“Cousin, you are welcome! for truly do I know that when you have aught whereof to complain, you take not the moment of danger and disaster. And whatever has chanced to alienate your heart from me, the sound of the rebel’s trumpet chases all difference, and marries your faith to mine.”
“Oh, Edward, my king, why did you so misjudge me in the prosperous hour!” said Warwick, simply, but with affecting earnestness: “since in the adverse hour you arede me well?”
As he spoke, he bowed his head, and, bending his knee, kissed the hand held out to him.
Edward’s face grew radiant, and, raising the earl, he glanced proudly at the barons, who stood round, surprised and mute.
“Yes, my lords and sirs, see,—it is not the Earl of Warwick, next to our royal brethren the nearest subject to the throne, who would desert me in the day of peril!”
“Nor do we, sire,” retorted Raoul de Fulke; “you wrong us before our mighty comrade if you so misthink us. We will fight for the king, but not for the queen’s kindred; and this alone brings on us your anger.”
“The gates shall be opened to ye. Go! Warwick and I are men enough for the rabble yonder.”
The earl’s quick eye and profound experience of his time saw at once the dissension and its causes. Nor, however generous, was he willing to forego the present occasion for permanently destroying an influence which he knew hostile to himself and hurtful to the realm. His was not the generosity of a boy, but of a statesman. Accordingly, as Raoul de Fulke ceased, he took up the word.
“My liege, we have yet an hour good ere the foe can reach the gates. Your brother and mine accompany me. See, they enter! Please you, a few minutes to confer with them; and suffer me, meanwhile, to reason with these noble captains.”
Edward paused; but before the open brow of the earl fled whatever suspicion might have crossed the king’s mind.