* A cafe to which a depot of ice, or rather of snow, is
     attached.  There is hardly a village in Spain without its
     neveria.

“What clever inventions you foreigners do have!  What country do you belong to, sir?  You’re an Englishman, no doubt!"*

     * Every traveller in Spain who does not carry about samples
     of calicoes and silks is taken for an Englishman
     (inglesito).  It is the same thing in the East.

“I’m a Frenchman, and your devoted servant.  And you, senora, or senorita, you probably belong to Cordova?”

“No.”

“At all events, you are an Andalusian?  Your soft way of speaking makes me think so.”

“If you notice people’s accent so closely, you must be able to guess what I am.”

“I think you are from the country of Jesus, two paces out of Paradise.”

I had learned the metaphor, which stands for Andalusia, from my friend Francisco Sevilla, a well-known picador.

“Pshaw!  The people here say there is no place in Paradise for us!”

“Then perhaps you are of Moorish blood—­or——­” I stopped, not venturing to add “a Jewess.”

“Oh come!  You must see I’m a gipsy!  Wouldn’t you like me to tell you la baji?* Did you never hear tell of Carmencita?  That’s who I am!”

* Your fortune.

I was such a miscreant in those days—­now fifteen years ago—­that the close proximity of a sorceress did not make me recoil in horror.  “So be it!” I thought.  “Last week I ate my supper with a highway robber.  To-day I’ll go and eat ices with a servant of the devil.  A traveller should see everything.”  I had yet another motive for prosecuting her acquaintance.  When I left college—­I acknowledge it with shame—­I had wasted a certain amount of time in studying occult science, and had even attempted, more than once, to exorcise the powers of darkness.  Though I had been cured, long since, of my passion for such investigations, I still felt a certain attraction and curiosity with regard to all superstitions, and I was delighted to have this opportunity of discovering how far the magic art had developed among the gipsies.

Talking as we went, we had reached the neveria, and seated ourselves at a little table, lighted by a taper protected by a glass globe.  I then had time to take a leisurely view of my gitana, while several worthy individuals, who were eating their ices, stared open-mouthed at beholding me in such gay company.

I very much doubt whether Senorita Carmen was a pure-blooded gipsy.  At all events, she was infinitely prettier than any other woman of her race I have ever seen.  For a women to be beautiful, they say in Spain, she must fulfil thirty ifs, or, if it please you better, you must be able to define her appearance by ten adjectives, applicable to three portions of her person.