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Mathys had been obliged to do violence to his feelings in order not to put a speedy end to the fierce attack. Her glance had been like that of an infuriated wild beast as the rage in her soul burst forth with elementary power, and the sharpness of her hoarse voice still pierced him to the heart.
The Emperor had received the last report half an hour before, and then commissioned his physician, who had again warned him against the excess of work, to protect him from interruption he desired to have an hour alone. Dr. Mathys had fulfilled this order with the utmost strictness. Even the English ambassador was dismissed.
Queen Mary had ordered that it should be omitted, because Dr. Mathys had pronounced it poison for the gouty patient, and she confessed the offence.
But under the most careful nursing her strong constitution resisted even the most violent attacks of the fever, and when June was drawing toward an end all danger seemed over. Dr. Mathys had already permitted her to sit out of doors, and informed the Emperor that there was no further occasion for fear.
"And yet, if your Majesty will permit me to say so," Quijada replied with a low bow, "he may be in a very different condition to-morrow. I heard Dr. Mathys himself remark that the life of a gouty patient was like a showery day in July gloomy enough while the thunder-storm was raging, but radiant before and afterward until the clouds rose again.
Here he hesitated, and, after looking the physician in the face, went on: "You again think that harsh, Mathys I see it in your expression but, as my friend, you yourself can scarcely desire the world to see the Emperor Charles performing the same task with a Barbara Blomberg. She is free to choose.
When the physician informed the sovereign that Barbara might be considered saved for the second time, the latter expressed his pleasure by a warm "We are indebted to you for it again "; but when Mathys asked if he did not intend to hasten Barbara's recovery by paying her a visit, though only for a few moments, the Emperor looked into the grave countenance of the physician, in whom he noticed an embarrassment usually foreign to him, and said firmly, "Unfortunately, my dear Mathys, I must deny myself this pleasure."
Mathys a debt of gratitude, but she thought herself freed from that duty since he had made himself the blind tool of his master. Now the Spaniard, who had never been her friend, also came to urge the Emperor's will upon her. Toward him she need not force herself to maintain the reserve which she had exercised in her conversation with the confessor. On the contrary!
Tell her, Mathys, we wish her happiness; but if her maternal heart expects that I will do her child the honour of calling it mine, I must require her to keep silence, and intrust the newborn infant's destiny, from the first hour of its birth, to my charge."
"If only the body would prosper as well as the mind. That is as active and alert as ever. But the body the body! O Senor Adrian! I fear that the end is not far distant, although our royal sufferer looks better than at his arrival. "'The eating! Dr. Mathys complains; but you know well enough how that is. "Three days have passed since I began this letter.
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