“I might answer, sire, that he is too deeply interested in the question to be a very impartial witness; but so far from that, sire, I know the duke to be a royal gentleman, and I refer the matter to him — but upon one condition, sire.”

“What?”

“It is that your Majesty will make him come here, will interrogate him yourself, TETE-A-TETE, without witnesses, and that I shall see your Majesty as soon as you have seen the duke.”

“What, then! You will bind yourself,” cried the king, “by what Monsieur de la Tremouille shall say?”

“Yes, sire.”

“You will accept his judgment?”