Before my exile from her side I had begun to fear that my idol was but a thing of stone; and now that I had learned to know myself, and to see her as she really was, I realized that I had been worshipping naught but clay for lo, these many years.

There was only this consolation in the thought for me: every man at some time in his life is a fool--made such by a woman.

It is given to but few men to have for their fool-maker the rightful queen of three kingdoms.

All that was left to me of my life of devotion was a shame-faced pride in the quality of my fool-maker.

"Then," thought I, "I have at last turned to be my own fool-maker." But I suppose it had been written in the book of fate that I should ride from Haddon a lovelorn youth of thirty-five, and I certainly was fulfilling my destiny to the letter.
I continued to ride up the Lathkil until I came to a fork in the road.