The Nonexistent Knight Read Online Free PDF Page A

smell, went up to the mess tin and began licking the last traces of soup. In doing this its prickles touched up against the bare sole of Gurduloo’s foot, and the more it licked up the last trickles of soup the more its prickles pressed on the bare foot Eventually the vagabond opened his eyes and rolled them around, without realising where that sensation of pain which had awoken him came from. He saw his bare foot standing upright in the grass like an Indian fig tree, and the prickle against his foot.
    “Oh foot!” Gurduloo began to say. “Hey foot, I’m talking to you! What are you doing there like an idiot? Don’t you see that creature is tickling you? Oh f-o-o-o-t! Oh fool! Why don’t you pull yourself away? Don’t you feel it hurting? Fool of a foot! You need do so little, you need only move a tiny inch! Look how you're letting yourself be massacred! Foot! Just listen! Can’t you see you’re being taken advantage of? Pull over there, foot! Watch carefully now. See what I’m doing; I’ll show you ...” So saying he bent his knee, pulled his foot toward him and moved it away from the hedgehog. “There, it was quite easy, as soon as I showed you what to do you did it by yourself. Silly foot, why did you stay there so long and get yourself pricked?”
    He rubbed the aching part, jumped up, began whistling, broke into a run, flung himself into the bushes, let out a fart, another, then vanished.
    Agilulf began moving to try and find him, but where had he gone? The valley was striped with thickly sown fields of oats, clumps of arbutus, privet; and swept by breezes laden with pollen and butterflies, and above, by clusters of white clouds. Gurduloo had vanished in it all, down that slope where the sun was drawing mobile patterns of shadow and light He might be in any part of this or that slope.
    From somewhere came a faint discordant song: “De stir les ponts de Bayonne ...”
    The white armor of tall Agilulf stood high on the edge of the valley, its arms crossed on its chest.
    “Well, when does the new squire begin his duties?” asked his colleagues.
    Mechanically, in a voice without intonation, came Agilulf’s declaration. “A verbal statement by the emperor has the validity of an immediate decree.”
    “De sur les ponts de Bayonne ...” came the voice still further away.

4
    WORLD conditions were still confused in the era when this took place. It was not rare then to find names and thoughts and forms and institutions that corresponded to nothing in existence. But at the same time the world was polluted with objects and capacities and persons who lacked any name or distinguishing mark. It was a period when the will and determination to exist, to leave a trace, to rub up against all that existed, was not wholly used since there were many who did nothing about it—from poverty or ignorance or simply from finding things bearable as they were—and so a certain amount was lost into the void. Maybe too there came a point when this diluted will and consciousness of self was condensed, turned to sediment, as imperceptible watery particles condense into banks of clouds; and then maybe this sediment merged, by chance or instinct, with some name or family or military rank or duties or regulations, above all in an empty armor, for in times when armor was necessary even for a man who existed, how much more was it for one who didn’t. Thus it was that Agilulf of the Guildivern had begun to act and acquire glory for himself.
    I who recount this tale am Sister Theodora, nun of the order of Saint Colomba. I am writing in a convent, from old unearthed papers or talk heard in our parlor, or a few rare accounts by people who were actually present We nuns have few occasions to speak with soldiers, so what I don't know I try to imagine. How else could I do it? Not all of the story is clear to me yet. I must crave indulgence. We country girls, however noble, have always led retired lives in remote castles and convents. Apart