Perion shook his head, and declared: "You offer enough to make me a wealthy man. But I would prefer a sword."

At that Demetrios grimaced, saying, "I had hoped to get off more cheaply." He unbuckled the crosshandled sword which he now wore and handed it to Perion. "This is Flamberge," Demetrios continued--"that magic blade which Galas made, in the old time's heyday, for Charlemaigne. It was with this sword that I slew my father, and this sword is as dear to me as your ring was to you. The man who wields it is reputed to be unconquerable. I do not know about that, but in any event I yield Flamberge to you as a free gift. I might have known it was the only gift you would accept." His swart face lighted. "Come presently and fight with me for Melicent. Perhaps it will amuse me to ride out to battle and know I shall not live to see the sunset. Already it seems laughable that you will probably kill me with this very sword which I am touching now."

The champions faced each other, Demetrios in a half-wistful mirth, and Perion in half-grudging pity. Long and long they looked.

Demetrios shrugged. Demetrios said: "For such as I am, to love is dangerous. For such as I am, nor fire nor meteor hurls a mightier bolt than Aphrodite's shaft, or marks its passage by more direful ruin. But you do not know Euripides?--a fidgety-footed liar, Messire the Comte, who occasionally blunders into the clumsiest truths. Yes, he is perfectly right; all things this goddess laughingly demolishes while she essays haphazard flights about the world as unforeseeably as travels a bee. And, like the bee, she wilfully dispenses honey, and at other times a wound."

Said Perion, who was no scholar: "I glory in our difference. For such as I am, love is sufficient proof that man was fashioned in God's image."

"Ey, there is no accounting for a taste in aphorisms," Demetrios replied. He said, "Now I embark." Yet he delayed, and spoke with unaccustomed awkwardness. "Come, you who have been generous till this! will you compel me to desert you here--quite penniless?"

Said Perion: "I may accept a sword from you. I do accept it gladly. But I may not accept anything else."

"That would have been my answer. I am a lucky man," Demetrios said, "to have provoked an enemy so worthy of my opposition. We two have fought an honest and notable duel, wherein our weapons were not made of steel. I pray you harry me as quickly as you may; and then we will fight with swords till I am rid of you or you of me."




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