Notre Dame de Paris - Bartleby.com

that I am greatly frightened at the thought of being hanged!”
So saying, the desperate Gringoire kissed the King’s shoe, whereat Guillaume Rym murmured low to
Coppenole: “He does well to crawl upon the floor. Kings are like the Cretan Jupiter—they have ears on
their feet only.” And Coppenole, unmoved by the peculiar attributes of the Cretan Jupiter, answered with
a slow smile and his eye fixed on Gringoire: “Ah, that’s good! I could fancy I hear the Chancellor
Hugonet begging mercy of me?”
When Gringoire stopped at length, out of breath, he raised his head tremulously to the King, who was
engaged in scratching off a spot on his breeches’ knee with his fingernail, after which his Majesty took
another mouthful from the goblet. But he said never a word, and his silence kept Gringoire on the rack.
At last the King looked at him.
“Here’s a terrible babbler!” said he. Then turning to Tristan l’Hermite: “Bah! let him go!”
Gringoire, giddy with joy, suddenly sat flat on the floor.
“Free?” growled Tristan. “Your Majesty will not even have him caged for a while?”
“Compère,” returned Louis XI, “dost thou think it is for birds like this we have cages made at three
hundred and seventy-seven livres, eight sols, three deniers apiece? Set him at liberty, the rascal, and
send him off with a drubbing.”
“Ouf!” cried Gringoire; “here indeed is a great King!”
And, fearing a counter-order, he hurried to the door, which Tristan opened for him with a very bad
grace. The soldiers went out with him, driving him before them with great blows of their fists, which
Gringoire bore like a true Stoic.
The good humour of the King, since the revolt against the provost had been announced to him,
manifested itself at every point, and this unusual clemency was no insignificant sign of it. Tristan
l’Hermite in his corner looked as surly as a dog that has seen much but got nothing.
Meanwhile the King was gaily drumming the Pont Audemer march on the arms of his chair. He was a
dissembling prince, but he was much better able to conceal his sorrow than his joys. These outward and
visible signs of rejoicing at good news sometimes carried him great lengths—thus at the death of Charles
the Bold, to vowing balustrades of silver to Saint-Martin of Tours; on his accession to the throne, of
forgetting to give orders for his father’s obsequies.
“Hah, Sire!” suddenly exclaimed Jacques Coictier, “what of the sharp attack of illness for which your
Majesty sent for me?”
“Oh,” said the King, “truly I suffer greatly, Gossip Jacques. I have singings in the ear, and teeth of fire
that rake my chest.”
Coictier took the King’s hand and felt his pulse with a professional air.
“Look at him now, Coppenole,” said Rym in a low voice. “There he is between Coictier and Tristan.
That is his whole court—a physician for himself, a hangman for the others.”
As he felt the King’s pulse, Coictier assumed a look of great alarm. Louis regarded him with some