CHAPTER XV.
LAST _TENZON_ OF BERTRAN DE BORN I wish to be done with Bertran de Born, that lagging fox; but the dogs of my art must make a backward cast if they are to kill him in the open.
I beg the reader, then, to remember that when Richard left him half-throttled in his own house, and when he had recovered wind enough to stir his gall, he made preparations for a long journey to the South.
In that scandal concerning Alois of France he believed he had stuff which might wreck Count Richard more disastrously than Count Richard could wreck him.

He hoped to raise the South, and thither he went, his own dung-fly, buzzing over the offal he had blown; and the first point he headed for was Pampluna across the Pyrenees.

It is folly to dig into the mind of a man diseased by malice; better treat such like sour ground, burn with lime (or let God burn) and abide the event in faith.
If of all men in the world Bertran hated Richard of Anjou, it was not because Richard had misused him, but because he had used him too lightly.

Richard, offended with Bertran, gave him a flick on the ear and sent him to the devil with his japes.

He did no more because he valued him no more.