Before he reached the spot where Guerin stood, Philip dismounted, and gave his bridle to one of the squires. "I will through the garden," said he:--"go you round to the gates as quietly as possible--I would not have the poor burgesses know that I am returned, or I shall have petitions and lamentations about this accursed interdict: petitions that I cannot grant--lamentations that I would not hear."
The squire took the bridle, and, in obedience to the king's commands, turned another way with the rest of the party; while Philip advanced slowly, with his brow knit, and his eyes fixed on the ground. He did not observe his minister; and, as he came onward, it was easy to read deep, powerful, painful thought in every line of his countenance. Twice he stopped, as he advanced, with his look still bent upon the earth, and remained gazing thereon, without word or motion, for several minutes. It would have seemed that he paused to remark some moss and wild flowers, gathered together at his feet, had not his frowning forehead, and stern, fixed eye, as well as the mournful shake of the head, with which his pause still ended, told that sadder and more bitter contemplations were busy in his mind.
The last time he stopped was within ten paces of Guerin, and yet he did not see him, so deeply occupied were all his thoughts. At length, unclasping his arms, which had been folded over his breast, he clenched his hands tight, exclaiming, "Happy, happy Saladin! Thou hast no meddling priest to disturb thy domestic joys!--By Heaven! I will embrace thy creed, and worship Mahound!"
As he spoke, he raised his eyes, and they instantly rested on the figure of his minister. "Ha, Guerin!" cried the king, "has the interdict driven thee forth from the city?"
"Not so, sire," replied the minister. "I came forth to meditate here in silence, over what might be done to raise it.--Get thee gone, boy!" he continued, turning to his page. "Hie thee to the castle, and leave me with the king."
"Oh! Guerin!" said Philip, pursuing his own train of thought,--"oh Guerin! think of these base barons! these disloyal knights! After all their empty enthusiasm!--after all their vain boastings!--after all their lying promises!--falling off from me now, in my moment of need! like flies frightened from a dead carcase by the wings of a raven.--And the bishops too!--the goodly, saintly, fickle, treacherous pack, frightened by the very hum of Rome's vulture wings!--they leave me in the midst of the evil they have made! But, by the Lord above! they shall suffer for their treason! Bishops and barons! they shall feel this interdict as deeply as I do. Their treachery and cowardice shall fill my treasury, and shall swell my crown's domains; and they shall find that Philip knows how to make their punishment increase his power. Gournay has fallen, Guerin," continued the king, "without the loss of a man. I cut the high sluices and overwhelmed them in the waters of their own artificial lake. Walls, and turrets, and buttresses gave way before the rushing inundation, like straws before the sickle. Half Normandy has yielded without resistance; and I might have come back joyful, but that in every town as I passed, it was murmurs, and petitions, and lamentations on the foul interdict. They brought out their dead," proceeded Philip, grasping Guerin's arm,--"they brought out their dead, and laid them at my feet! They lined the streets with the dying, shrieking for the aid of religion. Oh! Guerin! my friend! 'tis very horrible!--very, very, very horrible!"
"It is indeed, sire!" said Guerin solemnly, "most horrible! and I am sorry to increase your affliction by telling you, that, by every courier that arrives, the most alarming accounts are brought from the various provinces of your kingdom, speaking of nothing but open rebellion and revolt."
"Where?" cried Philip Augustus, his eyes flashing fire. "Where? Who dares revolt against the will of their liege sovereign?"
"In fifty different points of the kingdom the populace are in arms, sire!" replied the minister. "I will lay the details before you at your leisure. Many of the barons, too, remonstrate in no humble tone."
"We will march against them, Guerin,--we will march against them," replied the king firmly, "and serfs and barons shall learn they have a lord."