The news might well make me grave. It was into this hornets’ nest I had to follow Sarita, and in following her had to take the double risk of danger from both sides. If the police agents identified me, I should be clapped into gaol by them as the dangerous revolutionary, Ferdinand Carbonnell; while the Carlists might very probably hold me for a spy and a traitor, the proper mark for either bullet or dagger. But go to Saragossa and on to Daroca, aye, and on to the end of the world, I would, if necessary, and if I could get there, in search of Sarita; and, putting down the paper, I picked up the railway guide to find the route and the train time. Then came a very pertinent and unpleasant reminder of the difficulties ahead of me. Chancing to glance into the street, I saw three men in earnest conversation close to the door, and recognised two of them; Senor Rubio, the official who had been at Quesada’s house the night before, and the man who had come in search of me to the Hotel de l’Opera. The third was a stranger. They stood for two or three minutes talking earnestly, and when they parted, the two I knew went together hurriedly toward the railway. I sauntered to the door and watched them enter the station, after exchanging a word with one or two men standing about in front of the building. How could I hope to get away unrecognised, was my perplexed thought as I returned to my table. These men knew me personally, and had spoken to me; one of them had my photograph, and I did not doubt that it had been reproduced by the hundred and distributed among the police spies. Quesada was not the man to do things by halves, and this Rubio was no doubt both a willing and clever agent. Still, the attempt must be made, and if they laid hold of me I must rely on the Embassy or the palace to procure my liberty; and I turned up Daroca in the guide. It was a beast of a place to get at and there was no train for some hours. It was the terminus of a loop-line some forty odd miles south of Saragossa, and could only be reached by going to that place first. It seemed to be a sort of _cul-de-sac_ with the mountains all about it—just the place of all others in the country that would be most difficult to reach, and having been reached, probably a hundred times worse to leave. As I realised the inaccessibility of the spot, and the proportionate increase in my difficulties and risks, my irritation and chagrin found vent in a curse which paradoxically proved most providential. "Damn the place," I exclaimed aloud, heartily, as I tossed the book on the table. "That’s just the sweetest word I’ve heard to-day, and if it is anything to do with the railway, sir, I’d like to join you in the curse." The speaker was a florid, flabby-faced, square-shouldered, middle-aged man, who was sitting at the other end of my table, and received my look of surprised and somewhat intolerant protest at his interruption, with a broad, good-natured, knowing smile.