THE SECOND NOVEL.—­ELLINOR OF CASTILE, BEING ENAMORED OF A HANDSOME PERSON, IS IN HER FLIGHT FROM MARITAL OBLIGATIONS ASSISTED BY HER HUSBAND, AND IS IN THE END BY HIM CONVINCED OF THE RATIONALITY OF ALL ATTENDANT CIRCUMSTANCES.

The Story of the Tenson

In the year of grace 1265 (Nicolas begins), about the festival of Saint Peter ad Vincula, the Prince de Gatinais came to Burgos.  Before this he had lodged for three months in the district of Ponthieu; and the object of his southern journey was to assure the tenth Alphonso, then ruling in Castile, that the latter’s sister Ellinor, now resident at Entrechat, was beyond any reasonable doubt the transcendent lady whose existence old romancers had anticipated, however cloudily, when they fabled in remote time concerning Queen Heleine of Sparta.

There was a postscript to this news.  The world knew that the King of Leon and Castile desired to be King of Germany as well, and that at present a single vote in the Diet would decide between his claims and those of his competitor, Earl Richard of Cornwall.  De Gatinais chaffered fairly; he had a vote, Alphonso had a sister.  So that, in effect—­ohe, in effect, he made no question that his Majesty understood!

The Astronomer twitched his beard and demanded if the fact that Ellinor had been a married woman these ten years past was not an obstacle to the plan which his fair cousin had proposed?

Here the Prince was accoutred cap-a-pie, and hauled out a paper.  Dating from Viterbo, Clement, Bishop of Rome, servant to the servants of God, desirous of all health and apostolical blessing for his well-beloved son in Christ, stated that a compact between a boy of fifteen and a girl of ten was an affair of no particular moment; and that in consideration of the covenantors never having clapped eyes upon each other since the wedding-day,—­even had not the precontract of marriage between the groom’s father and the bride’s mother rendered a consummation of the childish oath an obvious and a most heinous enormity,—­why, that, in a sentence, and for all his coy verbosity, the new pontiff was perfectly amenable to reason.

So in a month it was settled.  Alphonso would give his sister to de Gatinais, and in exchange get the latter’s vote to make Alphonso King of Germany; and Gui Foulques of Sabionetta—­now Clement, fourth Pope to assume that name—­would annul the previous marriage, and in exchange get an armament to serve him against Manfred, the late and troublesome tyrant of Sicily and Apulia.  The scheme promised to each one of them that which he in particular desired, and messengers were presently sent into Ponthieu.