yarrr, ye scurvy boy-king, halt ye whinin'

"Wait, boy, wait!" The squat little man rolled forward, affectionate concern on his great ugly face, and he set one of his pudgy hands on his godson's shoulder. "Now listen to me, Andre," he reasoned. "This is sheer knight-errantry -- moonshine, lunacy. You'll come to no good by it if you persist. You've read Don Quixote, and what happened to him when he went tilting against windmills. It's what will happen to you, neither more nor less. Leave things as they are, my boy. I wouldn't have a mischief happen to you."

Andre-Louis looked at him, smiling wanly.

"I swore an oath to-day. [...]"

"You mean that you'll go in spite of anything that I may say?" Impetuous as he was inconsequent, M. de Kercadiou was bristling again. "Very well, then, go...Go to the devil!"

"I will begin with the King's Lieutenant."

"And if you get into the trouble you are seeking, don't come whimpering to me for assistance," the seigneur stormed. He was very angry now. "Since you choose to disobey me, you can break your empty head against the windmill. [...]"

Andre-Louis bowed with a touch of irony, and reached the door.

"If the windmill should prove too formidable," said he, from the threshold, "I may see what can be done with the wind. Goodbye, monsieur my godfather."

He was gone, and M. de Kercadiou was alone, purple in the face, puzzling out that last cryptic utterance, and not at all happy in his mind, either on the score of his godson or of M. de La Tour d'Azyr. He was disposed to be angry with them both. He found these headstrong, wilful men who relentlessly followed their own impulses very disturbing and irritating. Himself he loved his ease, and to be at peace with his neighbours; and that seemed to him so obviously the supreme good of life that he was disposed to brand them as fools who troubled to seek other things.

from Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini