The moment was one of intense anxiety and terror. Concealed by the leaves of the old beech, every leap of the frantic bloodhound threatened to disclose the listener’s hiding-place. The Earls of Rothes and Argyle, with drawn swords and bent brows, looked high and low for the cause of the dog’s fury. Besides the dread of a violent death, all the more terrible at this his first hour of escape from captivity, Maxwell now felt that on him depended the liberty of his Queen; more than this, the life and honour of the woman he still so dearly loved. To do him justice he would willingly have died on the spot to be able to advertise his Sovereign of her danger.

For an instant the desperate expedient darted through his mind of leaping down on Argyle’s upturned face, wresting the sword from his grasp, and thus armed doing battle with Moray and Rothes; but, even then, he reflected, how surely the former, who was never surprised or at a loss, would run to the castle for assistance. If retaken, Walter shuddered to think, not of his own fate, but of Mary Carmichael’s capture on the morrow.

Nevertheless there seemed nothing else for it; he had even collected his breath, and nerved his muscles for the spring, when a trumpet sounded in the castle, and a puff of lurid smoke swept across the faces of the three noblemen, who were searching about with eager looks and bare blades, encouraging ‘Hubert’ the while with voice and gesture.

Again the smoke came rolling in a dun-coloured volume against the clear sky, and the bloodhound, his attention distracted by the new catastrophe, or his powers of scent dulled by the smell of fire, ceased to leap at the old tree, and lowering his stern, began to howl in abject terror and dismay.

Rothes could not forbear laughing, though he coughed and swore at the same time.

‘’Tis the alarm!’ said he, as the trumpet again rang out in the castle-yard. ‘Faith, Moray, I cannot but think they are burning the old house about our heads. Gentlemen both, I counted not to give ye so warm a reception as this!’

Nothing escaped Moray’s quick eye. While they hurried back towards the building, he observed the smoke and flames issuing from the turret Maxwell had so recently quitted.

‘The wind is favourable,’ said the earl, as another cloud rolled over them, ‘and you need not fear for more than the prison tower; for the sake of humanity, I trust, my lord, that it may be empty!’

Rothes did not answer; truth to say, he had quite forgotten Walter Maxwell, and even had he remembered him, would have thought the life of one poor prisoner mattered but little at such a time. The three noblemen addressed themselves to the task of quenching the fire with characteristic energy. Backed by the exertions of Rothes’ disciplined followers, they soon succeeded in subduing the flames, and, ere nightfall, Leslie House had resumed its usual appearance of security, having suffered but little damage save the scorching of its outer wall. Poor old Ralph, however, was found dead in the dungeon, probably stifled by the smoke. But it is not with the inmates of Leslie that we have now to do.

As may be imagined, directly the coast was clear, Maxwell lost no time in slipping out of the tree. With a fervent thanksgiving in his heart, he dropped upon the sward, and ran as hard as his legs could carry him in the direction of the open country. Yet, even now, his situation was one of no ordinary hazard and embarrassment. He was unarmed; he was in an enemy’s country; he might meet, at any moment, with retainers of Lord Rothes, who would recognise him at once for an escaped prisoner. Moreover, he was weaker than ordinary, from his long confinement, and, even had it been otherwise, he could not expect to reach Perth on foot in time to warn the Queen of the plot laid against her person; and how was he to procure a horse? Cogitating these matters with considerable anxiety, he hurried on nevertheless, and was dismayed to find limbs and breath failing him as he ran.

To add to his discomfiture he heard footsteps approaching rapidly from behind. Turning his head, he espied the countryman whom he had already observed in the garden, nearing him with every stride. Maxwell would have given ten years of his life ungrudgingly to have had as many inches of steel in his belt.

‘’Od sake, man, ye can run as weel as fight!’ exclaimed a familiar voice close to him, as the fugitive slackened speed to collect his strength for the desperate struggle he anticipated. ‘Keep wast, hinny! keep wast! down yon burnie-side. I can hear “Wanton Willie” nickerin’ at us the noo!’

Though they still kept on at a rapid pace, between running and walking, Maxwell’s hand was fast locked in that of ‘Dick-o’-the-Cleugh,’ whilst the borderer, pointing to a neighbouring brake in which a confederate, with two led horses, was concealed, in a tone of suppressed triumph assured his friend that he was safe.

