"A hard task, and which few have attained," said the historian; "but which is yet within the reach of princes, who wil strive for it. Meantime, Sire, be prepared, for the Duke will presently confer with you."
Louis looked long after Philip when he left the apartment, and at length burst into a bitter laugh. "He spoke of fishing – I have sent him home, a trout properly tickled! – And he thinks himself virtuous because he took no bribe, but contented himself with flattery and promises, and the pleasure of avenging an affront to his vanity! – Why, he is but so much the poorer for the refusal of the money – not a jot the more honest. He must be mine, though, for he hath the shrewdest head among them. – Well, now for nobler game! I am to face this leviathan Charles, who will presently swim hitherward, cleaving the deep before him. I must, like a trembling sailor, throw a tub overboard to amuse him. But I may one day find the chance – of driving a harpoon into his entrails!"[55]
CHAPTER XIV. THE INTERVIEW.
Hold fast thy truth, young soldier. – Gentle maiden, Keep you your promise plight – leave age its subtleties, And grey-hair'd policy its maze of falsehood; But be you candid as the morning sky, Ere the high sun sucks vapours up to stain it. The Trial
On the perilous and important morning which preceded the meeting of the two Princes in the Castle of Peronne, Oliver le Dain did his master the service of an active and skilful agent, making interest for Louis in every quarter, both with presents and promises; so that when the Duke's anger should blaze forth, all around should be interested to smother, and not to increase, the conflagration. He glided, like night, from tent to tent, from house to house, making himself friends, but not, in the Apostle's sense, with the Mammon of unrighteousness. As was said of another active political agent, "his finger was in every man's palm, his mouth was in every man's ear;" and for various reasons, some of which we have formerly hinted at, he secured the favour of many Burgundian nobles, who either had something to hope or fear from France, or who thought that, were the power of Louis too much reduced, their own Duke would be likely to pursue the road to despotic authority, to which his heart naturally inclined him, with a daring and unopposed pace.
Where Oliver suspected his own presence or arguments might be less acceptable, he employed that of other servants of the King; and it was in this manner that he obtained, by the favour of the Count de Crèvecoeur, an interview betwixt Lord Crawford, accompanied by Le Balafré, and Quentin Durward, who, since he had arrived at Peronne, had been detained in a sort of honourable confinement. Private affairs were assigned as the cause of requesting this meeting; but it is probable that Crèvecoeur, who was afraid that his master might be stirred up in passion to do something dishonourably violent towards Louis, was not sorry to afford an opportunity to Crawford to give some hints to the young archer, which might prove useful to his master.
The meeting between the countrymen was cordial, and even affecting.
"Thou art a singular youth," said Crawford, stroking the head of young Durward, as a grandsire might do that of his descendant; "Certes, you have had as meikle good fortune as if you had been born with a lucky hood on your head."
"All comes of his gaining an archer's place at such early years," said Le Balafré; "I never was so much talked of, fair nephew, because I was five-and-twenty years old before I was hors de page."
"And an ill-looking mountainous monster of a page thou wert, Ludovic," said the old commander, "with a beard like a baker's shool, and a back like old Wallace Wight."