“However, in this unknown region,” Coth reflected, “there are, doubtless, a large number of unknown gods. They may not amount to much, but Dame Abonde has taught me that in religious matters a traveler loses nothing by civility.”
Coth knelt. He tendered fealty, and he prayed to this image for protection in his search for his lost liege-lord. Coth heard a voice saying:
“Your homage is accepted. Your prayers are granted.”
Coth looked upward, still kneeling. Coth saw that the huge black image regarded him with living eyes, and that the mouth of this image was now of moving purple flesh.
“Your prayers are granted, full measure,” the image continued, “because you are the first person of your pallid color and peculiar clothing to come over the edge of the map and worship me. Such enterprise in piety ought to be rewarded: and I shall reward it, prodigally. Bald-headed man with long mustaches, I promise you, upon the oath of the Star Warriors, even by the Word of the Tzitzi-Mime, that you shall rule over all the country of Tollan. So that is settled: and now do you tell me who you are.”
“I am Coth of the Rocks, the Alderman of St. Didol. I followed Dom Manuel of Poictesme, about whom the poets nowadays are telling so many outrageous lies. I followed him, that is, until he rode westward to a far place beyond the sunset. Now I still follow him, since to do that was my oath: and I have come into the West, not to rule over this outlandish place, but to get news of my master, and to fetch him back into Poictesme.”
“You will get no such news from me, for I never heard of this Manuel.”
“Why, then, whatever sort of deity can you be!”
“I am Yaotl, the Capricious Lord, the Enemy upon Both Sides. This is my Place of the Dead: but I have everywhere power in this land, and I shall have all power in this land when once I have driven out the Feathered Serpent.”
“Then let me tell you, Messire Yaotl, you might very profitably add to this power at least such knowledge as is common to the run of civilized persons. It is not becoming in any deity never to have heard of my liege-lord Dom Manuel, who was the greatest of all captains, and who founded the Fellowship of the Silver Stallion, of which I had the honor to be a member. Such ignorance appears strange in anybody. In a deity it is perfectly preposterous.”
“I was only saying—”
“Stop interrupting me! What sort of god are you, who break in upon the devotional exercises of people when they are actually upon their knees! It is my custom, sir, whenever I go into a foreign country, to be civil to the gods of that country; and I am thus quite familiar with the behavior appropriate to a deity in such circumstances. When people pray to you, you ought to exhibit more repose of manner and a certain well-bred reticence.”
“Oh, go away!” said the image of Yaotl, “and stop lecturing me! Go up into Porutsa yonder, where the Taoltecs live, and where it may be they have heard of your Dom Manuel, since the Taoltecs also are fools and worship the Feathered Serpent. And when you are emperor over the country of Tollan, do you come back and pray to me more civilly!”
Coth rose up from his kneeling, in strong indignation. “I tendered fealty in the liberal sense appropriate to religious matters. It was but a bit of politeness recommended by Dame Abonde, and I did not mean a word of it—”
The image replied: “Nobody cares what you meant, it matters only what you have sworn. I have accepted your sworn homage; and the affair is concluded.”
“—And upon no terms,” Coth continued, “would I consent to be emperor of this outlandish place. For the rest, do you instantly tell me what you meant by saying ‘the Taoltecs also are fools.’ because I do not understand that ‘also.’”
“But,” said the image, wearily, “but you will have to be emperor, now that I have sworn it upon the oath of the Star Warriors. I do not deny that I spoke hastily: even so, I did say it, with an unbreakable oath; and, here likewise, the affair is concluded.”
Coth replied, “Stuff and nonsense!”
“You are now,” continued the image of Yaotl, “under my protection: and as a seal of this, I must put upon you three refrainments. We will make them very light ones, since this is but a matter of form. I will order you to refrain from such things as no sane person would ever dream of doing in any event; and thus nobody will be discommoded.”
Coth cried out, “Bosh!”
“So you must not infringe upon divine privileges by going naked in public; you must avoid any dealings with green peppers such as you see over yonder, for the reason that they are sacred to my worthless stepson, the Flower Prince; and the third refrainment which I now put upon you I shall not bother to reveal, because you are certain to find this abstinence even more easy to observe than the others. I have spoken.”
“I know well enough that you have spoken! But you have spoken balderdash. For if you for one moment think I am going to be bullied by you and your idiotic refrainments—!”
But Coth saw that the image had closed its eyes, and had tranquilly turned back in all to stone, and was not heeding him any longer.
Chapter XXI. The Profits of Pepper Selling
Coth was goaded, by such incivility, from indignation into a fine rage. He addressed the idol at some length, in terms which no person, whether human or divine, could have construed as worshipful. He gathered from the plants about him an armful of green peppers, he took off all his clothes, and he left them there in a heap upon the altar that was carved with skulls. He went up into the city of Porutsa stark naked and sat down in the market-place, crying, “Who will buy my green peppers!”
None of the Taoltecs hindered him, because the hill people, from Uro and Hipal and Thiapas, were used to come into Porutsa almost thus lightly clad; and it was evident enough that this fair-skinned stranger, with the bare, great, round, pink head, came unarmed with anything except the equipments of nature.
Coth sold his peppers, and went striding about the market-place inquiring for news of Dom Manuel, but none of these charcoal- and copper-colored persons seemed ever to have heard of the gray champion. When the market for that day was over, Coth went up into the hills about Tzatzitepec, in company with a full-bosomed, brown-eyed, delicious girl who had been selling watercresses in the market-place: she proved brisk; and Coth spent four days with her to their mutual contentment.
On the fifth day he returned, still naked as his mother bore him, to the market-place in Porutsa; and there he again sold green peppers, so that this brow-beating Yaotl might have no least doubt as to the value which Coth set on this god’s patronage.
And all went well enough for a while. But by and by seven soldiers came into the market-place, and so to where Coth had just disposed of the last bunch of peppers; and the leader of these soldiers said, “Our Emperor desires speech with you.”
“Well,” Coth returned, “I am through with my day’s work, and I can conveniently spare him a moment or two.”
He went affably with these soldiers, and they led him to the emperor Vemac. “Who are you?” said the Emperor, first of all, “and what is your business in Porutsa?”
“I am an outlander called Coth of the Rocks, a dealer in green peppers, and I came hither to sell my green peppers.”
“But why do you come into my city wearing no blanket and no loin-cloth and, in fact, nothing whatever except a scowl?”