“Put these in the fire,” repeated the King. “I ’ave no more time.”
The Jacobite took the papers; with a great rush of crimson to his face, he thought of Delia and the hundreds to whom this would mean salvation.
“Your Highness is magnanimous,” he said unsteadily. “Your generosity disarms me.”
“You ’ave mistake’ me,” answered William coldly. “Wherefore did you think I would wish to be revenge’? Sir John think to serve me with this an’ I am indebt’ to ’im that he preserve peace, but I do not stoop, Mr. Caryl, to revenge.”
He went back to his seat at the bureau; there was a pause, a silence, then Jerome Caryl put the papers into the fire; the great flare they made lit up the pale face of William of Orange and the beautiful flushed countenance of the Jacobite.
Across the narrow bright room the eyes of the two men met, as if they measured each other; then the King dropped his glance to the letters before him.
“You ’ave nothing more to say?” he asked coldly. “Then you may depar’.”
“I shall not soon forget your Highness’ generosity,” said Jerome Caryl unsteadily, and the sincerity of his voice made amends for the conventional wording.
“Call it my policy,” answered William with a slight lift of his green eyes. “And so, Mr. Caryl, you will be spare’ an obligation.”
Jerome Caryl waited for him to demand some oath or promise, to attach some condition to this cold magnanimity; he felt more utterly at this man’s mercy than when those papers lay under his hand.