“I hate a fat man,” she said, looking at the stout landlord ruthlessly. “I am always filled with disgust by such enormous bulks. If I ever come to the state of power, I will have every fat man broke upon the wheel; and when I take over the governance of my father’s province, as I mean to do this very afternoon, I will at once enact an ordinance whereby every fat man within my dominion shall receive an hundred blows with a stick.”
The poor innkeeper, who for one of his tribe was an honest fellow, began to tremble horribly and to sweat like a horse.
“Annually,” she said, with such a truculent look that I marvelled how so fair a countenance could compass it, “an hundred blows.”
“Poor fellows!” said the Count of Nullepart. “Poor fat men, won’t they cry out!”
“There will never be such crying heard in Spain for many a year. I will have it ordained that the sticks be edged with sharp pieces of wire. Get you from my sight, you foolish, fat, lubberly fellow, else you shall be the first to receive your merit.”
The innkeeper needed no second admonition to retire, for upon this speaking her ladyship ordered the Count of Nullepart to procure her riding-whip from the corner of the room. When the Count of Nullepart brought forth this implement with an extremely grave face, it looked so formidable as to justify the landlord in his flight. Yet how one fashioned so delicately would have been able to wield such an enormous weapon was beyond the comprehension of both the Count of Nullepart and myself.
The instancy of the lady’s anger being past, she turned to the Count of Nullepart, who still preserved the utmost gravity in his mien, and said in a proud voice, which yet had nothing of its recent displeasure, “I am led to think, sir, you have a wise and a subtle mind. I will see to it that you are admitted into my counsels. What, sir, is your name and your degree?”
The Count of Nullepart informed her of his titles in his melodious accent.
“I am not displeased, sir,” said she, “that you are a man of birth. But I had already adjudged it by your address. Now, my friends, as soon as you have broken your fasts we will to horse. Five hot and dusty leagues lie before us up the side of a steep mountain. We must not tarry, else we shall not find the sun to be our friend.”
We did not venture to court her disapproval, which certainly, as we had just had the proof, could be of the most imperious nature, by lingering over our matutinal wine and meat. For myself, I ate my breakfast in a state of high excitement. I could do nothing but think of the subtle trick that fortune had set upon me. I was overjoyed to feel that by the stroke of Providence I was to be permitted to prove my quality. All my dreams, my ambitions, the wide vista opened to the view by my father’s wisdom and prophetic foresight, were suddenly offered an ample field in which to bear a golden fruit.