The sound sense of that was plain, though I could see that Monseigneur spoke more out of a perfunctoriness and kindness of heart rather than any real expectation that I should have cause to put a tax upon my powers. So, while he was absent, Blaise, his page, served me, and I made it my steadfast duty to force down bite and sup, resting on a couch as I ate. And, indeed, I was not only very weary, but in much pain, though more of spirit than body. Think what the waiting in inaction was to me, and judge if each minute did not creep through my thought slowly, slowly, and yet searing as if it was red hot. CHAPTER XXXII THE MERCY OF LOUIS THE ELEVENTH At last, late in the afternoon, the lad Blaise came for me in great haste. "Mademoiselle, the King is asking for you." "For me? How can that be?" "I only know what I am told," he answered, fumbling at his bonnet. "Is that all Monsieur de Commines' message?" I have studied boys as well as men, and from his confusion I guessed his mind was burdened by more than he had delivered. At the question, his face flushed red in the sunlight, and he broke out-- "Mademoiselle, I hate the court, and court ways. God made me for a plain soldier, and not to truckle in mud." "Wait," said I; "presently you will find that mud is your surest stepping-place to fortune. What more had you to say?" "Monsieur de Commines beseeches you not to be angry if the King thinks evil of you; if he even puts a vile construction on your friendship for Monsieur de Helville." "The King can think no more vilely of me than I of him," I answered hotly. Then my heart leaped into my mouth. Not for myself; for me the bitterness of fear was long past: but with that illumination which they say the drowning have at the last, I suddenly realised that Gaspard's life hung not alone on my powers of pleading, but on my self-control. All my grown years I had hated, loathed, and despised Louis of Valois, not only as the merciless enemy of Navarre, but as the vilest, meanest cunning spirit that ever made flesh contemptible. What if that loathing and despisal crept into my pleading and pled against me? What if that hatred, which to me was almost a religion, flashed through my prayer and blasted the King's mercy? What if they hardened Louis' softer mood, and so left me all my life guilty of Gaspard's blood? What if---- "Mademoiselle! Mademoiselle!" cried Blaise, half piteously, half in indignation. "Do not look so horrified, so troubled. It was a lie, we all know it was a lie." "Did Monsieur de Commines say, It is a lie?" "For policy's sake, Mademoiselle----" "Policy! policy! policy! That is Monsieur de Commines all over. Truth? There is no truth, there is only policy. A woman's honour? her reputation? her good name? To his slippery, pliant policy all these are nothing. There, there, Monsieur Blaise, it is my turn to say, do not look so horrified! Monsieur de Commines is his master's mirror."