Slaye gave a wild sardonic laugh. “First you must convince Derwe Coreme of your authority. She is of the House of Domber, gloomy and fitful; she looks little more than a girl, but she manifests the brooding carelessness of a forest grue. Beware of Derwe Coreme; she will order you and my amulet plunged into the ocean's deep!”

“If you fear to this extent,” said Cugel with asperity, “instruct me in the use of the amulet, and I will prevent that calamity.”

But Slaye mulishly shook his head. “The deficiencies of Derwe Coreme are known; why exchange them for the outlandish excesses of a vagabond?”

For his outspokenness Slaye received a buffet which sent him staggering. Cugel then proceeded along the shore. The sun wallowed low upon the sea; he hastened his steps, anxious to find shelter before dark.

He came at last to the end of the beach. The headland loomed above, with the tall dark trees standing still higher. A balustrade surrounding the gardens showed intermittently through the foliage; somewhat below, a colonnaded rotunda overlooked the ocean to the south. Grandeur indeed! thought Cugel, and he examined the amulet with a new attentiveness. His temporary heart's-desire, sovereignty over Cil, had become no longer felicitious. And Cugel wondered if he should not fix upon a new heart's-desire — an aspiration to master the lore of animal husbandry, for instance, or a compelling urge to excel at acrobatic feats.... Reluctantly Cugel dismissed the scheme. In any event, the cogency of the shell-creature's curse was not yet certain.

A path left the beach, to wind up among bushes and odorous shrubs: dymphian, heliotrope, black quince, olus, beds of long-stemmed stardrops, shade ververica, flowering amanita. The beach became a ribbon fading into the maroon blur of sunset, and the headland at Benbadge Stull could no longer be seen. The path became level, traversed a dense grove of bay trees, and issued upon a weed-grown oval, at one time a parade ground or exercise field.

Along the left boundary was a tall stone wall, broken by a great ceremonial portico which held aloft a heraldic device of great age. The gates stood wide upon a marble-flagged promenade a mile in length leading to the palace: this a richly detailed structure of many tiers, with a green bronze roof. A terrace extended along the front of the palace; promenade and terrace were joined by a flight of broad steps. The sun had now disappeared; gloom descended from the sky. With no better shelter in prospect, Cugel set off toward the palace.

The promenade at one time had been a work of monumental elegance, but now all was in a state of dilapidation which the twilight invested with a melancholy beauty. To right and left were elaborate gardens now untended and overgrown. Marble urns festooned with garlands of carnelian and jade flanked the promenade; down the center extended a line of pedestals somewhat taller than the height of a man. Each of these supported a bust, identified by an inscription in runes which Cugel recognized as similar to those carved on the amulet The pedestals were five paces apart, and proceeded the entire mile to the terrace. The carving of the first was softened by wind and rain until the faces were barely discernible; as Cugel proceeded the features became more keen. Pedestal after pedestal, bust after bust; each face stared briefly at Cugel as he marched toward the palace. The last of the series, obscure in the fading Jight, depicted a young woman. Cugel stopped short: this was the girl of the walking boat, whom he had encountered in the land to the north: Derwe Coreme, of the House of Domber, ruler of Cil!