ad set King Theodoret to
pestering Manuel with magniloquent offers of what Theodoret would do and
give if only the rescuer of Megaris would put aside his ugly crippled
wife and marry the King's lovely sister.

Manuel laughed at him. Some say that Manuel and the King's sister
dispensed with marriage: others accuse Dom Manuel of exhibiting a
continence not very well suited to his exalted estate. It is certain, in
any event, that he by and by returned into Poictesme, with a cold in his
head to be sure, but with fresh glory and much plunder and two new fiefs
to his credit: and at Storisende Dom Manuel found that his rooms had
been thoroughly cleaned and set in such perfect order that he could lay
hands upon none of his belongings, and that the pastry-cook had left.

"It simply shows you!" says Dame Niafer, "and all I have to say is that
now I hope you are satisfied."

Manuel laughed without merriment. "Everything is in a conspiracy to
satisfy me in these sleek times, and it is that which chiefly plagues
me."

He chucked Niafer under the chin, and told her she should be thinking of
what a famous husband she had nowadays, instead of bothering about
pastry-cooks. Then he fell to asking little Melicent about how much she
had missed Father while Father was away, and he dutifully kissed the two
other children, and he duly admired the additions to Emmerick's
vocabulary during Father's absence. And afterward he went alone into the
Room of Ageus.

Thereafter he was used to spend more and more hours in the Room of
Ageus, and the change in Count Manuel was more and more talked about.
And the summer passed: and whether or no Count Manuel had, as some
declared, contracted unholy alliances, there was no denying that all
prospered with Count Manuel, and he was everywhere esteemed the most
lucky and the least scrupulous rogue alive. But, very certainly, he was
changed.

XXXVII

Opinions of Hinzelmann

Now the tale tells that on Michaelmas morning little Melicent, being in
a quiet mood that time, sat with her doll in the tall chair by the third
window of Ageus while her father wrote at his big table. He was pausing
between phrases to think and to bite at his thumb-nail, and he was so
intent upon this letter to Pope Innocent that he did not notice the slow
opening of the third window: and Melicent had been in conference with
the queer small boy for some while before Dom Manuel looked up
abstractedly toward them. Then Man