"They dare not," he repeated over and over, both to himself and to others; "the King—his kingdom—hangs upon a single hair, and that hair is my life!"
So he walked into the armed and defended fortress of his mortal enemy as freely as into his own house. Like perfect love, perfect contempt casteth out fear.
Yet when once he had saluted the company in the hall of audience, Guise sat him down by the fire and complained of being cold. He had, he said, lain down in his damp clothes, and had risen up hastily to obey the King's message.
"Soon you will be hot enough upon the branders of Tophet!" muttered D'O, the royal favourite, to Revol, the King's secretary, who went and came between the inner cabinet and the chamber where the council were sitting about a great table.
The superintendent of the finances, one Petremol, was reading a report. The Archbishop of Lyons bent over to the Duke of Guise, where he sat warming him by the fire.
"Where goes our royal Penitent so early—I mistrust his zeal? And specially," he added, as a furious burst of sleet battered like driven sea-spray on the leaded panes of the council room, "on such a morning; it were shame to turn out a dog."
"Oh, the dog goes of his own will—into retreat, as usual!" said the Duke carelessly; "in half-an-hour we shall see him set off with a dozen silken scourges and the softest down pillows in the castle. Our reverend Henry is of the excellent order of Saint Commode!"
Presently, leaving the fireside, the Duke returned to the table where the others sat. It was observed that he was still pale. But the qualm was physical only; no shade of fear mixed with it. He asked for a handkerchief from any of his people who might have followed him. As the greatest care had been taken to exclude these, he was supplied with one from the King's own wardrobe by St. Prix, the King's valet de chambre. Then he asked for comfits to stop his cold, but all that could be found within the castle was only a paper of prunes of Brignolles, with which Guise had to content himself, instead of the Smyrna raisins and rose conserves of Savoy which he asked for.
He chatted indifferently with one and another while the routine of the council unrolled itself monotonously.
"I think brother Henry might have let us sleep in our beds, if this be all," he said. "What is the use of bringing us here at this hour, to pronounce on the fate of rascals who have done no worse than hold a few Huguenots to ransom? Wait a while, and we will give the Huguenots something that will put ransoming them out of the question!"