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The war was nearly over, but one of its concluding chapters taught Bertram that the soldier who had been impudent enough to call Helena his “kicky-wicky” was far less courageous than a wife. Parolles was such a boaster, and so fond of trimings to his clothes, that the French officers played him a trick to discover what he was made of. He had lost his drum, and had said that he would regain it unless he was killed in the attempt. His attempt was a very poor one, and he was inventing the story of a heroic failure, when he was surrounded and disarmed.

“Portotartarossa,” said a French lord.

“What horrible lingo is this?” thought Parolles, who had been blindfolded.

“He’s calling for the tortures,” said a French man, affecting to act as interpreter. “What will you say without ’em?”

“As much,” replied Parolles, “as I could possibly say if you pinched me like a pasty.” He was as good as his word. He told them how many there were in each regiment of the Florentine army, and he refreshed them with spicy anecdotes of the officers commanding it.

Bertram was present, and heard a letter read, in which Parolles told Diana that he was a fool.

“This is your devoted friend,” said a French lord.

“He is a cat to me now,” said Bertram, who detested our hearthrug pets.

Parolles was finally let go, but henceforth he felt like a sneak, and was not addicted to boasting.

We now return to France with Helena, who had spread a report of her death, which was conveyed to the Dowager Countess at Rousillon by Lafeu, a lord who wished to marry his daughter Magdalen to Bertram.

The King mourned for Helena, but he approved of the marriage proposed for Bertram, and paid a visit to Rousillon in order to see it accomplished.

“His great offense is dead,” he said. “Let Bertram approach me.”

Then Bertram, scarred in the cheek, knelt before his Sovereign, and said that if he had not loved Lafeu’s daughter before he married Helena, he would have prized his wife, whom he now loved when it was too late.

“Love that is late offends the Great Sender,” said the King. “Forget sweet Helena, and give a ring to Magdalen.”

Bertram immediately gave a ring to Lafeu, who said indignantly, “It’s Helena’s!”

“It’s not!” said Bertram.

Hereupon the King asked to look at the ring, and said, “This is the ring I gave to Helena, and bade her send to me if ever she needed help. So you had the cunning to get from her what could help her most.”

Bertram denied again that the ring was Helena’s, but even his mother said it was.

“You lie!” exclaimed the King. “Seize him, guards!” but even while they were seizing him, Bertram wondered how the ring, which he thought Diana had given him, came to be so like Helena’s. A gentleman now entered, craving permission to deliver a petition to the King. It was a petition signed Diana Capilet, and it begged that the King would order Bertram to marry her whom he had deserted after winning her love.

“I’d sooner buy a son-in-law at a fair than take Bertram now,” said Lafeu.

“Admit the petitioner,” said the King.

Bertram found himself confronted by Diana and her mother. He denied that Diana had any claim on him, and spoke of her as though her life was spent in the gutter. But she asked him what sort of gentlewoman it was to whom he gave, as to her he gave, the ring of his ancestors now missing from his finger?

Bertram was ready to sink into the earth, but fate had one crowning generosity reserved for him. Helena entered.

“Do I see reality?” asked the King.

“O pardon! pardon!” cried Bertram.

She held up his ancestral ring. “Now that I have this,” said she, “will you love me, Bertram?”

“To the end of my life,” cried he.

“My eyes smell onions,” said Lafeu. Tears for Helena were twinkling in them.

The King praised Diana when he was fully informed by that not very shy young lady of the meaning of her conduct. For Helena’s sake she had wished to expose Bertram’s meanness, not only to the King, but to himself. His pride was now in shreds, and it is believed that he made a husband of some sort after all.