“Nay, thou hypocrite, I’ll not have thee,” saith she. “Thou shouldst serve me as the wooden horse did the Trojans.” And she added some Latin words, the which I wist not. (Note 3.)
“‘Femme qui parle Latin
Ne vient jamais à bonne fin.’”
saith Sir Robert under his voice.
“That is because you like to have it all to yourselves,” saith Aunt Joyce, turning upon him. “There be few men would not fainer have a woman foolish than learned. Tell me wherefore?”
“I dispute the major,” quoth he, and shaked his head.
“Then I’ll tell you,” pursueth she. “Because—to give you French for your French—‘Parmi les aveugles, les borgnes sont rois.’ You love to keep atop of us; and it standeth to reason that the lower down we are the less toil shall you have in climbing.”
“‘Endless genealogies, which breed doubts more than godly edifying,’” saith Father. “Are we not landed in somewhat like them?”
“Well, Sir Robert, I’ll forgive you!” saith Aunt Joyce, and held forth her hand. “But mark you, I am right and you are wrong, for all that.”
Sir Robert lifted Aunt Joyce’s hand to his lips, with ever so much fun in his eyes, though his mouth were as grave as a whole bench of judges.
“My mistress,” said he, “I have been wed long enough to have learned never to gainsay a gentlewoman.”