I did as I was told, and he disappeared through a door. I was standing in a dreary hallway of gray granite, no tapestries, paintings, or any other ornament in evidence, and all that cold stone made me shiver. I shivered still more when the count reappeared and ordered me curtly to come in, for I found myself entering a long gallery with a painted ceiling and walls adorned with frescoes depicting scenes of war. The only furniture was a chair and a table containing writing implements. Along one wall there were nine windows that opened onto an inner courtyard, and the light from these windows lit up the fresco on the opposite wall, which showed Christian knights fighting Moors and recorded the battle in all its military detail. This was the first time I had entered the Hall of Battles, and I was far from imagining then that, in time, those paintings commemorating the victory at Higueruela, the battle of San Quintin, and the attack on the Azores would be as familiar to me as the rest of the royal palace when, years later, I was made lieutenant and then captain of King Philip IV’s guard. At that moment, however, the Inigo Balboa walking beside the Count of Guadalmedina was merely a frightened boy, incapable of appreciating the magnificent paintings decorating the gallery. My five senses were all focused on the imposing figure waiting at the far end, next to the last of the nine windows. He was a heavily built man, with a thick, closely trimmed beard and a fearsome mustache that grew bushier at the ends. He was wearing a costume made of brown lame with the green cross of Alcantara on his breast, and his large, powerful head sat on a thick neck barely contained by a starched ruff. As I approached, he fixed me with his dark, intelligent eyes, as threatening as two harquebuses; and at the time I am describing, those eyes could send a shudder of fear throughout the whole of Europe.
“This is the boy,” said Guadalmedina.
The count-duke, His Catholic Majesty’s favorite and adviser, nodded almost imperceptibly, without taking his eyes off me. In one hand he was holding a piece of paper, and in the other a cup of thick, hot chocolate.
“When is this Alatriste fellow supposed to arrive?” he asked Guadalmedina.
“At sunset, I believe. He has instructions to present himself here as soon as possible.”
Olivares leaned slightly toward me. Hearing him say my master’s name had left me speechless.
“Are you Inigo Balboa?”
I nodded, incapable of uttering a word, while I struggled to put my thoughts in order. In between sips of chocolate, the count-duke was reading aloud from the piece of paper he was holding: “. . . born in Onate, Guipuzcoa, the son of a soldier who died in Flanders, servant to Diego Alatriste y Tenorio, better known as Captain Alatriste, et cetera. A soldier’s page in the old Cartagena regiment. Present at the taking of Oudkerk, at the battles of Ruyter Mill and Terheyden, the siege of Breda . . .” After each Flemish name, he glanced up as if to compare the fact with my evident youth. “And before that, there had been an auto-da-fe in the Plaza Mayor in Madrid, in sixteen hundred and twenty-three.
“Ah, yes, I remember now,” he said, looking at me more attentively now, meanwhile putting his cup down on the table. “Some business with the Holy Office of the Inquisition.”
It was not at all reassuring to know that one’s biography was so precisely documented, and the memory of my brush with the Inquisition did nothing to calm my spirits. However, the question that followed transformed my bewilderment into panic.
“What happened in Camino de las Minillas?”
I looked at Alvaro de la Marca, who nodded reassuringly.
“You can speak openly to His Excellency,” he said. “He is fully informed.”
I continued to eye him suspiciously. When we met in Juan Vicuna’s gambling den, I had described to him the events of that ill-starred night on condition that he told no one until Captain Alatriste had spoken to him. The captain had not yet arrived; Guadalmedina, who was, after all, a courtier, had not played fair. Or perhaps he was merely covering his back.
“I don’t know anything about the captain,” I stammered.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Guadalmedina. “You were there with him and with the man who died. Tell His Excellency exactly what happened.”
I turned to the count-duke. He was still observing me with alarming fixity. That man bore on his shoulders the most powerful monarchy on earth; he could move whole armies across seas and mountains just by lifting an eyebrow. And there was I, trembling inside like a leaf and about to tell him no.
“No,” I said.
The count-duke blinked.
“Have you gone mad?” exclaimed Guadalmedina.
The count-duke still did not take his eyes off me, although his gaze seemed more curious now than angry.
“By my life, I’ll . . .” began Guadalmedina threateningly, taking a step toward me.
Olivares stopped him by making the very slightest of movements with his left hand. Then he glanced back at the piece of paper and folded it in four before putting it away.
“Why not?” he asked me.
He did so almost gently. I looked across at the windows and chimneys on the far side of the courtyard, at the blue-gray slate tiles lit by the setting sun. Then I shrugged my shoulders and said nothing.
“Ye gods,” said Guadalmedina, “I’ll make you loosen that tongue of yours.”
The count-duke again brought him up short, with that same slight gesture. He seemed to be able to see into every corner of my mind.
“He is, of course, your friend,” he said at last.
I nodded. After a moment, the count-duke nodded too.
“I understand,” he said.
He took a few steps about the gallery, stopping by a fresco that showed ranks of Spanish infantry, bristling with pikes, all grouped around the cross of San Andres, marching toward the enemy. Sword in hand, smeared with gunpowder, hoarse with shouting out the name of Spain, I, too, had once belonged to those ranks, I thought bitterly, as had Captain Alatriste. Despite that, there we were. I noticed that the count-duke saw that I was looking at the scene and read my thoughts. The hint of a smile softened his features.
“I believe your master is innocent,” he said. “You have my word.”
I studied the imposing figure standing before me. I had no illusions. I had some experience of life, and I knew perfectly well that the kindness being shown to me by the most powerful man in Spain—indeed, in the world—was nothing but a highly intelligent ploy, as one would expect from a man capable of applying all his talents to the vast enterprise that was his one obsession: that of making his nation great, Catholic, and powerful, and defending it on land and sea against English, French, Dutch, Turks, against the world in general, for the Spanish empire was so vast and so feared that other countries could hope to achieve their own ambitions only at the expense of ours. As far as the count-duke was concerned, such an enterprise justified any means. I realized that he would use the same measured, patient tone were he issuing the order to have me quartered alive, and, if it came to that, he would do so with no more qualms than he would have about squashing a fly. I was merely the humblest of pawns on the complex chessboard where Gaspar de Guzman, Count-Duke of Olivares, was playing the very dangerous game of being the king’s favorite. Much later on, when life again placed me in his path, I was able to confirm that while our king’s all-powerful favorite never hesitated to sacrifice as many pawns as might prove necessary, he never let go of a piece, however modest, as long as he believed it could be useful to him.
Anyway, that afternoon in the Hall of Battles, I saw that every path was blocked, and so I plucked up my courage. After all, Guadalmedina would only have passed on what I had confided to him, nothing more. There was no harm in repeating that. As for the rest, including Angelica de Alquezar’s role in the conspiracy, that was another matter entirely. Guadalmedina could not talk about what he did not know, and I—for in my youthful chivalry I was ingenuous in the extreme—would not be the one to utter the name of my lady in the presence of the count- duke.
“Don Alvaro de la Marca,” I said, “has told Your Excellency the truth . . .”
At that point, I suddenly realized what the count-duke’s first words meant, and the realization troubled me greatly: Captain Alatriste’s journey to El Escorial was not a secret. He and Guadalmedina both knew about it, and I wondered who else might know, and wondered, too, if that information—for bad news travels faster than good—had also reached the ears of our enemies.
