"What?" the stranger asked, as he raised his head and wiped his moustache; "What is the matter with you, my good man?"
"Matter, indeed!" mine host growled.
"By the way, is my horse in the stable?"
"Your horse, your horse," the other grumbled, "as if that is troubling me."
"What is it then, if you please, master mine?" the stranger asked, as he poured out a bumper which he conscientiously drained to the last drop. "Ah," he said, "it is Jurançon; I recognise it."
This indifference and this coolness raised the landlord's anger to the highest pitch, and caused him to forget all prudence.
"Cogswounds," he said, boldly seizing the bottle, "it is a strange piece of impudence thus to enter an honest house without the owner's permission; decamp at once, my fine gentleman, unless you wish harm to befall you, and seek a lodging elsewhere, for, as far as I am concerned, I cannot and will not give you one."
The stranger had not moved a feature during this harangue; he had listened to Master Pivois without displaying the slightest impatience: when the landlord at length held his tongue, he threw himself back in his chair, and looked him fixedly in the face.
"Listen to me in your turn, master," he said to him, "and engrave these words deeply on your narrow brain: this house is an inn, is it not? Hence it must be open without hesitation to every stranger who comes here for food and lodging with money in his pocket. I am aware that you claim the right of only receiving such persons as you think proper; if there are people who put up with that, it is their business, but for my part, I do not intend to do so. I feel comfortable here, so I remain, and shall remain as long as I think proper; I do not prevent you from swindling me, for that is your duty as a landlord, and I have no right to object; but, if I am not served politely and dexterously—if you do not give me a proper bedroom to spend the night in—in a word, if you do not perform the duties of hospitality toward me in the way I expect, I promise to pull down your signboard, and hang you up in its place, on the slightest infraction you are guilty of. And now I suppose you understand me?" he added, squeezing the other's hand so hard that the poor fellow uttered a yell of agony, and went tottering against the kitchen wall: "Serve me, then, and let us have no more argument, for you would not get the best of the quarrel if you picked one with me."
And without paying further attention to the landlord, the traveller continued his interrupted supper.