"Now, Titania, ascend the steps of your castle. To your right you will find your dressing-room; to the left, your bed-chamber. Your supper will be served al fresco.... Will you deign to share it with me?"
"With all of my heart, Robin Goodfellow," cried Nance as she walked airily into Columbine.
Jean François poked the mysterious pot, fried ham, scrambled eggs, made coffee, and toasted bread. This they ate by the light of the fire and the stars.
After the meal the pedler filled his pipe, lighted it with an ember, and stretched himself full length upon the earth with his ugly red head propped by his arm. Nance sat gazing into the fire, her knees hugged against her stooping figure, a dream upon her face. The darkness about was intense. The light flickered in ghostly shadows upon the yellow sides and spokes of the van. The steady munching of Rogue, the occasional popping of the fire, the murmuring of the river with the melancholy song of a thousand insects, now loud, now still, as the breeze came and went, made the sleepy music of the night.
Thus they sat for two hours, neither of them speaking a word. Jean François was occupied with a choice entertainment in which he often indulged. To begin with, in imagination he went over the whole matter of Nance's escapade with Doctor Longstreet and Charles King. He explained her temperament, defending her nobly with a delicate suggestion of his own attitude toward her. Then, again in fancy, he talked of young Dr. King to the jade. All to himself he became quite an old match-maker. This was followed by witnessing them as the occupants of the old home of the many pillars. Here his dreams took unusual liberty; he peopled the house with other and tinier folk than the father and mother.... Here he smiled as he thought of Nance's chagrin could she but see his mind. He looked up and caught her gaze bent upon him.
"Did you ever hear the story of 'The King of Bohemia and the Beggar from Bagdad'?" he asked as he knocked his pipe, to empty it, upon the heel of his boot, and dropped it into his pocket.
"Never," she said, looking at him interestingly. "If there isn't any moral to it, tell it."
"I'm afraid there is," said he. "It is about a sleepy monarch—"
"O," she exclaimed, light breaking on her face as she remembered an old trick of the childhood days which he had used a hundred times to send her and Charles to bed, "and you dream the tale?... I remember."
"That's right," said the pedler.