"Where can the thief-friar be?" muttered the student. "He is usually not far off from sweet Nanette."
"You mean the monk who had a hand in your nuptials?"
"Who else? He, the source of all ill. He who gave her the money of which she e'en presented me a moiety. Whoever employed him—was it your friends, gentle sir?—rewarded him with gold. Being a craven rogue, I e'en suspect him of shifting the task to myself for a beggarly pittance, whilst he is off with the lion's share."
The jester, watching the company within, made no reply. From the student to the woman, to the friar, was a chain leading—where? He found it not difficult to surmise. Suddenly Nanette threw down the cards and laughed harshly.
"Neither the devil nor his imps could read the things that are happening in the castle!"
Then abruptly springing from the table, she made her way to the fire, over which hung a pot of some savory stew, a magnet to the company's sharp desire; for throughout all the boisterous merriment wandering glances had invariably returned to it. To reach the kettle and make herself mistress of the culinary preparations, she cuffed a dwarf with such vigor that he hobbled howling from a suspicious proximity to the appetizing mess to a safe refuge beneath the table. With equally dauntless spirit, she pushed aside the herculean morio who had been childishly standing over the pot, licking his fingers in eager anticipation; whereupon the imbecile set up a sharp cry that blended with the deeper roar of the lilliputian.
"And I caught the rabbit!" piteously bellowed the latter from his retreat.
"And I found the turnips!" cried the colossal idiot, tears running down his lubberly cheeks.
"Peace, you demons!" exclaimed the woman, waving the spoon at them, "or, by the hell-born, you'll ne'er taste morsel of it!"
Quieted by this stupendous threat, they closed their mouths and opened their eyes but the wider, while the gipsy spouse of the student stirred and stirred the mixture in the iron pot, gazing at the fire with frowning brow as though she would read some page of the future in the leaping flames.