When Warwick had departed, Edward’s eye followed him, musingly.  The frank expression of his face vanished, and with the deep breath of a man who is throwing a weight from his heart, he muttered, “He loves me—­yes; but will suffer no one else to love me!  This must end some day.  I am weary of the bondage.”

II.—­A Dishonoured Embassy

One morning, some time after Warwick’s departure for France, the Lord Hastings was summoned to the king’s presence.  There was news from France, in a letter to Lord Rivers, from a gentleman in Warwick’s train.  The letter was dated from Rouen, and gave a glowing account of the honours accorded to the earl by Louis XI.  Edward directed Hastings’ attention to a passage in which the writer suggested that there were those who thought that so much intercourse between an English ambassador and the kinsman of Margaret of Anjou boded small profit to the English king.

“Read and judge, Hastings,” said the king.

“I observe,” said Hastings, “that this letter is addressed to my Lord Rivers.  Can he avouch the fidelity of his correspondent?”

“Surely, yes,” answered Rivers.  “It is a gentleman of my own blood.”

“Were he not so accredited,” returned Hastings, “I should question the truth of a man who can thus consent to play the spy upon his lord and superior.”

“The public weal justifies all things,” said Lord Worcester, who, with Lord Rivers, viewed with jealous scorn the power of the Earl of Warwick.

“And what is to become of my merchant-ships,” said the king, “if Burgundy take umbrage and close its ports?”

Hastings had no cause to take up the quarrel on Warwick’s behalf.  The proud earl had stepped in to prevent his marriage with his sister.  But Hastings, if a foe, could be a noble one.

“Beau sire,” said he, “thou knowest how little cause I have to love the Earl of Warwick.  But in this council I must be all and only the king’s servant.  I say first, then, that Warwick’s faith to the House of York is too well proven to become suspected because of the courtesies of King Louis.  Moreover, we may be sure that Warwick cannot be false if he achieve the object of his embassy and detach Louis from the side of Margaret and Lancaster by close alliance with Edward and York.  Secondly, sire, with regard to that alliance, which it seems you would repent, I hold now, as I have held ever, that it is a master-stroke in policy, and the earl in this proves his sharp brain worthy his strong arm; for, as his highness the Duke of Gloucester has discovered that Margaret of Anjou has been of late in London, and that treasonable designs were meditated, though now frustrated, so we may ask why the friends of Lancaster really stood aloof—­why all conspiracy was, and is, in vain?  Because the gold and subsidies of Louis are not forthcoming, because the Lancastrians see that if once Lord Warwick wins France from the Red Rose nothing short of such a miracle as their gaining Warwick instead can give a hope to their treason.”