It took but little time to mount ‘Wanton Willie,’ the redoubtable bay that Dick affirmed was the pride of his lord’s stable, and less to inform the borderer of the plot against Her Majesty, and the necessity for reaching Perth with the utmost speed they could command. As they swung along at a hand-gallop, Dick, with many a smothered laugh and quaint allusion, for he looked on the whole performance, from first to last, as an unparalleled jest, detailed to his companion the measures he had adopted to effect his delivery.

Translated from his own vernacular, the borderer’s account was as follows:—After his interview with the Queen and her ladies in Edinburgh, he had ridden on to Leslie with the intention of rescuing Walter with the strong hand; but on arriving in Fife he found that country in so alarmed a state, and Leslie House itself so securely watched and strongly garrisoned, that such a project was utterly impracticable. His predatory habits had taught Dick, long ago, that where force was useless, resort must be had to stratagem, and he set about his task with all the quiet energy of his character and the craft of his profession.

In the first place it was necessary to diminish his retinue, in order to avoid suspicion. ‘Lang Willie’ and ‘Jock-o’-the-Hope’ accordingly were despatched back to Hermitage, leaving one of their horses for the use of the prisoner, and Ralph Armstrong, a sedate and cautious old jackman, remained at a considerable distance from Leslie with the three horses, which he kept well exercised, and fit for a trial of speed and endurance at any moment.

Dick then disguising himself like a countryman, applied for a day’s work or two in the gardens and pleasure-grounds of Leslie, and ere long his great strength and inexhaustible good-humour so won upon the gardener, that he was installed as a regular labourer about the place. Here he soon made himself acquainted with the passages and entrances of the stronghold, more especially with the geography of the dungeon tower. Nevertheless, study it as he would, he could find no means of communicating with the captive, much less of liberating him from thraldom. A thick iron door between massive stone walls is no ineffectual barrier, if only it be kept locked.

Turning matters over and over in his own mind, while he worked away in the flower-garden, Dick had arrived at the conclusion that the shortest method would be to set the whole place on fire, seize his keys, after braining old Ralph the jailer in the confusion, and thus make his escape with the prisoner through the flames. To his great relief he had long since ascertained, amidst the gossip of the servants, that Maxwell was still alive.

It was necessary, however, to choose a judicious moment for this exploit, and Dick, understanding that the Lord Rothes and a large force were to move on the Sabbath from Leslie, had selected that day, when the house would be less strictly guarded than usual, for his undertaking. His plan was to fire the place about the hour of curfew, when the retainers were sauntering abroad in the summer evening, and were less easily collected than at any other hour; but as our borderer was a man of great rapidity in action, and kept himself ready at any moment to take an advantage, Armstrong had strict directions whenever, by day or night, he should see a wreath of smoke or a red glare above the old beeches, that instant the horses should be brought to a certain secluded coppice within half a mile of the castle.

Thus our friend laid his plans, and with equal judgment disposed his combustibles, straw by straw, as it were, and faggot by faggot, even as the bird of the air builds her nest, with secrecy and perseverance. Everything was ready, and the borderer went about his work in the garden, as he said to himself, ‘with a clear conscience.’ On this very afternoon, when Maxwell made his unaided escape from confinement, Dick had just returned from attending the three noblemen to their game at bowls—the very game which Maxwell had remarked unfinished as he crossed the green. It was with no small surprise that he saw the prisoner escaping across the garden which was his own peculiar charge.

The borderer was somewhat disconcerted; nevertheless, he reflected for a moment. ‘If,’ thought he, ‘Mr Maxwell can surmount the outer wall he will but light down plump amongst the three earls who are walking in the avenue beyond; if he remain concealed here in the garden, he is sure to be missed when old Ralph visits the prison, discovered, and retaken; nay, if Rothes be the least out of humour, probably put to death. The faggots are all laid: I have a flint and steel in my belt; I had best set fire to the place at once, and have done with it.’

