第139章 THE KING AND THE PRIEST.(4)

"She does it already, although she is your wife, sire! She imagines her exalted position renders her unamenable, and protects her from your righteous wrath; therefore she does what no one else dares do, and speaks what in the mouth of any other would be the blackest treason.""What does she? and what says she?" cried the king. "Do not hesitate to tell me, your highness. It behooves me well to know what my wife does and says.""Sire, she is not merely the secret patroness of heretics and reformers, but she is also a professor of their faith. She listens to their false doctrine with eager mind, and receives the cursed priests of this sect into her apartments, in order to hear their fanatical discourse and hellish inspiration. She speaks of these heretics as true believers and Christians; and denominates Luther the light that God has sent into the world to illuminate the gloom and falsehood of the Church with the splendor of truth and love--that Luther, sire, who dared write you such shameful and insulting letters, and ridiculed in such a brutal manner your royalty and your wisdom.""She is a heretic; and when you say that, you say everything!"screamed the king. The volcano was ripe for an eruption, and the seething lava must at last have an outlet. "Yes, she is a heretic!"repeated the king; "and yet we have sworn to exterminate these atheists from our land.""She very well knows that she is secure from your wrath," said Gardiner, with a shrug of his shoulders. "She relies on the fact that she is the queen, and that in the heart of her exalted husband love is mightier than the faith.""Nobody shall suppose that he is secure from my wrath, and no one shall rely on the security afforded him by my love. She is a proud, arrogant, and audacious woman!" cried the king, whose looks were just then fixed again on the chess-board, and whose spite was heightened by the remembrance of the lost game. "She ventures to brave us, and to have a will other than ours. By the holy mother, we will endeavor to break her stubbornness, and bend her proud neck beneath our will! Yes, I will show the world that Henry of England is still the immovable and incorruptible. I will give the heretics an evidence that I am in reality the defender and protector of the faith and of religion in my land, and that nobody stands too high to be struck by my wrath, and to feel the sword of justice on his neck.

She is a heretic; and we have sworn to destroy heretics with fire and sword. We shall keep our oath.""And God will bless you with His blessing. He will surround your head with a halo of fame; and the Church will praise you as her most glorious pastor, her exalted head.""Be it so!" said the king, as with youthful alacrity he strode across the room; and, stepping to his writing-table, with a vigorous and fleet hand he wrote down a few lines. Gardiner stood in the middle of the room with his hands folded; and his lips murmured in an undertone a prayer, while his large flashing eyes were fastened on the king with a curious and penetrating expression.

"Here, your highness," the king then said, "take this paper--take it and order everything necessary. It is an arrest-warrant; and before the night draws on, the queen shall be in the Tower.""Verily, the Lord is mighty in you!" cried Gardiner, as he took the paper; "the heavenly hosts sing their hallelujah and look down with rapture on the hero who subdues his own heart to serve God and the Church.""Take it and speed you!" said the king, hastily. "In a few hours everything must be done. Give Earl Douglas the paper, and bid him go with it to the lord-lieutenant of the Tower, so that he himself may repair hither with the yeomen of the guard. For this woman is yet a queen, and even in the criminal I will still recognize the queen.

The lord-lieutenant himself must conduct her to the Tower. Hasten then, say I! But, hark you, keep all this a secret, and let nobody know anything of it till the decisive moment arrives. Otherwise her friends might take a notion to implore my mercy for this sinner; and I abhor this whining and crying. Silence, then, for I am tired and need rest and sleep. I have, as you say, just done a work well pleasing to God; perhaps He may send me, as a reward for it, invigorating and strengthening sleep, which I have now so long desired in vain."And the king threw back the curtains of his couch, and, supported by Gardiner, laid himself on the downy cushion.

Gardiner drew the curtains again, and thrust the fatal paper into his pocket. Even in his hands it did not seem to him secure enough.

What! might not some curious eye fasten on it, and divine its contents? Might not some impertinent and shameless friend of the queen snatch this paper from him, and carry it to her and give her warning? No, no, it was not secure enough in his hands. He must hide it in the pocket of his gown. There, no one could find it, no one discover it.

So there he hid it. In the gown with its large folds it was safe;and, after he had thus concealed the precious paper, he left the room with rapid strides, in order to acquaint Earl Douglas with the glorious result of his plans.