“Before I go,” he said, “I have a mind to visit the spot where my brother died.”
To Charles, no doubt, this seemed a morbid notion to be discouraged. But Ludwig was insistent.
“Take me there,” he bade the Duke.
“Indeed, I scarce know—I was not here, remember,” Charles answered him, rendered faintly uneasy, perhaps by a certain grimness in the gaunt King's face, perhaps by the mutterings of his own conscience.
“I know that you were not; but surely you must know the place. It will be known to all the world in these parts. Besides, was it not yourself recovered the body? Conduct me thither, then.”
Perforce, then, Charles must do his will. Arm-in-arm they mounted the stairs to that sinister loggia, a half-dozen of Ludwig's escorting officers following.
They stepped along the tessellated floor above the Abbot's garden, flooded now with sunshine which drew the perfume from the roses blooming there.
“Here the King slept,” said Charles, “and yonder the Queen. Somewhere here between the thing was done, and thence they hanged him.”
Ludwig, tall and grim, stood considering, chin in hand. Suddenly he wheeled upon the Duke who stood at his elbow. His face had undergone a change, and his lip curled so that he displayed his strong teeth as a dog displays them when he snarls.
“Traitor!” he rasped. “It is you—you who come smiling and fawning upon me, and spurring me on to vengeance—who are to blame for what happened here.”