"Sir," said Cromwell at once, "I should have waited on you sooner, but I have been sick of an imposthume in the head. But now I am here I have weighty matters to say, and I would have Your Majesty give a keen ear to my words."
"Am I not ever," said Charles, with a faint smile, "attentive to your words?"
"I know not," replied Cromwell, with his plain outspokenness. "I cannot read the heart of Your Majesty," and he looked at him straightly.
With the tip of his cane Charles disturbed the first little dead gold leaves which lay at his feet.
"Ah," he replied slowly, "so you have weighty things to say?"
He had long known that his conferences with the leaders of the army must come to a crisis and a plain issue soon; it had not been his purpose to force this moment until his plans were all smoothly arranged, but now he was ready enough. As usual he had his points clear, his feelings under command, as usual his manner was gentle, contained, courteous, his mind alert and watchful; yet there was a weariness in his face and voice that all his art could not disguise, as he came again to the old wretched business of speaking his enemies fair, as he once more engaged in the endless game of negotiation, proposal and counter-proposal, which he never intended should come to anything.
The keen eyes of Commissary-General Ireton detected the shudder of reluctance, almost repulsion, which Charles so instantly repressed.
"We will be short, Your Majesty," he said, "and it is not our intention to ask you for more audiences. The army doth not like our meeting. All must be settled in this coming together."
Charles glanced up at the two men standing before him as John Pym had stood before him once in another of his royal gardens—Pym was dead, but his principles were alive indeed; Charles thought that if the old Puritan was in any hell which allowed him a glimpse of the earth he must be grinning derisively at this scene now.
"We have had," said Cromwell, not waiting for Charles to speak, "conferences, rendezvous, councils of war, much running to and fro between the army and the Parliament, many talks between ourselves and Your Majesty. Surely this thing must come to an end. The country is without a government, and many extreme and fanatic men do seize the time to unsettle the mind of the vulgar with fierce, empty words."