"A truce, fellow, with thy profane foolery," said Don Rodrigo; "it is not seemly when the life of thy master is at stake. Prepare to give me a full and circumstantial account of this iniquitous business, or by my sword thou shalt severely rue the day thy master first bestrode a mule."
"Alack a-day," submissively rejoined the valet.—"You must know, Don Rodrigo, that the mule is the cause of all this. When I returned from church I was startled to see the inn thrown into the greatest confusion. The reverend fat friar was running round the place bellowing like a bull, calling for his noble mule, and vowing vengeance on the profane thief, which unseemly appellation he was pleased to bestow upon your honor."
"The friar must have been drunk," said Don Rodrigo, sneeringly; "why! did he not perceive that I had left my steed in the stable, which I think was sufficient security, till you could pay him the value of his beggarly mule!"
"Sure enough he did perceive it, but when I proposed to pay him for his loss, he demanded such an exorbitant price that it was out of my power to comply therewith. In his opinion, the steed was no adequate compensation for his mule; so to make matters even, and adjust the affair amicably, he proposed that I should give up my horse into the bargain, and then take this abominable ass as a present."
Peregil accompanied the epithet with another donation of his wonted favors.
"Thou miserable sinner," said Don Rodrigo, "how couldst thou consent to this nefarious arrangement?"
"Because I could not help it. Think you, Señor mio, I would have agreed to such an extortion had it been in my power to avoid it? But your precipitate flight gave me to understand that you had killed your adversary. Any delay in the town might have been attended with danger, backed as his reverence was by all the rabble of the inn."
Don Rodrigo was sensible of the force of this argument, and after bestowing sundry anathemas on the cheating friar and the inn, in which he was zealously joined by Peregil, he said in a melancholy tone, "Well, as there is no remedy, we must put up with this misfortune as well as we can."
"So we must, Señor," replied Peregil; "and at least there is some consolation in the reflection that we are already on such familiar terms with dame Fortune, that this new instance of her good-will ought by no means to take us by surprise.—But may I ask whither we are going?"
"To seek refuge in the mountains," gloomily answered Don Rodrigo.