The courtier waited until the storm had passed, and when the King had become more calm, he said,-- "Allow me, Sire; you make a grave mistake in this interpretation of the treaty. There is nothing said about violence. You are merely to use your influence to persuade Alexander to be present at the plenary council. If he be innocent, if he be the lawful Pope, he will be charmed with this opportunity of asserting his rights." "Very good!--You have exceeded your powers, and the treaty is invalid. Alexander can do what he pleases; and we, whatever appears to us to be just and proper. Are we then nothing but the Emperor's vassals? Have we no longer liberty to act in accordance with our own ideas?" "I repeat that the treaty in no way interferes with your supremacy," replied the Count of Champagne; "but what was I to do? The Emperor was on the point of concluding an alliance with England against you; ought I to have permitted such a contract to be signed?" The King made no answer to this crafty observation of his courtier; but it was not without its effect, for it was the fear of this very alliance between Frederic and the English monarch, which had made him, in the first instance, open the negotiations. "And how is Barbarossa preparing for our alliance?" asked Louis, who was seeking a new pretext for his ill-humor. "Is he not on our very frontiers, at the head of a powerful army? Is not that, of itself, a threat?" As if in answer to the question, a loud flourish of trumpets rang out in the palace-yard. "What is that?" said the King. He approached the window. A troop of knights had halted before the palace, and a chamberlain came up to announce the arrival of Frederic's envoys. _CHAPTER XXXVII_. _THE SPY_. The Chancellor Rinaldo and the Count Palatine Otho de Wittelsbach were at the head of the embassy which had been sent by Frederic to congratulate the French King. Whilst their retinue dispersed through the town, the marshal of the palace introduced the two German nobles into the royal apartments.