SENTINEL [incredulously] “Wives!” Oh, not to-day! I have heard such titles of courtesy afore; but they never shake me. “W” begins other female words than “wives!”--You'll have trouble, good dames, to get into Salamanca to-night. You'll be challenged all the way down, and shot without clergy if you can't give the countersign. MRS. PRESCOTT Then surely you'll tell us what it is, good kind man! SENTINEL Well--have ye earned enough to pay for knowing? Government wage is poor pickings for watching here in the rain. How much can ye stand? MRS. DALBIAC Half-a-dozen pesetas. SENTINEL Very well, my dear. I was always tender-hearted. Come along. [They advance and hand the money.] The pass to-night is “Melchester Steeple.” That will take you into the town when the weather clears. You won't have to cross the ford. You can get temporary shelter in the shed there. [As the ladies move towards the shed the tramp of the infantry draws near the ford, which the downfall has made to purl more boisterously. The twain enter the shed, and the dragoons look up inquiringly.] MRS. DALBIAC [to dragoons] The French are luckier than you are, men. You'll have a wet advance across this ford, but they have a dry retreat by the bridge at Alba. SERGEANT OF PATROL [starting from a doze] The moustachies a dry retreat? Not they, my dear. A Spanish garrison is in the castle that commands the bridge at Alba. MRS. DALBIAC A peasant told us, if we understood rightly, that he saw the Spanish withdraw, and the enemy place a garrison there themselves. [The sergeant hastily calls up two troopers, who mount and ride off with the intelligence.] SERGEANT You've done us a good turn, it is true, darlin'. Not that Lord Wellington will believe it when he gets the news.... Why, if my eyes don't deceive me, ma'am, that's Colonel Dalbiac's lady! MRS. DALBIAC Yes, sergeant. I am over here with him, as you have heard, no doubt, and lodging in Salamanca. We lost our way, and got caught in the storm, and want shelter awhile. SERGEANT Certainly, ma'am. I'll give you an escort back as soon as the division has crossed and the weather clears. MRS. PRESCOTT [anxiously] Have you heard, sergeant, if there's to be a battle to-morrow? SERGEANT Yes, ma'am. Everything shows it. MRS. DAlBIAC [to MRS. PRESCOTT] Our news would have passed us in. We have wasted six pesetas. MRS. PRESCOTT [mournfully] I don't mind that so much as that I have brought the children from Ireland. This coming battle frightens me! SPIRIT OF THE YEARS This is her prescient pang of widowhood. Ere Salamanca clang to-morrow's close She'll find her consort stiff among the slain!