He hesitated, and
during that moment of halting I was by turns cold as ice and hot as
fire. Finally his resolution took form, and he drew out the missive. I
thought I should die then and there, when he began to look it over. But
after a careless glance he put it back in the pouch, and threw it on
the table in front of the bishop. I could hardly keep from shouting for
joy. He had failed to see the alteration, and in case of its discovery,
he might now be his own witness against King Louis, should that crafty
monarch dare to alter my father's missive by so much as the crossing of
a 't'. If father hereafter discovers anything wrong in the letter, he
will be able to swear that King Louis was the evil doer, since father
himself put the letter in the pouch with his own hands. Father will
never suspect that a friend came to me out of far-away Styria to commit
this crime."
"I rejoice that I came," I said.
"And I," she answered. "I feared the bishop would read the letter, but
he did not. He tied the ribbon, softened the lead wafer over the lamp
flame, and placed it on the bow-knot; then he stamped it with father's
small seal. When it was finished I did not want to laugh for joy--when
one is very happy one wants to weep. That I could safely do, and I did.
The bishop handed the letter to Byron, and father spoke commandingly:
'Deliver the missive to the French king before you sleep or eat, unless
he has left Paris. If he has gone to Tours, follow him and loiter not.
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