“That is not what we wished to ask of you,” said the Prince, too sad and earnest to be amused even for a moment. “Tell us whom you said, even now, you had seen in the tent you shared with him in Africa.”
“I said I had seen his wraith,” said John.
No smile lighted upon the Prince’s features; they were as serious as those of the boy, as he commented, “His likeness—his exact likeness—you mean.”
“Ay,” said the boy; “but Richard proved to me after, that it had been less tall, and was bearded likewise. So I hoped it did not bode him ill.”
“Worse, I fear, than if it had in sooth been his double,” said Gloucester to Prince Edmund. The Prince added the question whether this visitor had spoken; and John related the inquiry for Richard by the name of Montfort, and his own reply, which elicited a murmur of amused applause among the bystanders.
The Prince, however, continued in the same grave manner to draw from the little witness his account of Richard’s injunction to secresy; and then asked about the letter-writing, of which John gave his plain account. The Prince then said, “Speak now, Hamlyn.”
“This, then, I have to add, my Lord, that I, as all the world, remarked that Richard de Montfort consorted much with Sir Reginald de Ferrières, who, as we all remember, is the son of a family deeply concerned in the Mad Parliament. By Sir Reginald, on his arrival at Castel San Giovanni, a messenger is despatched, bearing letters to the Hospital at Florence, and it is immediately after his arrival there, that the two Montforts speed from the Maremma to the unhappy and bloody Mass at Viterbo.”
“You hear, Richard!” said the Prince. “I bade you choose between me and your brothers. Had you believed me that you could not serve both, it had been better for you. I credit not that you incited them to the assassination; but your tidings led them to perpetrate it. I cannot retain the spy of the Montforts in my camp.”
“My Lord,” said Richard, at last finding space for speech, “I deny all collusion with my brothers. I have neither seen, spoken with, nor sent to them by letter nor word.”
“Then to whom was this letter?” demanded the Prince.