“You, madam,” said Don Jose scornfully, “have three hundred soldiers in your service, as I am informed. Whoever heard such proud words, madam, upon so much insufficiency?”
“Harkee, Don Jose,” said the little countess menacingly, “I would not have you give too free an expression to your private ideas, for there are dungeons under this castle which on a day have held your betters.”
“So I believe, madam,” said Don Jose. “But I stand in the light of one who would come between a woman and her inclination. Yet I would ask you to believe, madam, that in this matter I am your sincere well-wisher.”
“We none of us doubt that, sir,” said the Count of Nullepart in his sweetest accent, and looking upon the messenger with his charming melancholy. “And if, sir, you will heed madam’s youth rather than her speaking, you will be her good servant. If you will have the goodness to inform the King your master that his cartel has been received with all consideration and honourable courtesy; that his grace the Duke of Montesina will bestow all possible attention upon it during the interregnum of twenty days which his Majesty has nominated with so much kindness; and that any decision at which his grace may arrive shall be delivered to the King your master by another hand, all within this castle shall ever be yours in all humility.”
“Yes, that is right speaking,” said Sir Richard Pendragon, who had almost assumed the demeanour of a cardinal; “that is a ripe wisdom and a courteous maturity.”
“You speak well, sir,” said Don Jose de Fermosilla, making a low bow. “And I convey that message to the King, my master.”
“Perhaps it were not amiss, Sir Count,” said I, “if you put your good words in writing. Were it not well to call a scrivener?”
“Truly,” said the ambassador, “that would indeed be well.”
The Countess Sylvia, however, was furiously angry, but those three councillors who strove humbly to serve her attended her humours with the highest patience. Yet, for all their devices, they were not able entirely to succeed, for as soon as the scrivener was come into the room she bade him leave her presence on the pain of death.
In such circumstances our natural ally was the duke. But so completely had his lordship’s grace been overborne by the heats and violences of the day, that having picked his ortolan, he had duly fallen asleep on his stool in the middle of the negotiations. Therefore it remained for us, her councillors, to soften the affront that was like to be put by our mistress upon the Castilian. Yet in the end we could do no better than put our faith in the humanity and discretion of Don Jose de Fermosilla to represent the attitude of madam with a becoming leniency. For again and yet again did she announce her determination to flout her insolent cousin. And presently matters were brought to such a pass that it was only the highly diplomatic conduct of Sir Richard Pendragon in feigning utter deafness when she called on him in peremptory tones to summon the guard to have the envoy and the Count of Nullepart himself placed in a dungeon for seeking to outface her, that made it possible to conclude the matter at all.