Andrés, and the merchants of Toledo

I left the castle at dawn so light of heart that Rocinante seemed to feel it through the saddle. On the castellan's advice I meant to go home first for money, shirts and a squire. But I had not gone a mile when I heard, from a thicket on my right, the cries of someone in distress, and I thanked heaven for sending me work so soon.

01 Andrés

A boy of perhaps fifteen was tied to an oak, bare to the waist, and a heavy-set farmer was laying into him with a leather belt, lecturing him between strokes. I told the farmer, in a voice I did not know I possessed, that it was a coward's act to beat someone who could not strike back, and that if he would take up the lance leaning against the tree I would teach him so properly.

The farmer, seeing armour and a levelled lance, became very mild. The boy, he explained, was his shepherd, and lost him a sheep a day through carelessness, and then claimed he was beaten only so that his master could avoid paying him. I asked the boy what he was owed. Nine months, he said, at seven reales a month. I worked it out: sixty-three reales. I told the farmer to untie him and pay him at once.

The farmer, whose name was Juan Haldudo, of Quintanar, said he had no money on him, but that if the boy, Andrés, came home with him, he would pay every coin and something over. Andrés said he would not go anywhere alone with that man for all the money in Spain, since the moment I was out of sight he would be skinned. I told him he was mistaken. A man who swears by the order of chivalry does not break his word. Andrés pointed out that his master was no knight. I answered that this was neither here nor there, since a man is made by what he does and not by what he was born, and Haldudo might yet be a knight in his conduct.

Haldudo swore, by every order of knighthood he could name, and by some he could not, that he would pay the boy in full, in good coin, and perfumed. I told him who I was, Don Quixote de la Mancha, righter of wrongs, so that he would know whom to fear if he failed, and I promised to find him wherever he hid. Then I rode away, and as I went I heard him calling Andrés to him in the warmest voice, saying he meant to settle up now, and generously. I confess my heart was full. On my very first morning I had turned a hard man soft and put sixty-three reales in a poor boy's hand.

I have thought of Andrés often since, always with satisfaction. If I did not look back, it was because to doubt another man's oath is to insult him. I hope to meet the boy again one day and hear him tell it himself.

02 The merchants

Two miles on, at a crossroads, I saw a party approaching: six merchants of Toledo on their way to buy silk in Murcia, under sunshades, with servants on horseback and muleteers on foot. I knew at once what the moment required. I planted myself in the road and announced that no one would pass until he had confessed that there was no lady in the world more beautiful than the Empress of La Mancha, the peerless Dulcinea del Toboso.

One merchant, a wit, said they would gladly confess it if I would only show them the lady. I explained that this would make it worthless: the merit lay in believing it unseen and swearing to it all the same. He then asked whether I might at least show them a likeness, however small, and added that even if it showed her with a squint and a running eye, they would say whatever I liked about her, to oblige me.

That was more than a knight could hear of his lady. I lowered my lance and charged, and it would have gone very badly for that merchant had Rocinante not chosen that instant to stumble. He went down, and I went over his head and rolled some distance, and found that with lance, shield, spurs and my great-grandfather's armour all on top of me I could not rise. I continued, from the ground, to inform them of their cowardice, and to make clear that the fault was my horse's and not mine.

One of their muleteers, a man of poor character, took my lance, broke it, and beat me with the pieces until there were no pieces left. His masters called on him to stop, but he was enjoying himself. Then they went on their way with plenty to talk about.

I lay there consoling myself that such misfortunes are proper to knights errant. A neighbour of mine, Pedro Alonso, coming back from the mill, found me and set me on his donkey to take me home. On the way I recited ballads that seemed to fit my case. He said very little. I think he was moved.

For the sage who will set this down: it was the horse. Write it plainly, so no enchanter may smudge it.