"There also your remembrance fails you, my valourous Lord. It was your own proposition. But all this has nothing to do with the point in argument, and it may be that Count Bertrich's loyalty has clouded his memory, while it is possible that my own recollection has not been of the best in dealing with doings long past, these doings having connection with so unscrupulous a man as Heinrich of Thuron. His appeal I did not consider as anything but a ruse to gain time. He well knew that your Majesty was thousands of leagues away and that it would be long before his petition could be heard; in truth, for two years, as has been shown by your present return. Therefore, I paid no heed to an invocation that was on the face of it dishonest. When Count Bertrich says he acted without my orders he speaks the technical truth, but everything he did had my most cordial approval, then and now; and, as I have said before, if we had not been harnessed with a poltroon, we should have had the castle within five days. It is futile, then, to punish this underling, and let the chief culprit go, if my action be adjudged censurable."
"Your action is adjudged a crime."
"Then I plead that, in justice, Count Bertrich should not suffer, being under my command."
"Your Lordship is not logical. Count Bertrich has himself confessed that he acted without your sanction. Your crime is that you approved of an illegal action, not that you gave illegal orders, which, it seems, you did not."
What motion the proud Prelate might have made at this juncture which would have led to his inevitable destruction, can only be surmised, but, happily for him, he cast a glance at his brethren of Cologne and Mayence, and detected on their faces ill-concealed looks of triumph. It meant much to them that the Lion of Treves should accomplish his own ruin, and the stern face of the Emperor indicated that unqualified submission must be made to him, if, indeed, such submission were not already too long delayed. That brief gleam of triumph on the face of his late ally saved von Isenberg. His manner instantly changed.
"Your Majesty," he said in a penitential tone, "I am compelled to confess that I am illogical, and that the case against me is but too clear, looking at it from your Majesty's higher point of view, unburdened by the prejudice, and, perhaps I should add with shame, the hatred which has enveloped me. I have no excuse to offer, and there is nothing left for me to hope, except that the clemency which you so generously bestowed on others you may extend to—Count Bertrich."
The Emperor's face lightened, and something almost approaching a smile touched his lips as he saw that the haughty Archbishop, in spite of his evident intention to sue for favour when he began, could not bring himself to beg for any save a friend. The Emperor ignored his lack of pleading for himself, and said:
"Are you content to return to Treves and accept the protection which my soldiers will deem it an honour to supply?"
"I am content, your Majesty."