The mendacious captain was perfectly well aware that an affair of honor always makes a man stand well in the eyes of a woman. In fact, Fleur-de-Lys looked him full in the face, all agitated with fear, pleasure, and admiration. Still, she was not completely reassured.
“ Provided that you are wholly cured, my Phœbus!” said she. “I do not know your Mahé Fédy, but he is a villanous man. And whence arose this quarrel?”
Here Phœbus, whose imagination was endowed with but mediocre power of creation, began to find himself in a quandary as to a means of extricating himself for his prowess.
“ Oh! how do I know?—a mere nothing, a horse, a remark! Fair cousin,” he exclaimed, for the sake of changing the conversation, “what noise is this in the Cathedral Square?”
He approached the window.
“ Oh!
