"Yes, Fernan, I will, and I am just coming to it. But what good has it done you to visit so often the witch of the torrent, if you have not yet learned to know things beforehand, an art in which people say she excels?"
"I vow by Judas Iscariot that I'll throw you out of the window if you don't cease talking such nonsense, and get out of this at once."
Alvar stepped backwards on seeing the threatening gesture of the impatient squire, for he knew that it was the habit of Fernan to accompany his words with acts, to which his ribs, almost broken more than once by the squire, could testify. As the reader has already perceived, the page was one of those young men who are so fond of circumlocutions that they go to the grain, as sparrows, through the straw. We have corresponding types in our own times, as may be often seen in meetings of Parliament, in which is often heard the cry, "To the grain, to the grain!" or "Question, question," which is the same thing.
Thanks, then, to the threats of Fernan, the page related, without any more roundabout expressions, what had brought the messenger of Don Fernando; adding, as we already know, that both Diego and Rodrigo had decided to set out for the court on the following day.
"I am much pleased to hear that," said Fernan, "for my life at Vivar is but a lingering death, since that ungrateful Mayorica repays my love with scratches and insults, and that vixen of an Aldonza shuts the door in my face."
"Then you love them, Fernan?" said the page, much surprised.
"And I must love them, I fear, in spite of the fact that they treat me worse than a captive Moor."
"By the soul of my grandfather, he who goes on in that way deserves a hundred lashes. Oh, how vain are the intentions of lovers! Why don't you swear, you unfortunate man, that as long as you live you'll have nothing more to do with women?"
"What do you desire, Alvar? Man proposes and woman disposes. I was born with such weaknesses, and I fear that I shall die with them."
"Conquer these inclinations of yours, Fernan."