The knight was about to speak, when the sounds of voices approaching were heard through the low small door that opened from their chamber upon a stone gallery at the head of the staircase. De Coucy listened.
"Thou art bold!--thou art too bold!" cried one of the speakers, pausing opposite the door. "Tell not me of other prisoners! Thine orders were strict, that he should be kept alone.--What was 't to thee, if that mad De Coucy had rotted with fifty others in a cell? Thy charge is taken from thee. Speak not! but begone! Leave me thy keys.--Thou, Humbert, stand by with thy men. Listen not; but if I call, rush in. Mark me, dost thou? If I speak loud, rush in!"
The bolts were withdrawn, the key turned, and, the door opening, John, King of England, entered, stooping his head to pass the low arch of the doorway. Arthur had looked up at the first sound, and his pale cheek had become a hue paler, even before the appearance of his uncle; but, when John did at length approach, a quick sharp shudder passed over his nephew's form, as if there had been indeed some innate antipathy, which warned the victim that he was in presence of him destined to be his murderer.
The king advanced a step or two into the chamber, and then paused, regarding Arthur, who had risen from his seat, with a cold and calculating eye. A slight smile of gratification passed over his lip, as he remarked the sallow and emaciated state to which imprisonment and despair had reduced a form but three short months before full of life, and strength, and beauty.
The smile passed away instantly from a face little accustomed to express the real feelings of the heart; but John still continued for a moment to contemplate his nephew evidently little pained at the sight of the change he beheld, whether from that change he augured sufficient depression of mind to second his purpose of wringing from his nephew the cession of his claims, or whether he hoped that sickness might prove as good an auxiliary as murder, and spare him bloodshed, that would inevitably be accompanied by danger, as well as reproach. His eye then glanced through the sombre arches of the vault, till it rested on De Coucy with a sort of measuring fixedness, as if he sought to ascertain the exact space between himself and the knight.
Satisfied on this point, he turned again to Arthur.
"Well, fair nephew," said he, with that kind of irony which he seldom banished from his lips, "for three years I asked you in vain to honour my poor court with your noble presence. You have come at last, and doubtless the reception I have given you is such, that you will never think of departing from a place where you may be hospitably entertained for life. How love you prison walls, fair nephew?"
Arthur replied not; but, casting himself again upon the settle, covered his eyes as before, and seemed, from the quick rise and fall of his shoulders, to weep bitterly.
"Sir King," said De Coucy, interposing indignantly, "thou art, then, even more cruel than report gives thee out. Must thou needs add the torture of thy words to the tyranny of thine actions. In the name of God! bad man, leave this place of wretchedness, and give thy nephew, at least, such tranquillity as a prison may afford."
"Ha! beau sire de Coucy," cried John with an unaltered tone. "Methinks thou art that gallant knight who proclaimed Arthur Plantagenet King of England in the heart of Mirebeau. His kingdom is a goodly one," he continued, looking round the chamber, "gay and extensive is it! He has to thank thee much for it!--Let me tell thee, sir knight," he added, raising his voice and knitting his brow, "to the bad counsels of thee, and such as thee, Arthur Plantagenet owes all his sorrows and captivity. Ye have poisoned his ear against his kindred; ye have raised up in him ambitious thoughts that become him not; ye have taught him to think himself a king; and ye have cast him down from a prince to a prisoner."