“Stop, Crampas, no more of that.  It is indecent, and disgusting besides.  And all this when we are just about on the point of eating lunch!”

“I for my part am not affected by it, as I make it my rule to let my appetite depend only upon the menu.”

During this conversation they had come from the beach, according to program, to a bench built in the lee of the dunes, with an extremely primitive table in front of it, simply a board on top of two posts.  Kruse, who had ridden ahead, had the lunch already served—­tea rolls, slices of cold roast meat, and red wine, and beside the bottle stood two pretty little gold-rimmed glasses, such as one buys in watering places or takes home as souvenirs from glass works.

They dismounted.  Kruse, who had tied the reins of his own horse around a stunted pine, walked up and down with the other two horses, while Crampas and Effi sat down at the table and enjoyed the clear view of beach and mole afforded by a narrow cut through the dunes.

The half-wintery November sun shed its fallow light upon the still agitated sea and the high-running surf.  Now and then a puff of wind came and carried the spray clear up to the table.  There was lyme grass all around, and the bright yellow of the immortelles stood out sharply against the yellow sand they were growing in, despite the kinship of colors.  Effi played the hostess.  “I am sorry, Major, to have to pass you the rolls in a basket lid.”

“I don’t mind the platter, so long as it holds a favor.”

“But this is Kruse’s arrangement—­Why, there you are too, Rollo.  But our lunch does not take you into account.  What shall we do with Rollo?”

“I say, give him everything—­I for my part out of gratitude.  For, you see, dearest Effi—­”

Effi looked at him.

“For, you see, most gracious Lady, Rollo reminds me of what I was about to tell you as a continuation or counterpart of the Vitzliputzli story, only much more racy, because a love story.  Have you ever heard of a certain Pedro the Cruel?”

“I have a faint recollection.”

“A kind of Bluebeard king.”

“That is fine.  That is the kind girls like best to hear about, and I still remember we always said of my friend Hulda Niemeyer, whose name you have heard, I believe, that she knew no history, except the six wives of Henry the Eighth, that English Bluebeard, if the word is strong enough for him.  And, really, she knew these six by heart.  You ought to have heard her when she pronounced the names, especially that of the mother of queen Elizabeth,—­so terribly embarrassed, as though it were her turn next—­But now, please, the story of Don Pedro.”

“Very well.  At Don Pedro’s court there was a handsome black Spanish knight, who wore on his breast the cross of Calatrava, which is about the equivalent of the Black Eagle and the Pour le Merite together.  This cross was essential, they always had to wear it, and this Calatrava knight, whom the queen secretly loved, of course—­”