Zaraides cried out in vehement protest. “By ho means! Cugel distorts the case! If pure justice were done, both Cugel and Fabeln should be tallied to my score!”

“All is as before!” called out the shrill voice.

Zaraides threw up his hands and went to writing parchments with furious zeal, Fabeln hunched himself on a stool and sat in placid reflection. Cugel, in crawling past, kicked a leg from the stool and Fabeln fell to the floor. He rose and sprang at Cugel, who threw the stool at him.

“Order!” called the shrill voice. “Order or penalties will be inflicted!”

“Cugel dislodged the stool, to send me sprawling,” complained Fabeln. “Why is he not punished?”

“The sheerest mischance.” stated Cueel. “In my opinion the irascible Fabeln should be placed incommunicado, for at least two, or more properly, three weeks.”

Fabeln began to sputter, but the shrill voice behind the grate enjoined an impartial silence upon all.

Food was presently brought, a coarse porridge of offensive odor. After the meal all were forced to crawl to a constricted burrow on a somewhat lower level, where they were chained to the wall. Cugel fell into a troubled sleep, to be awakened by a call through the door to Fabeln: “The message has been delivered — it was read with great attention.”

“Good news!” came Fabeln's voice. “Tomorrow I shall walk the forest a free man!”

“Silence,” croaked Zaraides from'the dark. “Must I daily write parchments for everyone's benefit but my own, only to lie awake by night to your vile gloating?”

“Ha ha!” chortled Fabeln. “Hear the voice of the ineffectual wizard!”

“Alas for my lost librams!” groaned Zaraides. “You would sing a vastly different tune!”

“In what quarter are they to be found?” inquired Cugel cautiously.

“As to that, you must ask these foul murids; they seized me unawares.”

Fabeln raised his head to complain. “Do you intend to exchange reminiscences the whole night through? I wish to sleep.”

Zaraides, infuriated, began to upbraid Fabeln in so violent a manner that the rat-folk ran into the burrow and dragged him away, leaving Cugel and Fabeln alone.

In the morning Fabeln ate his porridge with great rapidity. “Now then,” he called to the grating, “detach this collar, that I may go forth to summon the second of my tallies, Cugel being the first.”

“Bah,” muttered Cugel. “Infamous!”

The rat-folk, paying no heed to Fabeln's protests, adjusted the collar even more tightly around his neck, affixed the chain and pulled him forth on hands and knees, and Cugel was left alone.

He tried to sit erect, but the damp dirt pressed on his neck, and he slumped back down on his elbows. “Cursed rat-creatures! Somehow I must evade them! Unlike Fabeln, I have no household to draw from, and the efficacy of Zaraides' parchments is questionable.... Conceivably, however, others may wander close, in the fashion, of Fabeln and myself.” He turned to the gate, behind which sat the sharp-eyed monitor. “In order to recruit the required two items, I wish to wait outside the cave.”