"Seigneur duke, I shall fetch the drink, do you take care of the kiss," retorted the adventurer, turning his horse's head toward the baggage, while, stooping down on his horse, the duke pushed his head under the curtain.
"Oh, William, only the other day my lips were white and frozen. The fire of your kisses has returned to them their reddish hue."
"Which proves that I can perform as great prodigies as you, my beautiful witch."
"You quit giving me that name, William. It recalls the days I spent in the turret of Neroweg Worse than a Wolf, whom I execrate,—days of shame and trial to me, and whose memory haunts me."
"But you are well revenged for those days of shame. Count Neroweg is now poorer than the lowest of his serfs as a result of his losses at the gaming tables of Joppa where he met such consummate gamblers that they won from him five thousand gold besans, his silver plate, his baggage, his horses, his arms and even his sword. By Satan! I imagine I see that Neroweg, that Worse than a Wolf, that Count of Plouernel, so rudely plucked at the start of his Crusade, fighting with an old cap on for helmet, a stick for a lance, and for charger an ass, a goat or good Palestine mastiff!"
"Let's drop that sad topic, and talk about yourself, who have been the dream of my youth. Now that I am yours, I should feel happy, and yet my heart is cruelly tormented. Your inconstancy makes me despair. I am dying with jealousy. Can it be that that infamous Perrette the Ribald has her share of your caresses?"
"What a frisky and bold girl that Perrette is! After the siege of Antioch, cup in hand, her hair to the breeze——"
"Be still, William, I am jealous of her!"
"Poor Ribald! She must have died on the route. She never turned up again after that moment."
"I could have strangled her with my hands, and Yolande, also!"