"Your Eminence will take no notice of the Count," he said, "since he is obviously far gone in wine."
"I take no notice of any of you," replied the Cardinal, "and I think you are more drunk with treason than with wine——"
"Treason?" shouted Brederode; "who dares give that word to me?"
And he was hurling himself on the Cardinal, but Hoogstraaten and Adolphus held him back and forced him against the wall; he laughed and broke loose from them, disappearing in the shadows behind the Cardinal's carriage.
"Ah, Floris Montmorency," cried the Cardinal, "is this the place for the Stadtholder of Hainault?"
"I but amuse myself with my companions," replied Montigny, with a smile, though he was deeply conscious of his false position.
"The nobles of the Netherlands choose dangerous amusements," said the Cardinal, "and the Princes of Nassau dangerous company," he added, glancing at Adolphus.
The three nobles, bitterly irritated at the Cardinal's questions and his delay, could hardly restrain their impatience, especially as they suspected that he knew well enough what they were about, and what they concealed behind them on the church door.
"You think I too dare something in reprimanding you?" said Granvelle, "yet I cannot believe that the chivalrous Houses of Nassau, Lalaing, and Montmorency would combine against a defenceless priest."
"Your Eminence need have no fear of that," replied Montigny, "though we are not among those who have found priests defenceless—nay, very much the opposite."