Meantime, in the palace, consternation reigned.  Search parties seeking their sovereign were out all night.  No one, however, was in such a state of dismay as the dauphin, who declared that he would be counted at fault when family dissensions followed so soon on his arrival.  Delighted he was, therefore, to act as mediator between father and son after the duke was in a sufficiently pacified state to listen to reason.  Charles betook himself to Dendermonde for a time until the duke was ready to see him[4].  His young wife made the most of her expectations to soften her father-in-law’s resentment, and between her entreaties and those of the guest, proud to show his tact and his gratitude, the quarrel was at last smoothed over.

There was one marked difference between this family dispute and the breach between the French king and the dauphin.  In the latter case no feeling was involved.  In the former, the son was really deeply wounded by what he deemed lack of parental affection for his interests.  At the same time he was shocked by the bitter words and was, for the moment, so filled with contrition that he was eager to make any concession agreeable to the duke.  He dismissed two of his servants[5], suspected by his father of fomenting trouble between them, and he showed himself in general very willing to placate paternal displeasure.

Reconciliation between duke and duchess was more difficult.  Isabella resented Philip’s reproaches for her sympathy with Charles.  She said she had stepped between the two men because she had feared lest the duke might injure his son in his wrath[6].  This was in answer to the Marshal of Burgundy when he was telling her of Philip’s displeasure.  She concluded her dignified defence with an expression of her utter loneliness.  Stranger in a strange land she had no one belonging to her but her son.

She was certainly present at the baptism of her grandchild, but shortly afterwards she retired to a convent of the Grey Sisters, founded by herself, and rarely returned to the world or took part in its ceremonies during the remainder of her life.

The quarrel, too, left its scar upon Charles.  It is not probable that he had much personal liking for the guest upon whom his father heaped courtesies and solicitous care.  On one occasion, when the two young men were hunting they were separated by chance.  When Charles returned alone to the palace, the duke was full of reproaches at his son’s careless desertion of the guest in his charge.  Again the court was organised into search parties and there was no rest until the dauphin was discovered some leagues from Brussels[7].  Here, also, it is an easy presumption that the Count of Charolais was a trifle sulky over his father’s preoccupation in regard to the prince.

The transient character of the dauphin’s sojourn in his cousin’s domains soon changed.  In the summer of 1457, when news came that Dauphine had submitted to Charles VII., when the successive embassies despatched by Philip to the king had all proved fruitless in their conciliatory efforts, Philip proceeded to make more permanent arrangements for the fugitive’s comfort.