letter sealed with your seal; in secret you wrote it, but it accuses you in public.  Then why, after bringing us hither to avenge our brother’s death, of which you beyond all doubt were the cause,—­why did you suddenly turn to the queen’s party and march against our town of Aquila, daring to raise an army against our faithful subjects?  You hoped, traitor, to make use of us as a footstool to mount the throne withal, as soon as you were free from every other rival.  Then you would but have awaited our departure to kill the viceroy we should have left in our place, and so seize the kingdom.  But this time your foresight has been at fault.  There is yet another crime worse than all the rest, a crime of high treason, which I shall remorselessly punish.  You carried off the bride that our ancestor King Robert designed for me, as you knew, by his will.  Answer, wretch what excuse can you make for the rape of the Princess Marie?”

Anger had so changed Louis’s voice that the last words sounded like the roar of a wild beast:  his eyes glittered with a feverish light, his lips were pale and trembling.  Charles and his brothers fell upon their knees, frozen by mortal terror, and the unhappy duke twice tried to speak, but his teeth were chattering so violently that he could not articulate a single word.  At last, casting his eyes about him and seeing his poor brothers, innocent and ruined by his fault, he regained some sort of courage, and said—­

“My lord, you look upon me with a terrible countenance that makes me tremble.  But on my knees I entreat you, have mercy on me if I have done wrong, for God is my witness that I did not call you to this kingdom with any criminal intention:  I have always desired, and still desire, your supremacy in all the sincerity of my soul.  Some treacherous counsellors, I am certain, have contrived to draw down your hatred upon me.  If it is true, as you say, that I went with an armed force to Aquila I was compelled by Queen Joan, and I could not do otherwise; but as soon as I heard of your arrival at Fermo I took my troops away again.  I hope for the love of Christ I may obtain your mercy and pardon, by reason of my former services and constant loyalty.  But as I see you are now angry with me, I say no more waiting for your fury to pass over.  Once again, my lord, have pity upon us, since we are in the hands of your Majesty.”

The king turned away his head, and retired slowly, confiding the prisoners to the care of Stephen Vayvoda and the Count of Zornic, who guarded them during the night in a room adjoining the king’s chamber.  The next day Louis held another meeting of his council, and ordered that Charles should have his throat cut on the very spot where poor Andre had been hanged.  He then sent the other princes of the blood, loaded with chains, to Hungary, where they were long kept prisoners.  Charles, quite thunderstruck by such an unexpected blow, overwhelmed by the thought of