"You have lied to me, scoundrel; it is not medicine you were
preparing, but poison."
The gardener disappeared. "If I wished to do what I should,"
said Coctier, "I would treat you like Charles the Bold did when you
cheated him."
"What did he do? What do people say that he did?"
"People say that he beat you with a stick."
The King was ashamed, went to bed again, and hid his face in the
pillow. The Doctor considered this a favourable moment for
preferring a long-denied request.
"Will you now liberate the Milanese?" he asked.
"No."
"But he cannot sit any more in his iron cage!"
"Then let him stand!"
"Don't you know that when one has to die, one good deed atones for
a thousand crimes?"
"I will not die!"
"Yes, sire, you will die soon."
"After you!"
"No, before me."
"That is also a lie of yours."
"All have lied to you, liar. And your four thousand victims whom you
have had executed...."
"They were not victims; they were criminals."
"Those four thousand slaughtered will witness it the judgment seat
against you."
"Lengthen my life; then I will reform myself."
"Liberate the Milanese."
"Never!"
"Then go to perdition--and quickly. Your pulse is so feeble that
your hours are numbered."
The King jumped up, fell on his knees before the physician, and
prayed, "Lengthen my life.
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