第43章

"After that, it shall be precisely as I please!" replied the ringing voice; while the black eyes flashed anything but loving glances upon him."While I am queen here, I shall be obeyed;when I am queen no longer, you may do as you please! My lords"(turning her passionate, beautiful face to the hushed audience), am I or am I not sovereign here!""Madame, you alone are our sovereign lady and queen!""Then, when I condescend to command, you shall obey! Do you, your highness, and you, lord duke, go on with the Earl of Gloucester's trial, and I will be the stranger's jailer.""She is right," said the dwarf, his fierce little eyes gleaming with a malignant light; "let us do one thing before another; and after we have settled Gloucester here, we will attend to this man's case.Guards keep a sharp eye on your new prisoner.

Ladies and gentlemen, be good enough to resume your seats.Now, your grace, continue the trial.""Where did we leave off?" inquired his grace, looking rather at a loss, and scowling vengeance dire at the handsome queen and her handsome protege, as he sank back in his chair of state.

"The earl was confessing his guilt, or about to do so.Pray, my lord," said the dwarf, glaring upon the pallid prisoner, "were you not saying you had betrayed us to the king?"A breathless silence followed the question - everybody seemed to hold his very breath to listen.Even the queen leaned forward and awaited the answer eagerly, and the many eyes that had been riveted on Sir Norman since his entrance, left him now for the first time and settled on the prisoner.A piteous spectacle that prisoner was - his face whiter than the snowy nymphs behind the throne, and so distorted with fear, fury, and guilt, that it looked scarcely human.Twice he opened his eyes to reply, and twice all sounds died away in a choking gasp.

"Do you hear his highness?" sharply inquired the lord high chancellor, reaching over the great seal, and giving the unhappy Earl of Gloucester a rap on the head with it, "Why do you not answer?""Pardon! Pardon!" exclaimed the earl, in a husky whisper."Do not believe the tales they tell you of me.For Heaven's sake, spare my life!""Confess!" thundered the dwarf, striking the table with his clinched fist, until all the papers thereon jumped spasmodically into the air-"confess at once, or I shall run you through where you stand!"The earl, with a perfect screech of terror, flung himself flat upon his face and hands before the queen, with such force, that Sir Norman expected to see his countenance make a hole in the floor.

"O madame! spare me! spare me! spare me! Have mercy on me as you hope for mercy yourself!"She recoiled, and drew back her very garments from his touch, as if that touch was pollution, eyeing him the while with a glance frigid and pitiless as death.

"There is no mercy for traitors!" she coldly said."Confess your guilt, and expect no pardon from me!""Lift him up!" shouted the dwarf, clawing the air with his hands, as if he could have clawed the heart out of his victim's body;"back with him to his place, guards, and see that he does not leave it again!"Squirming, and writhing, and twisting himself in their grasp, in very uncomfortable and eel-like fashion, the earl was dragged back to his place, and forcibly held there by two of the guards, while his face grew so ghastly and convulsed that Sir Norman turned away his head, and could not bear to look at it.

"Confess!" once more yelled the dwarf in a terrible voice, while his still more terrible eyes flashed sparks of fire - "confess, or by all that's sacred it shall be tortured out of you.Guards, bring me the thumb-screws, and let us see if they will not exercise the dumb devil by which our ghastly friend is possessed!""No, no, no!" shrieked the earl, while the foam flew from his lips."I confess! I confess! I confess!""Good! And what do you confess?" said the duke blandly, leaning forward, while the dwarf fell back with a yell of laughter at the success of his ruse.

"I confess all - everything - anything! only spare my life!""Do you confess to having told Charles, King of England, the secrets of our kingdom and this place?" said the duke, sternly rapping down the petition with a roll of parchment.

The earl grew, if possible, a more ghastly white."I do - Imust! but oh! for the love of - "

"Never mind love," cut in the inexorable duke, "it is a subject that has nothing whatever to do with the present case.Did you or did you not receive for the aforesaid information a large sum of money?""I did; but my lord, my lord, spare - "

"Which sum of money you have concealed," continued the duke, with another frown and a sharp rap."Now the question is, where have you concealed it?""I will tell you, with all my heart, only spare my life!""Tell us first, and we will think about your life afterward.Let me advise you as a friend, my lord, to tell at once, and truthfully," said the duke, toying negligently with the thumb-screws.

"It is buried at the north corner of the old wall at the head of Bradshaw's grave.You shall have that and a thousandfold more if you'll only pardon - ""Enough!" broke in the dwarf, with the look and tone of an exultant demon."That is all we want! My lord duke, give me the death-warrant, and while her majesty signs it, I will pronounce his doom!"The duke handed him a roll of parchment, which he glanced critically over, and handed to the queen for her autograph.That royal lady spread the vellum on her knee, took the pen and affixed her signature as coolly as if she were inditing a sonnet in an album.Then his highness, with a face that fairly scintillated with demoniac delight, stood up and fixed his eyes on the ghastly prisoner, and spoke in a voice that reverberated like the tolling of a death-bell through the room.