Moreover, Dick was not very sure on his own account that he might not be himself suspected. In getting the bowls ready for the three noblemen, Moray’s piercing glance had not failed to detect a face he seemed to recognise. With a brief effort of memory the Earl recalled that thrust on the causeway of Edinburgh from mad Arran’s blade, and the interposition of Earl Bothwell’s henchman, which saved his own life.

‘Good fellow,’ said he, as Dick raised his face from setting ‘the jack’ in its place, ‘I have seen you before; I owe you a debt for saving my life a while ago, during a brawl in the High Street.’

Argyle and Rothes were at the other end of the green, poising their bowls to begin; Dick answered hastily, and in a whisper—‘I’ve been in trouble on the border; I’m in trouble yet; but I’m no kent in Fife. Your honour can best pay it by no lettin’ on[15] that ye’ve ever seen me before!’

Moray was a good-natured man enough; he nodded an understanding, and put a piece of gold in the gardener’s hand; but, nevertheless, Dick felt none the more sanguine, after this recognition, for the success of his enterprise.

No sooner, however, had he seen Maxwell swing himself into the old beech tree, a gymnastic feat which called forth his warmest approval, than he hastened back to put his long-laid scheme in practice, with what success we have already learned; for the bloodhound’s sagacity must unquestionably have led to a discovery of the fugitive, had it not been for the diversion occasioned by the fire.

‘An’ noo,’ said the borderer, with a sad, wistful expression on his honest face, very different from the roguish humour with which he had narrated the detail of his adventure,—‘an’ noo, I’m easy in my mind, whichever way the bowl may rin. I’ve paid my debt, Maister Maxwell, ye ken; I’m thinking it’ll no be lang or I get my quittance.’

Maxwell was somewhat puzzled; he could not quite fathom the meaning of his honest friend. Alas! ere a few hours were past he understood it but too well.

Time of course was the chief object with the three cavaliers; it was indispensable to arrive in Perth at as early an hour as possible, so as to warn the Queen of her danger, and to raise the country for the punishment of her foes. The party however were right well mounted; Dick had not selected the worst of Bothwell’s horses for an expedition in which speed was so likely to be an essential element of success; and ‘Wanton Willie,’ once the property of Lord Scrope himself, and stolen from the English warden by a series of stratagems, remarkable alike for ingenuity and audacity, was an animal of extraordinary power, mettle, and endurance.

It was no ordinary sensation of delight that Maxwell experienced as he swept through the evening air borne onwards by the long untiring stride of the powerful bay stallion. It was like grasping the hand of an old friend to stroke and smooth that swelling crest as ‘Wanton Willie’ tossed his head and snorted, champing the bit and snatching playfully at the rein.

He had always loved a good horse well. Now with the fate of a kingdom dependent on his speed, he could not prize too highly the merits of his charger. Also Maxwell’s heart was even yet sore and empty; it was soothing to rely on the honest fidelity of a brute. How many men are there who lavish on horse and hound the affections that were hoarded, it may be, long ago, elsewhere; given unreservedly, accepted with glee, and returned after a while to the dejected owner with the sap dried up, the core extracted, and the virtue gone! So he learns to content himself perforce with that which is real and substantial, at least as far as it goes; learns to thrill at the note of a hound, forget the past in the glowing excitement of a gallop; and the well-judging world opines that he has a grovelling soul which soars not above the stables and the kennel, and is fit for no better things.

The moon was coming up from the horizon, and still the three rode swiftly and steadily on. They were many miles from Leslie now, but, alas! they were not yet clear of Leslie’s influence. At a small hamlet where they stopped to water and refresh their horses, Maxwell was recognised ere he touched the ground by a scion of the house of Rothes, even then on the march with a party of horse to join his kinsman’s forces at the Paren-Well.

David Leslie started with surprise as the bay was pulled up at the stone trough before the village inn, but the young soldier was prompt in action and saw at a glance he had but three men to deal with, and one of those unarmed. His own retainers were numerous and on the spot.

‘Walter Maxwell!’ he exclaimed, seizing ‘Wanton Willie’ at the same instant by the bridle, ‘you are my prisoner! Ho! a Leslie! a Leslie! to the rescue!’

His men came pouring out at the well-known cry. Stout troopers all of them, and armed besides to the teeth. There was nothing for it but a quick and determined resistance.

