Beyond that I never heard that Jehan Flemalle had any epitaph.
CHAPTER XIII
HIS MOST CHRISTIAN MAJESTY
It was Monsieur de Commines himself who came for me as I went my rounds of self-instruction three days after The Four Nations had gone a-hunting.
"The King calls you," he said, out of breath with haste; "I think your chance has come, for he has some scheme in his head."
"The King? What! This instant?" and I looked downward at my dress, plain, clean, and serviceable enough, but hardly fit for a court presentation.
"Bah! Catch fortune as she flies. Besides, silks and satins would not become the man who files a wolf's bars to save the King's life, and then hunts the brutes back to their cage at the risk of his own."
"But, Monseigneur, I did none of these things."
"No, but the King thinks you did, and that is the same thing. I told you the counter-plot was too trivial for me to lend my name to it. It would not hoist a man at the top of the ladder an inch higher; but you, who are at the bottom, it may raise a rung, or even two, if you are politic. Come, the King waits; he has his dogs to play with, but he may tire of them at any moment, and your chance be lost. One last word," he went on, as, hurrying at a trot whose pace was very significant in a man of Monseigneur's age and dignity, we drew near the mouth of the Cour au Soleil, where Louis warmed his cold blood in the sun. "Remember, you climb over my back. It is I who have brought you into Plessis, and there are many who would be glad to see you muddy my shoulders; therefore be watchful. Here in a sentence is the way to win and hold court favour. Catch the King's meaning, and jump with his humour, whatever it may be. Hush! not a word till he speaks, he is often like that."
The court was triangular in shape, and faced south. Across the apex of the angle a couch was drawn, and there, stretched upon its cushions, was Louis. One leg was drawn up under him, the other lay straight out, and where it showed below the edge of his mantle the calf was of a bigness no greater than my wrist. A sleeved cloak or coat of scarlet satin, lined and trimmed with ermine, wrapped him to the knees. A tight-fitting cap of the same colour as the cloak covered not alone the scalp, but coming round the back of the head as far as the nape, caught in his ears, leaving only the face exposed, and, my God! what a face it was! Meagre as a death's head, the smooth-shaven skin a yellow parchment, the nose long and thin as a vulture's beak, the full lips withered and shrivelled to a crumpling of livid skin tightened across broken teeth, the eyes—was he awake or asleep? living or dead? for though these eyes were open they had rolled back in their sockets and showed only a narrow splash of muddy grey shot with blood at the corners. One arm hung over the couch-edge almost to the ground, and the whole attitude was the pitiable collapse of a sick old age and utter weariness.