Short Fiction

with drinking, and his breath was thick, and he sat with his head between his hands. For he had drunk the blood-red wine sitting all alone through the mght, laughing, as he quaffed down goblet after goblet, at the discomfiture of the lord of Mountfidget. “Rinderpest, indeed!” he had said. “He that cometh hither empty-handed is likely to return a-dry. Ho! there, butler! another stoup of Malvoisie, and let it be that with the yellow seal.” But in the morning he had called for a cool tankard, and now he demanded his daughter’s presence, that she might pour for him the cup which cheers but not inebriates. “Where is the Lady Euphemia? Why tarries the Lady Euphemia?” But the attendants answered him never a word. Then he called again. “Why cometh not my child to pour for her father the beverage which he loves? Now, by cock and pie, an that old greybeard detain her, he shall hence from the mullioned chamber⁠—and that with a flea in each ear.” But still they answered him not a word. Then he up with the tankard from which he had taken his morning’s brewst, and flung it at the menial’s head. “Thou churl, thou sot, thou knave, thou clod! why answerest thou not thy liege and lord?” But the menial put his hands to his bruised head, and still answered he never a word.

Then there entered Dame Ulrica, a poor and aged cousin of the house, who went abroad to dances and to tea-parties with the gentle Euphemia. “An please you, my lord count,” said dame Ulrica, “Euphemuia has fled this morning by the small wicket which leads from beneath the west barbican into the forest, and Alasco the Wise has gone with her.”

Then the Count Grandnostrel stood up in his wrath, and sat down in his wrath, and stood up in his wrath once again. “That tankard full of gold pieces,” said he, “to him who shall bring me the greybeard’s head!”

Then the archers twanged their bows, and the men-at-arms sharpened their sabres, and the volunteers looked to their rifles, and the drummers drummed, and the fifers fifed, and they let down the drawbridge, and they went forth in pursuit of the wise Alasco and the gentle Euphemia.

“By cock and pie,” said the Count Grandnostrel, “an it be as I expect, and that sorry knave from Mountfidget is at the bottom of this⁠—”

“In that case it will be meetest, my lord, that she should be his wife,” said the Dame Ulrica, who was riding on a palfrey at his right hand. And when she spoke the ancient virtue of the old race was to be seen in her eye, and might be heard in her voice.

“Thou sayest well, dame,” answered the count.

“And the lord of Mountfidget has beeves and swine numerous as the stars, and ready money in many banks,” said Dame Ulrica. For Dame Ulrica was not virtuous only, but prudent also.

“By cock and pie thou sayest sooth,” said the Count Grandnostrel. And as they had now reached the Fiery Nostril, a hostel that standeth on the hill overlooking the olive gardens of the castle, the count called loudly for the landlord’s ale. “By cock and pie this is dry work,” said the Count Grandnostrel. “But we will squeeze Mountfidget drier before we have done with him.”

Then the menials laughed, and the potbellied landlord swayed his huge paunch hither and thither, as he shook his sides with merriment. “Faix, and it is my lord the count is ever ready with his joke,” said the landlord.

So they paid for the beer and rode on.

V

“A breathing but devoted warrior lay.
T’was Lara bleeding fast from life away.”

Byron

In the upper chamber of a small cottage, covered with ivy and vines, lay the lord of Mountfidget, hurt unto death. For one of the arrows had touched him on the nape of the neck, and the point had been dipped in the oil of strychnine. And there leaned over his couch a widow, watching him from moment to moment, touching his lips ever and anon with orange juice mixed with brandy, and wiping the clammy dew from his cold brow. “Lord of Mountfidget,” she said, “when my dear husband was torn from my widowed arms, thy father gave unto the poor widow this cottage. Would I could repay the debt with my heart’s blood.”

“Aha! alas! alack! and well-a-day,” said the young lord. “Nought can repay me now⁠—either interest or principal. All my money at all the banks cannot prolong my life one hour. No, nor my beeves and swine, though they outnumber the stars of heaven, and are fatter than a butter-tub. It is all up with poor Mountfidget.”

“Nay; say not so, my lord. If only I could reach the wise man that liveth in the mullioned chamber of the north tower, he hath a medicine that might yet be of avail.”

Then Mountfidget demanded who was the wise man, and where was the mullioned chamber of the north tower; and when he learned that aid could be had only from the Castle of Grandnostrel, he sighed amain, and sighed again, and then thus he addressed the widow; “Ay, help from Grandnostrel;⁠—yes; but not such aid as that. I want no greybearded senior to rack my dying brains with wise saws; but, if it might be given me to let my eyes rest but once on the form of the gentle Euphemia, methinks I could die contented.”

Then the door of the chamber was opened, and there entered a young page, whose slashed doublet and silken hose were foul with the mud of many lanes, and the dirt of the forest clung to his short cloak, and his hair was wet with the dropping of the leaves, and his cap was crushed and his jacket was torn. “He is here! he is here!” said the page. “I have followed him by his blood through the forest.” Then the page fell at the bed-foot, and