"Yes," agreed Charles, who was not sorry to hear it, and who hoped, in the troubled waters of these divisions, to fish for his own benefit; he was already like a wedge between Parliament and army, splitting them further apart.
"I am here," continued Cromwell, "as representing the army."
"Sent by a deputation?" asked the King keenly. His greatest hope was in the army.
"Sent by no deputation," returned the other firmly. "Inspired only by the Lord, yet what I offer I could engage the fulfilment of."
There was a quiet assumption of power in these words that was wormwood to the King, but he controlled himself.
"You have come to propose terms," he said. "I have been listening to terms for long weary months. What are yours?"
"Nay, I make no terms with Your Majesty," said Cromwell. "I only wish you to be sincere with your people."
It was what John Pym had said at the very beginning—before the war, Charles remembered; he remembered, too, that he had offered Pym a price and Pym had refused. "You did not bid high enough," the Queen said afterwards. Charles, ever untaught by experience, proceeded to repeat with Cromwell the tactics he had used with Pym. What, after all, could this man have come for, save to drive a bargain? And he was worth bargaining with, as Pym had been—powerful rebels both!
The King's eyes shot hate at the quiet figure before him, but he answered smoothly—