Tristan rose up, thrusting aside his stool.
“By God,” he said, “I will look through yonder grille.”
Ogier plunged forward and barred his way.
“Wait, my son,” he said, with a bending of the brows, “wait till they are drunk enough. Then, by my soul, you shall look at your leisure.”
CHAPTER XVIII
Tristan faced Ogier for the moment as though more than tempted to hold him in defiance. He remembered, however, that the giant was worth more to him as a friend than as an enemy; and making a laugh of the matter, he picked up the stool and returned to his supper. Old Nicholas by the fire had watched them with a dull grin on his ferocious and toad-like face. He poked the embers with a charred stake, winked at Ogier, and waxed witty over the strenuousness of youth.
“Young blood runs hot, sirs,” he said, “and prithee, what is this chivalry men prate about but youth gone mad.”
“Ha, old raven, we are all mad to you, since you are scourging lunatic folk all the days of your life. All creation’s moonstruck to an owl hooting in a chimney.”
“ ’Tis only like drink,” said the ferryman. “Some are quickly overset; others swim in wine—’tis their natural element. All men are mad in measure. These mad folk have more spirit than body; you, Messire Ogier, have more body than spirit. The flesh overbalanceth the spirit, and your fat paunch keeps out the vapours. It is good in season to make of one’s soul a toad under a stone.”
The old man sniggered, stretched himself, took a knotted whip from the wall, and passed out by a narrow door set back in the thickness of the wall. There was something so evil and repulsive about the creature that the room felt warmer to Tristan when he had gone. Ogier had stretched himself on a settle before the fire, for though it was summer, a cold mist rose from off the mere. Ogier, with his carcass propped before the glow, blinked and dozed after his superhuman meal.