THE FOOL ERRANT - World eBook Library - World Public Library

and my sack are no mean caterers. We'll make all snug for the night, and rise up betimes better friends than ever for our late
little difference of opinion."
Nothing could have been less to my taste; the man inspired me with extreme disgust. "Fra Palamone," I said firmly, "our ways
separate here. I go to Pistoja, you where you please; or, do you go to Pistoja, I shall take the other road. I commend you to
God, I salute you, I thank you, and hope I shall never see you again."
"English!" cried Fra Palamone, slapping his forehead. "Now I know with whom I am dealing. Who else commends his enemy to
God and hopes that the devil will step in?" He looked me up and down triumphantly, grating his upper lip with that fierce tusk of
his. "If I were in the humour, boy," he said, "which you may thank Madonna I am not, I could have you on your back in two
ticks, and your hands tied behind you. I could take every paul off you—ah, and every stitch down to your shirt. But no! you are
a gentleman. I prefer to take your hand, being confident that we shall meet again in a few days' time from now. Hold your way
to Pistoja, since so you will have it. I am never deceived in my man. I know you and all your concerns as well as if you were my
own son—and better, a deal. You have your troubles before you, brought upon you by your own headiness— your own
insufferable piety and crass conceit. And I, young sir, and I am one of them. That you will find out."
"I bid you farewell, sir," says I very stiff.
"But I say, To our next meeting!" he cried, and plunged down the hillside. I heard him for a long time shouting songs at the top
of his voice.
Resting no more on the road, I pressed my way southward, descending through chestnut woods to the olives, the garlanded
vines, the wonderful husbandry of a generous land, amazed and enchanted by the profusion I beheld. The earth seemed to well
forth rich blood at the mere tread of a foot. Boys and girls, young men and women, half naked but glowing with beauty and
vigour, watched their beasts on the woody slopes or drove the plough through the deep soil, following after great oxen, singing
as they toiled. The ground sent up heat intoxicating to the blood of a northern wanderer. It was the Land of Promise indeed,
flowing with milk and honey, a pastoral land of easy love and laughter, where man clove to woman and she yielded to him at the
flutter of desire, yet all was sanctioned by the Providence which fashioned the elements and taught the very ivy how to cling.
Was there not deep-seated truth, methought, in those old fables which told of the Loves of the Nymphs, the Loves of the
Fauns? Was there not some vital well-spring within our natures, some conduit of the heart which throbbed yet at the call of such
instincts? I was more sure of it than I had ever been before. The Loves of the Nymphs—the clinging ivy, the yielding reed! The
Loves of the Fauns— buffeting wind and kissing rain! These shy brown girls who peered at me from between the trees; these
musing shepherd lads calling them upon oaten pipes—"Panaque, Silvanumque senem, nymphasque sorores." I saw them, I saw
them! I walked fast! my feet raced with my thoughts. My heart was beating, my blood was hot, my inclinations were pastoral,
but enthusiastic. I was disposed to admire, and prepared to prove that I admired. I could have embraced a sapling and
swooned as I called upon Dryas or Syrinx. Then, by-and-by, in the fulness of the time I saw a slim solitary girl ahead of me in a
glade, walking bolt upright with a huge faggot of sticks upon her head. It was growing dusk. I could see little of her save that
she was tall and walked superbly well from the hips, that her skirts were thin and close about her person, that she was alone,
young and over-burdened. I quickened my steps.
She stopped, she turned to face me; I saw her black hair close- curtaining her whiteness; I saw her steady eyes under dark and
level brows; I saw she was very thin and as wild as a hawk. I was foolishly agitated, she not at all.
"Buona sera," said she. She stood easily, upright, her burden on her head. Her hands were on her hips, she was perfectly
simple, as simple as a nymph, and as handsome in her proud, calm, savage way.
I returned her greeting, and more for the sake of getting countenance than for the answer, asked her to direct me to some
lodging not too far off. She took some time in replying, but her eyes never left mine. She gave me a steady scrutiny, in which
were neither vulgar curiosity nor equally vulgar stupidity to be discerned. It seemed that she was busy with her thoughts how she
was to answer me, for when she had looked her full she shrugged and turned her head stiffly, saying, "There is none, for your
excellency."
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