is not our wish to pursue the road as far as Gualdo, else had we not
stopped at this kennel of yours."

I scarce know what it can have been that moved me to act as I then did,
for, in the truth, the manner of that rascal of a groom was little
prepossessing, and his master, I doubted, could be little better that he
left the fellow to hector it thus over that wretched tavern oaf. But I
stepped forward.

"Did you say that you were journeying to Cagli?" questioned I.

He eyed me sourly, suspicion writ athwart his round, ill-favoured face,
But my motley was hidden from his sight. My cloak, my hat and boots
allowed naught of my true condition to appear, and might as well have
covered a lordling as a jester. Yet his inveterate surliness the rascal
could not wholly conquer.

"What may be the purpose of your question?" he growled.

"To serve your master, whoever he may be," I answered him serenely,
"although it is a service I do not press upon him. I, too, am journeying
to Cagli, and like yourselves, I am in haste and go the shorter way across
the hills, with which I am well acquainted. If it so please you to follow
me your need of a guide may thus be satisfied."

It was the tone to take if I would be respected. Had I proposed that we
should journey in company I should not have earned me the half of the
deference which was accorded to my haughtily granted leave that they might
follow me if they so chose.