tie the twigs together.'
Jurgen did this, and laid upon the trapdoor a recognizable crucifix. 'Still, when anyone raises the trapdoor whatever lies upon it will fall off. Without disparaging the potency of your charm, I cannot but observe that in this case it is peculiarly difficult to handle. Magician or no, I would put heartier faith in a stout padlock.'
So the girl tore another strip, from the hem of her gown, and then another from her right sleeve, and with these they fastened their cross to the surface of the trapdoor, in such a fashion that the twigs could not be dislodged from beneath. They mounted the fine steed whose bridle was marked with a coronet, the girl riding pillion, and they turned westward, since the girl said this was best.
For, as she now told Jurgen, she was Guenevere, the daughter of Gogyrvan, King of Glathion and the Red Islands. So Jurgen told her he was the Duke of Logreus, because he felt it was not appropriate for a pawnbroker to be rescuing princesses: and he swore, too, that he would restore her safely to her father, whatever Thragnar might attempt. And all the story of her nefarious capture and imprisonment by King Thragnar did Dame Guenevere relate to Jurgen, as they rode together through the pleasant May morning.
She considered the Troll King could not well molest them. 'For now you have his charmed sword, Caliburn, the only weapon with which Thragnar can be slain. Besides, the sign of the cross he cannot pass. He beholds and trembles.'
'My dear Princess, he has but to push up the trapdoor from beneath, and the cross, being tied to the trapdoor, is promptly moved out of his way. Failing this expedient, he can always come out of the cave by the other opening, through which I entered. If this Thragnar has any intelligence at all and a reasonable amount of tenacity, he will presently be at hand.'
'Even so, he can do no harm unless we accept a present from him. The difficulty is that he will come in disguise.'
'Why, then, we will accept gifts from nobody.'
'There is, moreover, a sign by which you may distinguish Thragnar. For if you deny what he says, he will promptly concede you are in the right. This was the curse put upon him by Miramon Lluagor, for a detection and a hindrance.'
'By that unhuman trait,' says Jurgen, 'Thragnar ought to be very easy to distinguish.'
10. Pitiful Disguises of Thragnar
Next, the tale tells that as Jurgen and the Princess were nearing Gihon, a man came riding toward them, full armed in black, and having a red serpent with an apple in its mouth painted upon his shield.
'Sir knight,' says he, speaking hollowly from the closed helmet, 'you must yield to me that lady.'
'I think,' says Jurgen, civilly, 'that you are mistaken.'
So they fought, and presently, since Caliburn was a resistless weapon, and he who wore the scabbard of Caliburn could not be wounded, Jurgen prevailed; and gave the strange knight so heavy a buffet that the knight fell senseless.
'Do you think,' says Jurgen, about to unlace his antagonist's helmet, 'that this is Thragnar?'
'There is no possible way of telling,' replied Dame Guenevere: 'if it is the Troll King he should have offered you gifts, and when you contradicted him he should have admitted you were right. Instead, he proffered nothing, and to contradiction he answered nothing, so that proves nothing.'
'But silence is a proverbial form of assent. At all events, we will have a look at him.'
'But that too will prove nothing, since Thragnar goes about his mischiefs so disguised by enchantments as invariably to resemble somebody else, and not himself at all.'
'Such dishonest habits introduce an element of uncertainty, I grant you,' says Jurgen. 'Still, one can rarely err by keeping on the safe side. This person is, in any event, a very ill-bred fellow, with probably immoral intentions. Yes, caution is the main thing, and in justice to ourselves we will keep on the safe side.'
So without unloosing the helmet, he struck off the strange knight's head, and left him thus. The Princess was now mounted on the horse of their deceased assailant.
'Assuredly,' says Jurgen then, 'a magic sword is a fine thing, and a very necessary equipment, too, for a knight errant of my age.'
'But you talk as though you were an old man, Messire de Logreus!'
'Come now,' thinks Jurgen, 'this is a princess of rare discrimination. What, after all, is forty-and-something when one is well-preserved? This uncommonly intelligent girl reminds me a little of Marcoueve, whom I loved in Artein: besides, she does not look at me as women look at an elderly man. I like this princess, in fact, I adore this princess. I wonder now what would she say if I told her as much?'
But Jurgen did not tempt chance that time, for just then they encountered a boy who had frizzed hair and painted cheeks. He walked mincingly, in a curious garb of black bespangled with gold lozenges, and he carried a gilded dung fork.
Then Jurgen and the Princess came to a black and silver pavilion standing by the roadside. At the door of the pavilion was an apple-tree in blossom: from a branch of this tree was suspended a black hunting-horn, silver- mounted. A woman waited there alone. Before her was a chess-board, with the ebony and silver pieces set ready for a game, and upon the table to her left hand glittered flagons and goblets of silver. Eagerly this woman rose and came toward the travellers.
'Oh, my dear Jurgen,' says she, 'but how fine you look in that new shirt you are wearing! But there was never a man had better taste in dress, as I have always said: and it is long I have waited for you in this pavilion, which belongs to a black gentleman who seems to be a great friend of yours. And he went into Crim Tartary this morning, with some missionaries, by the worst piece of luck, for I know how sorry he will be to miss you, dear. Now, but I am forgetting that you must be very tired and thirsty, my darling, after your travels. So do you and the young lady have a sip of this, and then we will be telling one another of our adventures.'
For this woman had the appearance of Jurgen's wife, Dame Lisa, and of none other.
Jurgen regarded her with two minds. 'You certainly seem to be Lisa. But it is a long while since I saw Lisa in such an amiable mood.'
'You must know,' says she, still smiling, 'that I have learned to appreciate you since we were separated.'
'The fiend who stole you from me may possibly have brought about that wonder. None the less, you have met me riding at adventure with a young woman. And you have assaulted neither of us, you have not even raised your voice. No, quite decidedly, here is a miracle beyond the power of any fiend.'
'Ah, but I have been doing a great deal of thinking, Jurgen dear, as to our difficulties in the past. And it seems to me that you were almost always in the right.'
Guenevere nudged Jurgen. 'Did you note that? This is certainly Thragnar in disguise.'
'I am beginning to think that at all events it is not Lisa.' Then Jurgen magisterially cleared his throat. 'Lisa, if you indeed be Lisa, you must understand I am through with you. The plain truth is that you tire me. You talk and talk: no woman breathing equals you at mere volume and continuity of speech: but you say nothing that I have not heard seven hundred and eighty times if not oftener.'
'You are perfectly right, my dear,' says Dame Lisa, piteously. 'But then I never pretended to be as clever as you.'
'Spare me your beguilements, if you please. And besides, I am in love with this princess. Now spare me your recriminations, also, for you have no real right to complain. If you had stayed the person whom I promised the priest to love, I would have continued to think the world of you. But you did nothing of the sort. From a cuddlesome and merry girl, who thought whatever I did was done to perfection, you elected to develop into an uncommonly plain and short-tempered old woman.' And Jurgen paused. 'Eh?' said he, 'and did you not do this?'
Dame Lisa answered sadly: 'My dear, you are perfectly right, from your way of thinking. However, I could not very well help getting older.'
'But, oh, dear me!' says Jurgen, 'this is astonishingly inadequate impersonation, as any married man would see at once. Well, I made no contract to love any such plain and short-tempered person. I repudiate the claims of
