"Very well! unseal it without breaking the seal, and read it. For Heaven's sake, do you suppose for a moment that I am going to read it?"
Master Arnauld du Thill took from his pocket a sharp little chisel, and cut carefully around the seal, and unfolded the letter. He turned at once to the signature.
"Monseigneur sees that I was not mistaken. The letter addressed to the Cardinal de Guise is from Cardinal de Caraffa, as that wretched courier was simpleton enough to tell me."
"Read it, then, by the crown of thorns!" cried Anne de Montmorency.
Master Arnauld read as follows,—
"MONSEIGNEUR AND DEAR FRIEND,—Just three words of importance. In the first place, in accordance with your request, the Pope will let the affair of the divorce drag slowly along, and will put François de Montmorency off from consistory to consistory (he arrived at Rome yesterday) before finally refusing the dispensation that he solicits."
"Pater noster!" growled the constable. "May the Devil take them, all these red hats!"
Arnauld continued his reading:—
"In the second place, Monsieur de Guise, your illustrious brother, after having taken Campli, is holding Civitella in check. But before we resolve to send him the men and supplies that he asks, and which we can only give him at a great sacrifice, we must at least be assured that you will not call him away to serve in Flanders, as the report goes is likely to be the case. Just see that he remains with us, and his Holiness will make up his mind to an extensive issue of indulgences, hard though the times may be, to assist Monsieur François de Guise in soundly whipping the Duke of Alva and his haughty master."
"Adveniat tuum regnum," growled Montmorency. "We will remember that, body and blood! We will remember that, even if we have to call the English into France. Go on, Arnauld, go on, by the Mass!"