"All that your worship has said is quite true," answered the lad; "but
the end of the business turned out just the opposite of what your worship
supposes."
"How! the opposite?" said Don Quixote; "did not the clown pay thee then?"
"Not only did he not pay me," replied the lad, "but as soon as your
worship had passed out of the wood and we were alone, he tied me up again
to the same oak and gave me a fresh flogging, that left me like a flayed
Saint Bartholomew; and every stroke he gave me he followed up with some
jest or gibe about having made a fool of your worship, and but for the
pain I was suffering I should have laughed at the things he said. In
short he left me in such a condition that I have been until now in a
hospital getting cured of the injuries which that rascally clown
inflicted on me then; for all which your worship is to blame; for if you
had gone your own way and not come where there was no call for you, nor
meddled in other people's affairs, my master would have been content with
giving me one or two dozen lashes, and would have then loosed me and paid
me what he owed me; but when your worship abused him so out of measure,
and gave him so many hard words, his anger was kindled; and as he could
not revenge himself on you, as soon as he saw you had left him the storm
burst upon me in such a way, that I feel as if I should never be a man
again."
"The mischief," said Don Quixote, "lay in my going away; for I should not
have gone until I had seen thee paid; because I ought to have known well
by long experience that there is no clown who will keep his word if he
finds it will not suit him to keep it; but thou rememberest, Andres, that
I swore if he did not pay thee I would go and seek him, and find him
though he were to hide himself in the whale's belly."
"That is true," said Andres; "but it was of no use."
"Thou shalt see now whether it is of use or not," said Don Quixote; and
so saying, he got up hastily and bade Sancho bridle Rocinante, who was
browsing while they were eating. Dorothea asked him what he meant to do.
He replied that he meant to go in search of this clown and chastise him
for such iniquitous conduct, and see Andres paid to the last maravedi,
despite and in the teeth of all the clowns in the world. To which she
replied that he must remember that in accordance with his promise he
could not engage in any enterprise until he had concluded hers; and that
as he knew this better than anyone, he should restrain his ardour until
his return from her kingdom.