our feet. And when at length we shall have
put down Cranmer, and brought Catharine Parr to the scaffold, then
will we give King Henry a queen who will reconcile him with God and the
Church, out of which is no salvation."

"Amen, so be it!" said Gardiner; and arm in arm they both left the
cabinet.

Deep stillness now reigned in that little spot, and nobody saw John
Heywood as he now came from behind the hanging, and, completely worn out
and faint, slipped for a moment into a chair.

"Now I know, so far at least, the plan of these blood-thirsty
tiger-cats," muttered he. "They wish to give Henry a popish queen; and
so Cranmer must be overthrown, that, when they have deprived the queen
of this powerful prop, they may destroy her also and tread her in the
dust. But as God liveth, they shall not succeed in this! God is just,
and He will at last punish these evil-doers. And supposing there is no
God, then will we try a little with the devil himself. No, they shall
not destroy the noble Cranmer and this beautiful, high-minded queen.
I forbid it--I, John Heywood, the king's fool. I will see everything,
observe everything, hear everything. They shall find me everywhere on
their path; and when they poison the king's ear with their diabolical
whisperings, I will heal it again with my merry deviltries. The king's
fool will be the guardian angel of the queen."

CHAPTER XV. JOHN HEYWOOD.

After so much care and excitement, the king needed an hour of recreation
and amusement. Since the fair young queen was seeking these far away
in the chase, and amid the beauties of Nature, Henry must, no doubt,
be content to seek them for himself, and in a way different from the
queen's. His unwieldiness and his load of flesh prevented him from
pursuing the joys of life beyond his own halls; so the lords and ladies
of his court had to bring them hither to him, and station the flitting
goddess of Joy, with her wings fettered, in front of the king's
trundle-chair.

The gout had that day again overcome that mighty king of earth; and a
heavy, grotesque mass it was which sat there in the elbow-chair.

But the courtiers still called him a fine-looking and fascinating man;
and the ladies still smiled on him and said, by their sighs and by their
looks, that they loved him; that he was ever to them the same handsome
and captivating man that he was twenty years before, when yet young,
fine-looking, and slim. How they smile upon him, and ogle hi