been through eight formal wars, with any amount of light guerrilla work. He had slain his satisfactory quota of dragons and usurpers and ogres, and, also some years ago, had married the golden-haired and starry-eyed and swan-throated princess who is the customary reward of every champion’s faithful attendance to derring-do. Now, in the afternoon of Gonfal’s day, with his princess dead, and with the realms that he had shared with her all lost,—and with his overlord Count Manuel too departed from this world, and with the banner of the Silver Stallion no longer followed by any one,—now this tall Gonfal went among his fellows in Inis Dahut a little aloofly. Yet the fair-bearded man went smilingly, too, as one who amuses himself at a game which he knows to be not very important: for he was, as he said, a realist, even in the pagan Isles of Wonder. 30And Morvyth, the dark Queen of the five Isles of Wonder, was annoyed by the bantering ways of her slow-spoken lover; she did not like these ways: she would put out of mind the question whether this man was being bitterly amused by his own hopeless infatuation or by something—incredible as that seemed,—about her. But that question would come back into her mind: and Morvyth, with an habitual light lovely gesture, would tidy the hair about her ears, and would go again to talk with Gonfal, so that she might, privately and just for her own satisfaction, decide upon this problem. Besides, the man had rather nice eyes. 30 31 6.The Loans of Power ══════════════════════════════════════════════════ NOW, when the year was over, and when the bland persistent winds of April had won up again out of the South, the heroes returned, each with his treasure. Each brought to Morvyth a bridal gift as miraculous as the adventures through which it had been come by: and all these adventures had been marvelous beyond any easy believing. Indeed, as the Queen remarked, in private, their tales were hardly credible. “And yet, I think, these buoyant epics are based upon fact,” replied Gonfal. “Each of these men is the shrewd, small and ill-favored third son of a king. It is the law that such unprepossessing
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