I was stretched out in a gateway of the Calle de la Albardería, shaking with cold, my left hand wrapped in a bloody, dirty cloth. The fever burned me, and I longed for strength to hasten to the front. They were not all corpses beside me. I reached out my hand and touched the arm of a friend who was still living.
“What is going on, Señor Sursum Corda?”
“It seems that the French are on this side of the Coso,” he answered me, in a feeble voice. “They have blown up half of the city. May be we shall have to surrender. The Captain-General has fallen ill with the epidemic, and is in the Calle de Predicadores. They think he is going to die. The French will enter. I rejoice that I shall die before I see that. How do you find yourself, Señor de Araceli?”
“Very bad off. I will see if I can get up.”
“I am alive yet, it seems. I did not think I should be. The Lord be with me, I shall go straight to heaven. Señor de Araceli, have you died yet?”
I got up and took a few steps. Leaning against the walls, I advanced a little and came to the Orphanage. Some military officers of high rank were accompanying a short, slender ecclesiastic to the door, who dismissed them, saying, “We have done our duty, and human strength can compass nothing more.” It was Father Basilio. A friendly arm held me up, and I recognized Don Roque.
“Gabriel, my friend,” he said to me, in deep affliction, “the city surrenders this very day.”
“What city?”
“This.”
As he said so, it seemed to me as if nothing remained in its place. Men and houses all ran together confusedly. The Torre Nueva seemed to draw