MICHEL AND ANGELE

[A Ladder of Swords]

By Gilbert Parker

Volume 3.



CHAPTER XV

It seemed an unspeakable smallness in a man of such high place in the
State, whose hand had tied and untied myriad knots of political and court
intrigue, that he should stoop to a game which any pettifogging hanger-on
might play-and reap scorn in the playing. By insidious arts, Leicester
had in his day turned the Queen's mind to his own will; had foiled the
diplomacy of the Spaniard, the German and the Gaul; had by subterranean
means checkmated the designs of the Medici; had traced his way through
plot and counter-plot, hated by most, loved by none save, maybe, his
Royal mistress to whom he was now more a custom than a cherished friend.
Year upon year he had built up his influence. None had championed him
save himself, and even from the consequences of rashness and folly he had
risen to a still higher place in the kingdom. But such as Leicester are
ever at last a sacrifice to the laborious means by which they achieve
their greatest ends-means contemptible and small.

To the great intriguers every little detail, every commonplace
insignificance is used--and must be used by them alone--to further their
dark causes. They cannot trust their projects to brave lieutenants, to