“And did you also live unhappily ever afterward?”
“Our marriage was as happy as most marriages. My love defied Time and Fate. Because of my love I suffered unexampled chances and ignominies, and I performed deeds that are still rhymed about; and in the end, through my unswerving love, I got me a wife who was as good as most wives. So I made no complaint.”
And Florian nodded. “I take your meaning. There was once a king and a queen. They had three sons. And the third prince succeeded in everything—Your faces and your lives are strange to me. But it is plain all four of us have ventured into the high place, that dreadful place wherein a man attains to his desires.”
Then said another person: “That comes of meddling with Flamberge. Now my weapon was, at least upon some occasions, called Caliburn. And I ventured into a great many places, but I was careful of my behavior in all of them.”
“And did you never attain to your desire, monsieur?”
“Never, my lad, although I had some narrow shaves. Why, once there was only a violet coverlet between me and destruction, but I was poet enough to save myself.”
“Parbleu, now that is rather odd! For I first saw my wife—I mean, my present duchess,—asleep beneath a violet coverlet.”
“Ah,” said the other, drily, “so that is where you sought a woman to be, of all things, your wife! Then you are braver than I: but you are certainly not a monstrous clever fellow.”
“Well, well!” said Florian, “so the refrain of this obsolescent quartet is a jingle-jangle of shallow and cheap pessimism: and the upshot of the matter is that Flamberge is lost somewhere in the old time, and that I know not how to come to it.”
