him to reveal the carefully guarded secret of a conspiracy which
would have resulted in the king's death had it not been for his devotion.

The queen, shuddering at the mere thought of the danger her royal consort
had run, now begged that Reynard might step down from the scaffold and
speak privately to her and to Nobel. In this interview Reynard, still
pretending to prepare for immediate death, told how he discovered a
conspiracy formed by his father, Isegrim the wolf, Brown the bear, and many
others, to slay the king and seize the scepter. He described the various
secret conferences, the measures taken, and his father's promise to defray
all the expenses of the enterprise and to subsidize mercenary troops by
means of the hoard of King Ermenrich, which he had discovered and concealed
for his own use.

Reynard then continued to describe his loyal fears for his beloved
sovereign, his resolve to outwit the conspirators, and his efforts to
deprive them of the sinews of war by discovering and abstracting the
treasure. Thanks to his ceaseless vigilance, he saw his father steal forth
one night, uncover his hoard, gloat over the gold, and then efface the
traces of his search with the utmost skill.

"'Nor could one,
Not having seen, have possibly known. And ere he went onwards
Well he understood at the place where his feet had been planted,
Cleverly backwards and forwards to draw his tail, and to smooth it,
And to efface the trace with the aid of his mouth.'"

Reynard then told the king how diligently he and his wife, Ermelyn, labored
to remove the gold and conceal it elsewhere, and how the conspiracy came to
naught when no gold was found to pay the troops. He mournfully added that
his loyalty further deprived him of a loving father, for the latter had
hung himself in despair when he found his treasure gone and all his plans
frustrated. With hypocritical tears he then bewailed his own fate, saying
that, although ready to risk all for another, there was no one near him to
speak a good word for him in his time of bitterest need.

[Sidenote: Reynard Pardoned.] The queen's soft heart was so touched by
this display of feeling that she soon pleaded for and obtained Reynard's
pardon from Nobel, who freely granted it when the fox promised to give him
his treasure. Most accurately now he described its place of concealment,
but said that he could not remain at court, as his