"The sand sticks to the skin like glue," Orsini commented in Spanish, brushing it off his feet. "And the mosquitoes!"
The high-pitched whining of the insects reminded Ramage that they had little time: trying to persuade an unsuspecting Spaniard of one's credentials while he had been in a room burning citronella candles and one's own face was puffy and gross-looking from stings, was making the job harder than necessary.
The two men walked to the back of the beach, stepped across a line of what Ramage knew only by their Italian name of Fico dei Ottentotti, and then found themselves walking on coarse grass. Almost immediately Ramage spotted the elaborate marble angels, Virgins and crucifixes surmounting the tombs of the cemetery about twenty yards away on their right.
Together they struck out for the far side, where they had to climb a low wall and almost immediately sighted a house.
Ramage touched Orsini as a warning and then said in a conversational tone, his accent rough Castilian: "San José should be just the other side."
A dog gave a disheartened bark and was promptly sworn at by someone in the house.
Ramage stopped. "Might as well ask here," he said. "There's the door."
As they walked along a short path the dog started barking despite the threats, and then yelped as it was obviously kicked. Ramage knocked on the door.
A man's querulous voice answered: "Who's there?"
"Visitors for Señor Perez."
"Not here," the voice said abruptly, without opening the door. "The house on the north side of the church."
"Thank you," Ramage said politely.
"I wish I had a pistol," Orsini muttered as soon as they had gone on a few yards.
"Oh yes," Ramage said sarcastically. "We need a few pistol shots to rouse out all the dogs in the neighbourhood, not to mention soldiery. What about a set of handbells?"
Orsini was still trying to think of an answer which combined wit and brevity without being insubordinate when they reached the church.
Ramage groaned, because the main square was on the north side of the church, with half a dozen large houses built round it.
"Our fellow is probably one of the leading citizens of Cadiz if he owns one of those houses," Orsini muttered.
Ramage stepped out towards the square, making no attempt to keep quiet. If there was a curfew - which he was beginning to doubt: the man in the house did not seem surprised, nor had he assumed that they were soldiers - then any patrol was probably on horseback.
Now there were town smells. Horse and donkey droppings ripened by hot sun, rotting cabbage, stale urine ... a scurry told of rats interrupted at supper . . . and which house to choose first?
He picked the third of the five forming the north side of the square. The house itself stood back behind a high-walled garden, and when he paused to see if another would be more convenient, he saw in the darkness that they all had walls and gates.
He rattled the wrought iron a few times. A dog in the house started barking and a moment later a woman's voice demanded: "Who is that at the gate?"
"Visitors for Señor Perez."
"Who are you?"
Was this - by an extraordinary piece of luck - the right house?
"Is this the house of Señor Perez?" Orsini inquired.
"It is," a man's voice answered, and Ramage guessed from his accent that he was a manservant.
"Tell Señor Perez he has visitors."
"What name shall I give, señor?"
"Lieutenant Leblond," Ramage said on the spur of the moment, giving both words a pronounced French accent.
"Please wait, Lieutenant," the voice said politely, "I will inform Señor Perez."
Did custom demand that one stamped a foot and demanded the gate be opened at once, in the name of the Emperor, and was this the way to treat the representative of Spain's ally - or did one wait quietly?
Ramage decided to wait quietly: he wanted to be face to face with Perez as soon as possible.
He saw a lantern at the door and then in its light a man walked along the path towards the gate. In one hand he held the lantern, in the other a large key.
The man - yes, he was dressed as a manservant: that much was clear in the light of the lantern - turned the key and pushed back the gate with his shoulder. "This way, if you please."
Galicia? Yes, Ramage was sure of the accent: thick, as though spoken through cloth. He followed the man, with Orsini strolling along beside him.
What would the man be thinking? Neither visitor was wearing a uniform - which ruled out an official call. While both men were young, and spoke perfect Spanish, at least one of them was French, from the way he spoke his name. French officers out of uniform, obviously . . .
They reached the front door up half a dozen steps, and entered the house. Yes, the bittersweet smell of citronella, and Ramage felt his face beginning to itch: the mosquitoes had not wasted their time but with luck the swelling would be delayed.
Marble floors, plenty of furniture in the hall (unusual in a Latin house), a dog growling from the room in which he had been shut, two open doors ... the room to which they were going was at the far end of the corridor, and the thump, thump of his and Orsini's boots contrasted with the shuffle of the manservant's slippers.
They reached a door which the manservant opened, standing back and saying in slightly more than a conversational tone: "Lieutenant Leblond and companion, sir." He gestured them to go into the room.
It was a large, high-ceilinged room with a tiled floor. On the far side a white-haired man sat at a table, a quill in his hand and obviously interrupted while writing, and a woman perhaps ten years younger but well dressed sat at a stool, embroidering. Two lamps in the room showed a man and wife spending a quiet evening, even if the harbour was filled with the ships of the Combined Fleet of France and Spain, and the British fleet was just over the horizon.
"Lieutenant Leblond?" the white-haired man inquired, and the woman looked up curiously.
Ramage bowed and said: "May I introduce my assistant, Lieutenant Poulain?"
Ramage listened for the door to close behind him as the white-haired man said politely, but obviously puzzled. "To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit, gentlemen? Do you come on the Emperor's business?"
Ramage heard the door shut behind him, and it was quite natural to continue walking into the room approaching the man sitting at the table.
"Not the Emperor's business," Ramage said in a quiet voice. "Can we talk alone?"
"I have no secrets from my wife," the man said calmly. "If not from the Emperor then, pray, from whom?"
Ramage gave him the message.
At the mention - with an unmistakable English accent - of the name of His Britannic Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, the white-haired man sprang to his feet.
"Should I know that name?" he asked in Spanish. "What makes you think that, Lieutenant Leblond?"
"Forgive me," Ramage said in English. "In fact my name is Ramage, Captain Ramage, and I command a frigate in Lord Nelson's fleet. The Secretary of State saw Lord Nelson in London recently. As a result, Lord Nelson gave me orders to seek out a Señor Perez near the church of San José, and mention the name you know."
"Tell me more: mistakes could put the garotte round my neck," Perez said, speaking quietly and in good English.
"About the minister? I know little about him. His title is fairly new - a barony ten or fifteen years ago. A man of middle height - I've seen him a few times in the House of Lords. Hair grey now, bald on the top, does not wear a wig . . . that's about all."
"What were you doing in the House of Lords, Captain?"
"My father is Admiral the Earl of Blazey, and I bear one of his titles (although I do not use it in the service for obvious reasons)."