CHAPTER XXXIIIThe Grand Master was in Sir Oliver’s room. Assembled here were all the Commanders who could be spared from the walls, for there was news from the Viceroy’s court.
Commander Salvago, the Grand Master’s envoy at Palermo, sent his own account of a scene which himself had made on the palace steps. Other letters, which had been smuggled in by the same hand, gave various accounts of the stir that had been in the Viceroy’s court, and what they deduced therefrom. The Grand Master read, and his own deduction was soon made.
Passion shook in his voice, as he said: “Brothers, I have been silent till now. I would neither give excuse for offence by a petulant word, such as might be swelled in the mouths of men, nor would I think evil of Christian Kings. But I must tell you that which we
