my poor advice can aid but little your own keen judgment;
yet it is flattering to be asked it."

Richard made a gesture of dissent. "I did not summon you for flattery,"
he said; "if I did not value your discretion you would not be here."

"Then I trust your gracious confidence may not be misplaced."

"I am about to test it. . . Tell me, my lord, what is the gravest state
problem that confronts me now?"

The Lord Steward's crafty blue eyes shot a sharp glance at the King, but
Richard's black ones met it half way and drove it back in quick retreat.
Now, Stanley had one weakness. He was vain of his astuteness and ever
ready to display it; and he thought he had discerned instantly what was
in the King's mind.

"Your Majesty means the two Princes--Edward's sons," he said.

Richard's face showed blank surprise.

"Nay, my lord, I mean nothing in particular," he said. "I sought only
what, in your opinion, was my chief embarrassment and peril. . . And you
answer: the young Princes. . . By St. Paul! you may be right--give me
your reasons."

Stanley saw his blunder and grew hot with rage. He had been outwitted;
and now, as between him and the King, he must ever bear the burden of
having first suggested Edward's sons as a menace to the State. The trap
was so easy; and yet he had never seen it until it had caught him tight.
And between his anger and the strange influence which Richard exercised
over all men when in his presence, he blundered again--and worse than
before.

"When, since time began," he asked, "has a new King had peace or comfort
while his supplanted predecessor lived to breed revolt?"

Richard seized the opening instantly.

"Great St. George! You do not urge the Princes' death?" he exclaimed.

And Stanley floundered deeper.

"Holy Mother, Sire, do not misunderstand me," he answered. "I urge
nothing. But the problem, as I see it, is, not why to act, but how to
refrain."

"Yet Parliament has declared them bastards and so never eligible to the
crown," Richard objected.

But Stanley had gone too far now to retreat and he pressed on, knowing
that he, himself, was incurring little or no danger by the advice.
Richard alone would be responsible if he acted upon it, and all the open
shame would fall upon him.

"The Beauforts were bastards," he answered, "and Parliament specifically
refused them the royal dignity; yet who, to-day, is Lancaster's chief and
claimant for your Crown but the heir of th