Close before the king, on the tapestry, which spread over the steps on which his throne was raised, and extended some way into the hall, stood no less a person than the Brabançois, Jodelle, now dressed in a fine tunic of purple cloth, with a baldric of cloth of gold supporting by his side a cross-hilted sword.
His air was the invariable air of a parvenu, in which flippant, yet infirm self-conceit, struggles to supply the place of habitual self-possession, and in its eagerness defeats its object. Consummate vanity, when joined with grace, will sometimes supply the place of high breeding; but a man that doubts in the least is lost. Thus stood Jodelle, smiling in the plenitude, as he thought, of royal favour; yet, with irritable knowledge of his want of right to appear in such a presence, glancing his eye from time to time round the proud barons of England, who, occupied with thoughts of more dignified anger, scarcely condescended to despise him.
In the meanwhile, King John, as we have said, with a light and sneering smile upon his lips, amused himself with the conceited affectation of the Brabançois, who, enriched with the spoils of Mirebeau and several other towns in Poitou, now presented himself to claim the higher rewards that had been promised to his treachery. The king smiled; yet, in the dark recesses of his cruel heart, he at the very moment destined the man to death, with whom he jested as a favoured follower.
The simile of a cat and a mouse is almost as musty as the Prince of Denmark's proverb; and yet perhaps there is no other that would so aptly figure the manner in which John of England played with the traitor, of whose services he had availed himself to take his nephew prisoner.
"Well, beau Sire Jodelle," said he, after the Brabançois had made his obeisance, "doubtless you have exercised the royal permission we gave you, to plunder our loving subjects of Poitou to some purpose. Nay, your gay plumage speaks it. You were not feathered so, Sir Jodelle, when last we saw you. But our homely proverb has it, 'Fine feathers make fine birds.' Is it not so, Lord Pembroke?"
"Not always, sir," answered the earl boldly. "I have known a vulture plumed like an eagle, yet not deceive a daw!"
John's brow darkened for an instant, but the next it was all clear again, and he replied, "Your lordship follows a metaphor as closely as a buzzard does a field mouse. Think you not, Sire Jodelle, that our English lords have fine wits? Marry, if you had possessed as fine, you would have kept at a goodly distance from us all; for there are amongst us men that love you not, and you might chance to get one of those sympathetic knots tied round your neck that draw themselves the tighter the more you tug at them."
"I fear not, sire," replied Jodelle, though there was a sneering touch of earnest in the king's jests that made his cheek turn somewhat pale,--"I fear not; trusting that you will grant me your royal protection."
"That I will, man!--that I will!" replied the monarch, "and elevate you;" and he glanced his eyes round his court, to see if his jest was understood and appreciated. Some of the courtiers smiled, but the greater part still maintained their stern gravity; and John proceeded, applying to the Coterel the terms of distinctions used towards knights, not without an idea of mortifying those who heard, as well as of mocking him to whom they were addressed. "Well, beau sire," he said, "and what gives us the pleasure of your worshipful presence at this time? Some business of rare import, doubtless, some noble or knightly deed to be done."
"I am ever ready to do you what poor service I may, sire," replied Jodelle. "I come, therefore, to tell you that I have raised the band of free-companions, for which you gave me your royal permission, and to beg you to take order that they may have the pay[[25]] and appointments which you promised."