, where there were small tables and chairs, and at the outer corners orange trees in square green boxes. ‘We will have a bottle of wine—is it not so?—yes,’ he said, and gravely clapped his hands together to summon the waiter—an Oriental custom still in use in the Peninsula. The wine was brought and duly uncorked, during which ceremony the priest waited and watched with the preoccupied air of a host careful for the entertainment of his guest. He tasted the wine critically. ‘It might be worse,’ he said. ‘I beg you to excuse it not being better.’ There was something simple in the old man’s manner that won Conyngham’s regard. ‘The wine is excellent,’ he said. ‘It is my welcome to Spain.’