"The man started to speak but his throat was dry from all that stone dust; his voice failed him. So he grabbed up a large rock, squeezed it the way you squeezed Igli—forced water out of it as if it had been a goatskin, drank. Then he said, ‘Not me, my friend. He's strong, as everyone knows. Why, many is the time that I have seen him insert his little finger—‘ "
My mind was distracted from this string of lies by a wench pitching hay just across the ditch from the road. She had remarkable pectoral muscles and a lava-lava just suited her. She saw me eyeing her and gave me the eye right back, with a wiggle tossed in.
"You were saying?" I asked.
"Eh? ‘—just to the first joint...and hold himself at arm's length for hours!"
"Rufo," I said, "I don't believe it could have been more than a few minutes. Strain on the tissues, and so forth."
"Boss," he answered in a hurt tone, "I could take you to the very spot where the Mighty Dugan used to perform this stunt."
"You said his name was Muldoon."
"He was a Dugan on his mother's side, very proud of her he was. You'll be pleased to know, milord, that the boundary of the Doral's land is now in sight. Lunch in minutes only."
"I can use it. With a gallon of anything, even water."
"Passed by acclamation. Truthfully, milord, I'm not at my best today. I need food and drink and a long siesta before the fighting starts, or I'll yawn when I should parry. Too large a night."
"I didn't see you at the banquet."
"I was there in spirit. In the kitchen the food is hotter, the choice is better, and the company less formal. But I had no intention of making a night of it. Early to bed is my motto. Moderation in all things. Epictetus. But the pastry cook—Well, she reminds me of another girl I once knew, my partner in a legitimate business, smuggling. But her motto was that anything worth doing at all is worth overdoing—and she did. She smuggled on top of smuggling, a sideline of her own unmentioned to me and not taken into account—for I was listing every item with the customs officers, a copy with the bribe, so that they would know I was honest.
"But a girl can't walk through the gates fat as a stuffed goose and walk back through them twenty minutes later skinny as the figure one—not that she was, just a manner of speaking—without causing thoughtful glances. If it hadn't been for the strange thing the dog did in the night, the busies would have nabbed us."
"What was the strange thing the dog did in the night?"
"Just what I was doing last night. The noise woke us and we were out over the roof and free, but with nothing to show for six months' hard work but skinned knees. But that pastry cook—You saw her, milord. Brown hair, blue eyes, a widow's peak and the rest remarkably like Sophia Loren."
"I have a vague memory of someone like that."
"Then you didn't see her, there is nothing vague about Nalia. As may be, I had intended to lead the life sanitary last night, knowing that there would be bloodshed today. You know:
‘Once at night and outen the light;
‘Once in the morning, a new day a-borning'
"—as the Scholar advised. But I hadn't reckoned with Nalia. So here I am with no sleep and no breakfast and if I'm dead before nightfall in a pool of my own blood, it'll be partly Nalia's doing."
"I'll shave your corpse, Rufo; that's a promise." We had passed the marker into the next county but Star didn't slow down. "Bye the bye, where did you learn the undertakers trade?"
"The what? Oh! That was a far place indeed. The top of that rise, behind those trees, is a house and that's where we'll be having lunch. Nice people."
"Good!" The thought of lunch was a bright spot as I was again regretting my Boy Scout behavior of the night before. "Rufo, you had it all wrong about the strange thing the dog did in the night."
"Milord?"
"The dog did nothing in the night, that was the strange thing."
"Well, it certainly didn't sound that way," Rufo said doubtfully.
"Another dog, another far place. Sorry. What I started to say was: A funny thing happened to me on the way to bed last night—and I did lead the life sanitary."
"Indeed, milord?"
"In deed, if not in thought." I needed to tell somebody and Rufo was the sort of scoundrel I could trust. I told him the Story of the Three Bares.
"I should have risked it," I concluded. "And, swelp me, I would have, if that lad had been put to bed—alone—when she should have been. Or I think I would have, regardless of White Shotgun or jumping out windows. Rufo, why do the prettiest gals always have fathers or husbands? But I tell you the truth, there they were—the Big Bare, the Middle-Sized Bare, and the Littlest Bare, close enough to touch and all of them anxious to keep my bed warm—and I didn't do a damn thing! Go ahead and laugh. I deserve it."
He didn't laugh. I turned to look at him and his expression was piteous. "Milord! Oscar my comrade! Tell me it isn't true!"
"It is true," I said huffily. "And I regretted it at once. Too late. And you complained about your night!"
"Oh, my Cod!" He threw his mount into high gear and took off. Ars Longa looked back inquiringly over her shoulder, then continued on.
Rufo caught up with Star; they stopped, short of the house where lunch was to be expected. They waited and I joined them. Star was wearing no expression; Rufo looked unbearably embarrassed.
Star said, "Rufo, go beg lunch for us. Fetch it here. I would speak with milord alone."
"Yes, milady!" He got out fast.
Star said to me, still with no expression, "Milord Hero, is this true? What your groom reports to me?"
"I don't know what he reported."
"It concerned your failure—your alleged failure—last night."
"I don't know what you mean by ‘failure.' If you want to know what I did after the banquet...I slept alone. Period."
She sighed but her expression did not change. "I wanted to hear it from your lips. To be just." Then her expression did change and I have never seen such anger. In a low almost passionless voice she began chewing me out:
"You hero. You incredible butter-brained dolt. Clumsy, bumbling, loutish, pimple-peeked, underdone, over-muscled, idiotic—"
"Stop it!"
"Quiet, I am not finished with you. Insulting three innocent ladies offending a staunch—"
"SHUT UP!!!"
The blast blew her hair back. I started in before she could rev up again. "Don't ever again speak to me that way. Star. Never."
"But—"
"Hold your tongue, you bad-tempered brat! You have not earned the right to speak to me that way. Nor will any girl ever earn the right. You will always—always! -- address me politely and with respect. One more word of your nasty rudeness and I'll spank you until the tears fly."
"You wouldn't dare!"
"Get your hand away from that sword or I'll take it away from you, down your pants right here on the road, and spank you with it. Till your arse is red and you beg for mercy. Star, I do not fight females—but I do punish naughty children. Ladies I treat as ladies. Spoiled brats I treat as spoiled brats. Star, you could be the Queen of England and the Galactic Overlord all rolled into one—but ONE MORE WORD out of line from you, and down come your tights and you won't be able to sit for a week. Understand me?"
At last she said in a small voice, "I understand, milord."
"And besides that. I'm resigning from the hero business. I won't listen to such talk twice, I won't work for a person who treats me that way even once." I sighed, realizing that I had just lost my corporal's stripes again. But I always felt easier and freer without them.