council, but gay, giddy, vacillating; not subtle of wit
and resolute of deed, as he who so aspires should be!--Montagu, a vain
dream!"--Richard paused and then resumed, in a low tone, as to himself,
"Oh, not so--not so are kings cozened from their thrones! a pretext
must blind men,--say they are illegitimate, say they are too young, too
feeble, too anything, glide into their place, and then, not war--not
war. You slay them not,--they disappear!" The duke's face, as he
muttered, took a sinister and a dark expression, his eyes seemed to gaze
on space. Suddenly recovering himself as from a revery, he turned, with
his wonted sleek and gracious aspect, to the startled Montagu, and said,
"I was but quoting from Italian history, good my lord,--wise lore, but
terrible and murderous. Return we to the point. Thou seest Clarence
could not reign, and as well," added the prince, with a slight
sigh,--"as well or better (for, without vanity, I have more of a king's
mettle in me), might I--even I--aspire to my brother's crown!" Here he
paused, and glanced rapidly and keenly at the marquis; but whether
or not in these words he had sought to sound Montagu, and that glance
sufficed to show him it were bootless or dangerous to speak more
plainly, he resumed with an altered voice, "Enough of this: Warwick will
discover the idleness of such design; and if he land, his trumpets
must ring to a more kindling measure. John Montagu, thinkest thou that
Margaret of Anjou and the Lancastrians will not rather win thy brother
to their side? There is the true danger to Edward,--none elsewhere."

"And if so?" said Montagu, watching his listener's countenance. Richard
started, and gnawed his lip. "Mark me," continued the marquis, "I repeat
that I would fain hope yet that Edward may appease the earl; but if not,
and, rather than rest dishonoured and aggrieved, Warwick link himself
with Lancaster, and thou join him as Anne's betrothed and lord, what
matters who the puppet on the throne?--we and thou shall be the rulers;
or, if thou reject," added the marquis, artfully, as he supposed,
exciting the jealousy of the duke, "Henry has a son--a fair, and they
say, a gallant prince--carefully tutored in the knowledge of our English
laws, and who my lord of Oxford, somewhat in the confidence of the
Lancastrians, assures me would rejoice to forget old feuds, and call
Warwick 'father,' and my niece 'Lady and Princess of Wales.'"

With all his dissimulation, Richard