"May my own blood smother me; may the quartain fever settle my hash, if I understand it! A few hours ago I strained my remaining eye fit to give it a squint, in contemplating Don Ignatius. Seeing him so threadbare, so wan, so seedy and leaning upon his staff, I had not the courage to remind him of me. By the bowels of St. Quenet, I felt ashamed of having been page to the worn-out old crippled hunch-back."
"How is that! You described him as having been such a fine-looking cavalier and such a skilful swordsman—and yet he was hunch-backed?"
"He was crippled through two wounds that he received at the siege of Pampeluna. The devil! All the fathers, all the brothers, all the husbands whose daughters, sisters and wives the captain Loyolized, would have felt themselves thoroughly revenged if, like myself, they had seen him writhe like one possessed and howling like a hundred wolves from the pain of his wounds. By the bowels of the Pope, what horrible grimaces the man made!"
"But how could so intrepid a man display such weakness at pain?"
"Not at the pain itself; not that. On the contrary. As a result of his wounds he voluntarily endured positive torture, beside which his first agonies were gentle caresses."
"And why did he submit to such tortures? Can you explain that?"
"Yes. The truce between the Spaniards and the French lasted several days. At its close Captain Loyola mounted his horse, and placing himself at the head of his forces ordered a sortie. He made havoc among the enemy; but in the melee he received two shots from an arquebus. One of them fractured his right leg just below the knee, the other took him under the left hip. My gallant was carried to his house and we laid him in his bed. Do you know what were the first words that Don Ignatius uttered? They were these: 'Death and passion, I may remain deformed all my life!' And would you believe it? Captain Loyola wept like a woman! Aye, he wept, not with pain, no, by the bowels of St. Quenet, but with rage! You may imagine how crossed the handsome and roistering cavalier felt at the prospect. Imagine a limping cripple strolling under balconies and warbling his love songs! Imagine such a figure running after the señoras! What a sight it would be to have such a disjointed lover throwing himself at their feet at the risk of being unable to pick himself up again and yelling with pain: 'Oh, my leg! Oh, my knee!' Just think of such a lame duck attempting to try conclusions with jealous and irate husbands and brothers, arms in hand! Don Ignatius must have thought of all that—and wept!"
"It is almost incomprehensible that a man of his temper could be so enamoured of his physical advantages," remarked Christian.
"Not at all!" replied Monsieur John thoughtfully. "Oh, what an abyss is the human soul! I now think I understand—" but suddenly breaking off he asked the Franc-Taupin: "Accordingly, Don Ignatius was dominated by the fear of remaining crippled for life?"
"That was his only worry. But I must hurry on. I have a horror of empty wine pots. My present worry is about the wine spigot. Well, all the same, after healing, Captain Loyola's legs remained, as he feared, of unequal length. 'Oh, dogs! Jews! Pagan surgeons!' bawled Don Ignatius when he made the discovery. 'Fetch me here the robed asses! the brothers of Beelzebub! I shall have them quartered!' Summoned in great hurry, the poor wretches of surgeons hastened to Don Ignatius. They trembled; turned and turned him about; they examined and re-examined his leg; after all of which, the slashers of Christian flesh and sawers of Christian bones declared that they could render Captain Loyola as nimble of foot as ever he was. 'A hundred ducats to each of you if you keep your promise!' he cried, already seeing himself prancing on horseback, prinking in his finery, strutting about, warbling love songs under balconies, parading, and above all Loyolizing. 'Yes, señor; the lameness will disappear,' answered the bone-setters, 'but, we shall have, first of all, to break your leg over again, where it was fractured before; in the second place, señor, we shall have to cut away the flesh that has grown over the bone below your knee; in the third place, we shall have to saw off a little bone that protrudes; that all being done, no doe of the forest will be more agile than your Excellency.' 'Break, re-set, cut off, saw off, by the death of God!' cried Captain Loyola 'provided I can walk straight! Go ahead! Start to work!'"