[The Black Douglas by S. R. Crockett]@TWC D-Link book
The Black Douglas

CHAPTER XXV
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He seemed to be taking some bitter and nauseous drug of the apothecary.
"Yes, Sir Alexander, I see you have not forgot.

The words,'If dog eat dog, what should the lion care ?' made us every caitiff's scoff throughout broad Scotland." "For that he shall yet suffer, if God give me speed," said the tutor, for the answer had been repeated to the Queen, who, being English, laughed at the wit of the reply.
"I would that my boy should grow up such another as that Earl Douglas," she had said.
The tutor stroked his beard faster than ever, and there was in his eyes the bitter look of a handsome man whose vanity is wounded in its weakest place.
"But, after all, who is to cage the lion ?" said the Chancellor, pertinently.
The marshal of France raised his hand from the table as if commanding silence.

His suave and courtier-like demeanour had changed into something more natural to the man.

There came the gaunt forward thrust of a wolf on the trail into the set of his head.

His long teeth gleamed, and his eyelids closed down upon his eyes till these became mere twinkling points.
"I have that at hand which hath already tamed the lion," he said, "and is able to lead him into the cage with cords of silk." He rose from the table, and, going to a curtain that concealed the narrow door of an antechamber, he drew it aside, and there came forth, clothed in a garment of gold and green, close-fitting and fine, clasped about the waist with a twining belt of jewelled snakes, the Lady Sybilla..


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