30.Havoc of Bad Habits
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NEWS as to court affairs and the rest of the province came now to Coth, in his two lairs at Haut Belpaysage, belatedly and rarely. Yet at this time he heard that Anavalt the Courteous had gone out of Poictesme with as little warning as the other lords of the Silver Stallion had accorded their intimates when Gonfal and Kerin and Miramon, and Coth himself, had each gone out of the land after Manuel’s passing.
These overnight evasions appeared to be becoming a habit, Coth said to his wife Azra, so you had best cherish me in the night season while you may, instead of shrieking out nonsense about my hands being so cold. She replied with an uxorial generality as to sore-headed bears and snapping-turtles and porcupines, which really was not misplaced. And it was not for a long while that any tidings were had of Anavalt the Courteous, and the riddle of his evasion was unraveled,[1]but at the last the news came as to the end which Anavalthad found near a windmill in the Wood of Elfhame, in his courtship of the mistress of that sinister and superficial forest.
1.Among other places, in a volume calledStraws and Prayer-Books.
1.Among other places, in a volume calledStraws and Prayer-Books.
1.Among other places, in a volume calledStraws and Prayer-Books.
“At his age, too! and with a woman too thin to keep him warm!” said Coth. “It simply shows you, my dear son, what comes of lecherous habits, and I trust you may profit by it, for the world is very full of such deceits.”
And Coth, for his Jurgen’s benefit, piously indicated the motto which you encountered at well-nigh every turn in Coth’s two homes, along with the stallion rampant in every member.
Nevertheless, Coth was unhappier than he showed. He had loved Anavalt in the days when these two had served together under the banner of the Silver Stallion. It seemed to Coth that in dark Elfhame a handsome and fine-spoken and kindly rascal had been trapped and devoured rather wastefully. Nor was it cheering to consider that, now, but five of the great fellowship remained alive.... Meanwhile, in rearing a son judiciously, one must preserve the proper moral tone.
And Coth heard also, at about this time, of the magic which had been put upon King Helmas the Deep-Minded, that monarch whom, as people said, Dom Manuel in the old days had bamboozled into giving Manuel a fine start in life. Coth heard of how this magic had been put upon Helmas by his own daughter Mélusine, and of the notable transfer of the king’scastle and person and entire entourage from out of Albania to the high place at Brunbelois, in the impenetrable Forest of Acaire, where the ill-fated court of Helmas now all stayed enchanted, people said.
And Coth drew the moral. “It shows you what parents may expect of their children,” he remarked, with a malevolent glance toward his adored Jurgen. “It shows you what comes of this habit of indulging children.”
“Now, Father—” said the boy.
“Stop storming at me! How dare you attempt to bulldoze me, sir! Do you take me for another Helmas!”
“But, Father—”
“Get out of my sight, you quarrelsome puppy! I will not be thus deafened. Get back to that Dorothy of yours! You care for nobody else,” said jealous old Coth.
“Now, Father—”
“And must you still be arguing with me! Do you think there is no end to my patience? What is there to argue about? The puppy follows the bitch. That is natural.”
“But, Father, how can you—!”
“Get out of my sight before I break every bone in your body! Get back to that cold sanctimonious court and to your hot wench!” said Coth.
Yet all the while that he spoke with such fluencyCoth’s heart was troubled. Of course, in rearing a son judiciously, one must preserve the proper moral tone. Nevertheless, Coth felt, at heart, that he might be taking the wrong way with the boy, and was being almost brusque.
But Coth was Coth. That was his doom. He had only one way.