"How far have you gone?" asked the King.
"We move but slowly; but we never lose what we have once conquered."
"So you, in fact, are the King of the Wizards," said Charles IX., piqued at finding himself so small a personage in the presence of this man.
The imposing Grand Master of Adepts flashed a look at him that left him thunder-stricken.
"You are the King of men," replied he; "I am the King of Ideas. Besides, if there were real wizards, you could not have burned them!" he added, with a touch of irony. "We too have our martyrs."
"But by what means," the King went on, "do you cast nativities? How did you know that the man near your window last night was the King of France? What power enabled one of your race to foretell to my mother the fate of her three sons? Can you, the Grand Master of the Order that would fain knead the world,—can you, I say, tell me what the Queen my mother is thinking at this moment?"
"Yes, Sire."
The answer was spoken before Cosmo could pull his brother's coat to warn him.
"You know why my brother, the King of Poland, is returning home?"
"Yes, Sire."