"Sir," he replied, "you may yet hear worse words than any I have said, and may have to bear a rougher speech. I did not come to rail, but to tell you that I am now persuaded there can be no treaty or understanding between you and us. Sir, others advised me of this awhile ago, but I would not listen. But now the hand of God is plainly discoverable—your plots and subterfuges are revealed, sir, your secret letters to the Queen are known."
Charles, whose quick mind had been reviewing all the possible disasters that could have befallen, who had been wondering which of his intrigues had been unveiled, was not prepared for a catastrophe so complete as the discovery of his secret correspondence with his wife, which revealed, not one, but all of his complicated plots.
As Cromwell told him at last the cause of his sudden estrangement, he felt at once a shock and a premonition chill his heart; he remembered quite clearly what had been in his last letter to the Queen, and the statement that he had made in his irritation and humiliation regarding Cromwell and Ireton, and he saw that another golden chance had gone, and that he had lost for ever the help of the army which he had sacrificed so much pride to gain.
But he faced this misfortune as he had faced so many others, with unfailing courage and dignity.
"You pretend to deal with me as your king," he said, "but you treat me as your prisoner. I am spied upon, and my very letters opened.... There is no more to be said."
Cromwell did not deny the charge, as he might well have done, since Major Harrison, and not he, had tracked and arrested the King's messenger.
"My hopes of you are dead," he merely said. "I would have you leave Hampton, for I know not what the army may do, and if they take you to Whitehall now, sir, it will not be as a king, but as a prisoner."
"I am well used to that treatment," replied Charles, with hot bitterness, "nor have I looked for any other at the hands of rebellious fanatics. Didst thou think," he added, with the full force of that fury and scorn he had so long concealed breaking the bounds of his fitful prudence and his steady courtesy, "that I ever regarded thee as my friend?"
"I would have been so, sincerely," replied Cromwell, with his unruffled, melancholy calm. "I and Ireton risked our prestige with the army to make conferences and debates with you, but it hath been as if one should pour water into a sieve. I would have overlooked much—even the insult you put on me to-day when you tried to buy me with a feather for my cap, when I was offering myself to you with no thought but the good of this realm. So cheaply did you hold Pym, so cheaply will you always hold honest men, it seems—and I, sir, tell you plainly that I have done with you. I will find other ways. Not through you can peace come to England. I do now perceive it. 'Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel.' You must go on to your fate, sir, as I shall to mine; but look for no ally in me or in the army, for henceforth there can be no treaty between Your Majesty and us. My cousin, Colonel Whalley, shall remain here to look after your security; as for me, you shall not see me again, or in a manner very different. As for what may become of you or your estate, of that I wash my hands of—the Lord deal with you."
"Amen," said Charles sternly, "and may He judge between you and me. Between me who have kept His ancient statutes and upheld His Church, and you who have defied and blasphemed both."