The Pixilated Peeress Read Free Page B

Trongai?"
     
                  "What befell him?"
     
                  "As a result of untimely misfortunes, he found him self unable to pay his servants to man the castle. In deed, he could not even buy sufficient food to feed his family. So he donned a bogus beard, went to town, and persuaded the local taverner to hire him as bartender.
     
                  "All went well until one day a drunken customer, seeking a quarrel, remarked on the barke ep's piggy eyes and other features that the fellow deemed obnoxious. Count Helfram, unused to insolence, slapped the man's face, whereupon the drunkard seized the false beard and tore it off.
     
                  "The other folk recognized their Count and rose as one to hurl the drunkard into the street. But the tale took wings, until the King of Carinthia, hearing the rumor, ruled that Helfram had forfeited his rank, and the king appointed a new Count from another branch of the family. The last I heard, poor Helfram was sti l l tending bar at the tavern, whither people came from afar to gape at a nobleman toiling like a commoner."
     
                  "Then," said Thorolf cheerfully, "I count myself lucky to have no noble rank to lose. We must hasten, for the dragon wing of night o'erspreads the earth, as saith the man in Helmanax's play."
     
                  He heeled his horse to stir the beast to further effort. After they had ridden in silence for a time, Yvette con tinued:
     
                  "At all events, I would never marry a Rhaetian. You're an unromantic lot, whose only k nights are those little tin figurines that pop out of your clocks to mark the hours. None could essay the doughty deeds of ro mances."
     
                  Thorolf laughed. "Suppose a knight engaged in such deeds in this modern world! If he slew a dragon, he'd be arrested by the game warden for hunting out of sea son, as I believe once truly befell a Locanian knight in Pathenia, not long ago. If he snatched a maiden from an enchanter vile, the mage would hale him to law on charges of abduction. If he even sang a roundelay be neath his true love's casement window, the song's com poser would demand a royalty."
     
                  "A typical Rhaetian argument," retorted Yvette, "mired in base practicality! A sorry world we live in!" After a pause she asked: "For what goal, pray, do you strive?"
     
                  Thorolf frowned thoughtfully. "To settle, once and for all, the authorship of the Tyrrhenian play, Il Bast-mento dai Pazzi, doubtfully attributed to Goldinu."
     
                  "You would waste your life in thumbing dusty manu scripts to settle some obscure pedantic dispute?"
     
                  Thorolf shrugged. "To me it's more fun than standing daily in the drill yard and bawling at my company: 'About — face! Forward — march! Hartmund, get in step!' "
     
                  "Either were better than turning brigand, I ween," she said. "But this merely reinforces my point: that you are a typical stolid, avaricious, unromantic Rhaetian. As a noblewoman's consort, you'd be as out of place as a pig in a horse race."
     
                  "Avaricious?" Thorolf gave his most irritating chuckle. "My sire complains that I be not mercenary enough. And whilst we're trading flatteries, as a wife you'd be as useful to a soldier as slippers to a serpent. I fear, my dear Countess, you'll search the wide world over without finding your notion of a suitab l e spouse."
     
                  Yvette sighed. "Whilst I loathe to concede a point, you may be right. Many I've seen with one or another of my qualifications, but never one who met all. Me-thought I'd found my mate in a handsome troubadour who boasted blue blood and showed a promising grasp of county management; but he soon moved on."
     
                  "The scurvy lown!"