It was not until my wounds were dressed, and garments of I know not whose ownership provided in place of my mired rags, that Monsieur de Commines--we being in the privacy of his own suite of rooms--asked for my story. Nor did he interrupt me in its telling, but sat like a statue, his face turned up to the painted ceiling. The failure of our fortunes, the burning of Solignac, the murder of old Babette, moved him no more than if a stranger had bidden him good day. But as I ended he lowered his eyes, looking at me keenly but not unkindly. "And why do you come to Paris?" My answer was as curt as the question. "To move Monsieur de Commines to move the King to give me justice on Jan Meert." "I might as well hope to move the Louvre to carry you to Plessis les Tours--unless the King willed to be moved. And on Jan Meert!" a little grim smile dashed with a tolerant contempt, broke over his lips; "a Hollander, eh?" "You know him, Monseigneur, you know him!" I cried impetuously, moved less by the words than by the look on his face, "Oh, then, it will be easy." "I know many things," he answered, the smile deepening. "I know this, my friend; you are very innocent. Did it never strike you that the King of France has many agents--no, agents is too strong a word, it implies a kind of intimacy, a private confidence,--call them tools?" "Agents? Tools? Monseigneur, Monseigneur, what commerce can a King of France have with a Jan Meert?" "Commerce? Pish! this time it is you who use too strong a word. Monsieur Hellewyl, do you know how kingdoms are built? how varied, how complex, yes, and at times how opposite, the elements of construction? Loyalty at home, treason abroad, a bribe to avarice, a threat to cowardice, flattery to pride, men's blood, tears of women, babes made fatherless, the wisdom of a Louis, the rashness of a Charles, the I would but I dare not of a Maximilian, the brutishness of a Jan Meert." "The Most Christian King and Jan Meert! Oh! Monseigneur, the conjunction is impossible, the thought is too contemptible." Commines' face darkened as he leaned towards me, his arms resting on his knees. "Learn to guard your tongue, Monsieur, when you speak of the greatest monarch now upon earth. How can you, a green and weedy sapling out of a Flanders hedge, judge the oak of the forest? Is a gardener unclean because he raises a flower of nobility and strength from the outscourings of a stable?" But the wound to my hopes galled me, and I was obstinate. "I do not see the King's gain in such an honourable partnership." "I will tell you. But first, why should the King do justice for you on Jan Meert?" "It might give him a hold on Flanders." "You must have a great mind, friend Gaspard, for you and the King thought alike, only he before the event, and you after. Anarchy in Flanders creates a need for the strong hand of a better government, and so--Jan Meert!"