Indignation, amusement, concern for the evident idiocy of his chum would be expressed in his retort had he been there to make one. But he wasn't, more's the pity. And to our hero the amusing, idiotic side of his thoughts, if so you care to term it, was a source of no more than passing interest. He began to check certain matters over on the tips of his fingers. He nodded his head knowingly, and then, of a sudden, he looked up. For the door yonder had opened. Now it banged to with a crash. A step was coming along the passage. A key was thrust into the lock, and presently the man who was to supply him with food, and, later, with writing implements and paper, was pushing his way into his prison. In a moment he would stoop to cut those lashings which now were not in existence. In a moment, in fact, the cat would be out of the bag. Tom braced his muscles for a struggle. CHAPTER XIX Tom Thinks Furiously The man who had entered Tom's prison, the one whom his irregulars had captured outside Ciudad Rodrigo, and in whose clothes our hero had made his venture into the fortress, pushed the door to with his toe, and, stooping, deposited a wooden tray in the centre of the room, on the identical spot so lately occupied by the rickety and creaking chair of the fat rascal who had been so free with his promises and his pistol. "Food and drink," he said, as he stood upright. "Ah, I had forgotten the comrade! He, too, perhaps, would care for something. Then I must get the key. Eduardo has it. Yes, that is what I shall do. Then there is the pen and ink and paper, and later----" "The friend," smiled Tom, watching the fellow like a cat. "The little friend, comrade, whom you will marry when you have made this fortune." The fellow grinned; he liked the wit of the English staff officer. It flattered his vanity to be chaffed about this little matter of which he was inordinately proud. Yes, it pleased him distinctly--this prisoner was quite an amiable fellow. "Ho, ho!" he laughed. "Wait till you are one of us. But, remember, fine feathers make fine birds. You will have no gaudy uniforms. In matters such as this with us it is a case of the man alone. It is personality that tells." Tom would have laughed at his stupid vanity at another time. But there he was, all strung up for the struggle which he knew to be inevitable, waiting and waiting. And how can a man, or a youth for the matter of that, conjure up an easy smile under such circumstances? "Yes, it is always the man himself who makes the running," said this fellow. "But I will take food to your comrade, and then for the rest." He was wool-gathering, this spy. Even spies, we suppose, have their amorous moments and their gentler passions. This man was so taken up with the thought of the outing he was to have that he was actually pulling the door open and leaving without a thought as to the condition of his prisoner. Of what use food and drink when a man's hands were supposed to be fast bound behind him?