“—And in the four children that he had by Niafer,” Freydis continued. “And in these children’s children our Manuel’s life will be renewed, and after that in their grandchildren: and Manuel’s life and Manuel’s true nature will thus go on, in many bodies, so long as men act foolishly by day and wickedly at night. And in the images which I aided him to make and to inform with fire from Audela, in these also, when these are set to live as men among mankind,—and, to my fancy, no more reasonably than my two elder children, Sesphra and Raimbaut, have lived already,—in these also, will our Manuel live.”
“I see,” said Alianora: “and your explanation of his second and of, indeed, his two thousandth coming seems to me, I confess, much the more plausible. Yes, I see. Manuel has already returned; and he will return again any number of times—”
Freydis said moodily, “And to whose benefit and pleasuring?”
“My darling Freydis! You may depend upon it that on each occasion two persons will get a great deal of pleasure out of preparing the way for him. And that,” said Alianora, “that and whatever else may befall those persons who have Manuel’s proclivities and life in them will be but another happening in the Biography of Manuel. We three have begun a neverending set of comedies in which the life of Manuel will be the main actor. We have, as one might say,—among friends, my darlings,—collaborated with the dear boy to make an endless series of Manuels, without any special reassurance that to do this was going to give good and pleasure to anybody except—say what you will, my dears,—it does always give to a hearty young woman. For we do not know, even now, exactly what sort of a creature this Manuel was and, thanks to our collaboration, will continue to be. Yes, now I see your point, my dear Freydis; and it is really a curious one.”
Again, though, Alianora smiled up toward the statue of Manuel as though there were some secret between them. And Niafer had no patience whatever with the leering and iniquitous old hussy.
“The whole world knows,” said Niafer, indignantly, “what sort of person my husband was, for my Manuel is famous throughout Christendom.”
“Yes,” Alianora assented, “he is famous as a paragon of all the Christian virtues, and as the Redeemer whose return is to restore the happiness and glories of his people: and it is upon that joke, my dear Niafer, I was congratulating you a moment or two ago.”
“He is famous for his loyalty and valor and wisdom,” said Freydis. “I hear of it. And I remember the tall frightened fool who betrayed me, and whom at the last I spared out of mere pity for his worthlessness. And still, I spare and I perpetuate and I foster his living, in my children, because it is certain that a woman’s folly does not ever perish.”
“Nevertheless, I know how to avail myself of a woman’s folly,” said Horvendile,—for now, Dame Niafer perceived, that queer, red-headed Horvendile also was standing beside her husband’s tomb,—“and of the babble of children, and of the unwillingness of men to face the universe with no better backing than their own resources.”
Then Horvendile looked full at Niafer, with his young, rather cruel smile. And Horvendile said: