Part 22 (1/2)
”Being a near kinsman,” he said at last, ”it is not seemly that I should say aught against the Earl of Douglas; but this I do know--there will be no peace in Scotland till that young man and his brother are both cut off.”
The Chancellor and de Retz exchanged glances. The anxiety of the next-of-kin to the t.i.tle of Earl of Douglas for the peace and prosperity of the realm seemed to strike them both as exceedingly natural in the circ.u.mstances.
”And now, Sir Alexander, what say you?” asked the Sieur de Retz, turning to the King's guardian, who had been caressing the curls of his beard with his white and signeted hand.
”I agree,” he replied in a courtly tone, ”that in the interests of the King and of the n.o.ble lady whose care for her child hath led her to such sacrifices, we ought to put a limit to the pride and insolence of this youth!”
The Chancellor bent over a parchment to hide a smile at the sacrifices which the Queen Mother had made for her son.
”It is indeed, doubtless,” said Sir William Crichton, ”a sacrifice that the King and his mother should dwell so long within this Castle of Stirling, exposed to every rude blast from off these barren Grampians. Let her bring him to the mild and equable climate of Edinburgh, which, as I am sure your Excellency must have observed, is peculiarly suited to the rearing of such tender plants.”
He appealed to the Sieur de Retz.
The marshal bowed and answered immediately, ”Indeed, it reminds me of the sunniest and most favoured parts of my native France.”
The tutor of the King looked somewhat uncomfortable at the suggestion and shook his head. He had no idea of putting the King of Scots within the power of his arch enemy in the strong fortress of Edinburgh.
But the Frenchman broke in before the ill effects of the Chancellor's speech had time to turn the mind of the King's guardian from the present project against the Earl of Douglas.
”But surely, gentlemen, it should not be difficult for two such honourable men to unite in destroying this curse of the commonweal--and afterwards to settle any differences which may in the past have arisen between themselves.”
”Good,” said the Chancellor, ”you speak well. But how are we to bring the Earl within our danger? Already I have sent him offers of alliance, and so, I doubt not, hath my honourable friend the tutor of the King. You know well what answer the proud chief of Douglas returned.”
The lips of Sir Alexander Livingston moved. He seemed to be taking some bitter and nauseous drug of the apothecary.
”Yes, Sir Alexander, I see you have not forgot. The words,'If dog eat dog, what should the lion care?' made us every caitiff's scoff throughout broad Scotland.”
”For that he shall yet suffer, if G.o.d give me speed,” said the tutor, for the answer had been repeated to the Queen, who, being English, laughed at the wit of the reply.
”I would that my boy should grow up such another as that Earl Douglas,” she had said.
The tutor stroked his beard faster than ever, and there was in his eyes the bitter look of a handsome man whose vanity is wounded in its weakest place.
”But, after all, who is to cage the lion?” said the Chancellor, pertinently.
The marshal of France raised his hand from the table as if commanding silence. His suave and courtier-like demeanour had changed into something more natural to the man. There came the gaunt forward thrust of a wolf on the trail into the set of his head. His long teeth gleamed, and his eyelids closed down upon his eyes till these became mere twinkling points.
”I have that at hand which hath already tamed the lion,” he said, ”and is able to lead him into the cage with cords of silk.”
He rose from the table, and, going to a curtain that concealed the narrow door of an antechamber, he drew it aside, and there came forth, clothed in a garment of gold and green, close-fitting and fine, clasped about the waist with a twining belt of jewelled snakes, the Lady Sybilla.
CHAPTER XXVI
THE LION TAMER
On this summer afternoon the girl's beauty seemed more wondrous and magical than ever. Her eyes were purple-black, like the berries of the deadly nightshade seen in the twilight. Her face was pale, and the scarlet of her lips lay like twin geranium petals on new-fallen snow.
Gilles de Retz followed her with a certain grim and ghastly pride, as he marked the sensation caused by her entrance.
”This,” he said, ”is my lion tamer!”