“The Lord put His words once into the mouth of an ass,” replied Perrote, meekly. “I think I may claim to be an ass’s equal. I have spoken, fair Lord, and I shall add no more. The responsibility lies now with you. My message is delivered, and I pray God to give you ears to hear.”
“Sir Godfrey Foljambe, is this the manner in which you think it meet that one of your household should address a Prince?”
“Most gracious Lord, I am deeply distressed that this gentlewoman should so far have forgotten herself. But I humbly pray your Grace to remember that she is but a woman; and women have small wit and much spitefulness.”
“In good sooth, I have need to remember it!” answered the Duke, wrathfully. “I never thought, when I put myself to the pains to journey over half England to satisfy the fancies of a sick woman, that I was to be received with insult and contumely after this fashion. I pray you to send this creature out of my sight, as the least reparation that can be offered for such an injury.”
“You need not, Sir,” was the immediate reply of Perrote. “I go, for mine errand is done. And for the rest, may God judge between us, and He will.”
The Duke sat down to the collation hastily spread before him, with the air of an exceedingly injured man. He would not have been quite so angry, if his own conscience had not been so provoking as to second every word of Perrote’s reprimand. And as it is never of the least use for a man to quarrel with his conscience, he could do nothing but make Perrote the scape-goat, unless, indeed, he had possessed sufficient grace and humility to accept and profit by the rebuke:—which in his eyes, was completely out of the question. Had the Archbishop of York been the speaker, he might possibly have condescended so far. But the whims of an old nurse—a subject—a woman—he told himself, must needs be utterly beneath the notice of any one so exalted. The excellence of the medicine offered him could not even be considered, if it were presented in a vessel of common pottery, chipped at the edges.
Notwithstanding his wrath, the Duke did sufficient justice to the collation; and he then demanded, if it must be, to be taken to his mother at once. The sooner the ordeal was over, the better, and he did not mean to remain at Hazelwood an hour longer than could be helped.
Lady Foljambe went up to prepare the Countess for the interview. In her chamber she found not only Amphillis, who was on duty, but the Archbishop also. He sat by the bed with the book of the Gospels in his hands—a Latin version, of course—from which he had been translating a passage to the invalid.
“Well, what now, Avena?” faintly asked the Countess, who read news in Lady Foljambe’s face.
There was no time to break it very gradually, for Lady Foljambe knew that the Duke’s impatience would not brook delay.