Chapter Nineteen.
The glittering stone.
“You are satisfied, I trust, doctor, with our programme?” said the King, in a slightly ironical tone, as he passed to the window, humming an old hunting song as he tapped the panes, while Leoni remained standing near the table at which he had been busily engaged writing.
“Sir—” he began.
“Sit down, Master Leoni; sit down. You can respect my disguise better, and also more thoroughly please me. I was saying, you are satisfied?”
“Everything, sir, that you order is the best. Of that I am convinced; and yet, sir, I am anxious about the Majesty of France. I am common clay, sir. I am nothing; I can die; whereas you—”
“No, no, Leoni; not here, not here. We have left that in France. Do you not understand? Just at present we are travelling companions, and I look to you and to your great learning for assistance, just as I received it in the forest that night; and then it was timely indeed.”
“You are too indulgent, my lord, to any poor attainments that your servant may possess. Such as they are, they will always be at my lord’s service,” replied Leoni, and he slowly resumed his seat in the high-backed chair, in obedience to a commanding gesture from the King.