ARGATHONA
Project Gutenberg EPUB3 edition
McCarthy, Justin H. (Justin Huntly)
Simon nodded. If this were so he could understand that something in her utterance which seemed alien and quaint to him. Here truly was a gift scarcely less enviable than the grace of perdurable life. Argathona interrupted his meditations.
"You have asked me many questions," she said, looking straightly at him from under level brows; "now answer some for me. Is it the manner of mortal man to make love in your fashion?"
Simon looked awkward and fumbled with his beard.
"There are many ways of making love," he confessed. "Some are more formal," he admitted, after a moment's pause.
The nymph looked thoughtful.
"Such would please me better," she said. She eyed Simon circumspectly, then questioned, suddenly, "Why do you carry that lantern?"
Simon unhooked it from his girdle and held it at arm's-length, a formidable piece of furniture for a traveller.
"There was some fellow of old time did the like for my reason—looking for an honest man or an honest woman."
The dryad smiled at memories.
"I have heard of that; it was a mad Athenian called Diogenes."
"I care not what his name was," said Simon, "but I like his humor and I follow his quest. Not that the lantern is of much use to me in the daytime, but it shows my good faith."
"Have you found no honest folk?" Argathona asked, sympathetically. Simon shook his red head.
"Never since I came to these regions of Greece," Simon protested. "There were honest folk in Rouen, or, at least, I used to think so. Alain, the armorer, he was an honest man. He made this blade," and Simon patted the stout sword at his side. "I never met with a better. But since I came to Corinth to serve the duke I have found no honest soul or body."
Argathona gave a little shiver.
"I am glad that I dwell here in the greenwood, and not with your clan."
Simon rambled on with his narrative.
"When I came to these parts I still had the bulk of a pretty little patrimony. Where is it now? Every light o' love in Corinth has filched her bit of it; every cozener with the dice has picked his share. While I was rich my friends fawned on me; when I fell poor they turned their backs, lads and lassies. I have written some rhymes on my misfortune."
He paused, hoping that the maid might ask to hear them, but as she did no such thing he resumed, plaintively:
"So now I trample this planet seeking an honest human."
"Do you hope to find such in Athens?" Argathona asked.
She was quite interested in this queer, russet-colored man, with his wild words and his wild wits—as interested as she would be if she came upon some new kind of fawn or unfamiliar moth in the forest. Simon grunted uncertainly.
"I have my doubts," he said, "though every great lord and every little lord in Attica will be there. But I do not go to Athens solely to that end. I hope to find service with the Duke of Athens, who loves, so they tell me, such stout fellows as I be."
He stretched his great arms apart as he spoke, in pride at their mighty muscles. Then, remembering how little their strength had availed him against the witchery of the nymph, he grinned a thought sheepishly. But Argathona was honestly admiring his force, and only pitying him for not being comely. They sat for a moment looking at each other, thinking their own thoughts. About them all was very still in the moonlight, silence only troubled by the wheeling of bats and the droning of insects. Suddenly from the distance came loud shouts, furious cries, and then the angry clash of steel on steel and the clattering of a horse's hoofs in furious flight.