Dick spurred his horse without hesitation against the assailant on foot, dealing him at the same moment a heavy buffet with his gauntleted hand, for he had no time to draw his sword. Armstrong protected Maxwell’s other flank. There were several fierce oaths, a pistol-shot, a smothered groan, much trampling of hoofs, a plunge or two, and Maxwell found himself again careering along between his two defenders over the open plain at a pace that set pursuit at defiance.

‘Well out of that, Dick!’ said he cheerily, as they pulled their horses at last into a trot, and listened for the enemy who came not. ‘Well out of that! we’ll win the race and be home now before midnight, I expect. These are rare stuff, these Border nags of yours; it’s no wonder men should be tempted to steal such cattle as we are riding to-night!’

But Dick answered nothing, only he seemed to hold his horse in a rigid immovable grasp, and the three broke into a gallop even swifter than before. The moon was up now, riding clear and high in the mid-heaven. Was it only her light that made the borderer’s face so pale? Dick spoke at last in a thick, hoarse voice, and the others pulled up simultaneously as he did so.

‘I’ll light doun, I’m thinkin,’ said he. ‘Ride you on, Maister Maxwell! I’ll just bide where I am awee. It’s a kin’ o’ dwam[16]-like that’s come over me.’

He dismounted while he spoke. He was scarce clear of the saddle ere he staggered and fell heavily to the ground. Armstrong unbuckled his corslet and opened the buff jerkin beneath. It was light enough for Maxwell to see the little round mark that soldiers know so well. Large drops were standing on the borderer’s forehead, and his lips were turning white. Maxwell took his hand, and the dying man smiled a feeble, ghastly smile, as he returned the grasp.

‘I’ll no win back to Liddesdale,’ said he, faintly. ‘I’ll no get the length o’ Perth the nicht. I’ll be meat for the corbies[17] the morn. Gude speed ye, my canny lad! Pit yer foot intill the stirrup again. A Queen’s errans munna stan’ still for the like o’ me!’

Maxwell’s tears fell thick and fast. While Armstrong held the horses, he propped the borderer’s head upon his knee, and whispered a few broken words, he knew not what, of grief and hope, that seemed a mockery even then.

The mossy turf on which they rested was not more clammy than the pale forehead in its damps of death; he was bleeding inwardly, and every breath he drew exhausted more and more the shallow stream of vitality that was left.

‘Ride you on,’ he whispered, ‘ride you on! leave Ralph wi’ me, I’ll no keep him lang. Ye’ll win to the Court the morn, lad, an’ ye’ll see bonny Mistress Seton, an’ ye’ll tell her frae me——’

He was getting very weak now; twice or thrice he strove to speak, but no sound came. Maxwell bent over him, and held his breath to catch the sacred accents of the dying man.

He raised himself a little with an effort, and his voice was stronger now.

‘Tell her,’ said he, ‘that if ever she can win to Liddesdale, she maun walk afoot through the bonny glens, and hearken to the lilt of the lavrock, an’ pu’ a sprig o’ the red heather, just to mind her o’ “Dick-o’-the-Cleugh”—rough, rantin’ Dick, that wadna ha’ evened himself to kiss the very ground beneath her feet. Eh! lad, an’ she hadna been a born leddy, I wad hae lo’ed yon lassie weel!’

Then Dick’s head sank lower and lower; nor, although he lived for a short space afterwards, was he heard to speak again. Maxwell was forced to leave him, however loth, in charge of his comrade; his own duty would admit of no delay. Sadly and slowly he mounted ‘Wanton Willie’ once more; sadly and slowly he loitered away at a foot’s pace, turning his head often to gaze wistfully back where Ralph Armstrong was stooping in the moonlight over the long prostrate figure of the henchman. At last he saw Ralph lay the head gently down upon the sward, and walk a few paces away. Then he knew that it was over, and galloped on towards Perth with wet eyes and a heavy heart.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

‘Happy’s the wooing that’s not long of doing,’ says a hopeful Scottish proverb. ‘Marry in haste, and repent at leisure,’ is a wholesome English warning, that may be considered the converse of the above.

quoth Congreve, or one of the old dramatists. We may take our choice of maxims on the important topic of wedlock, satisfied that, ponder on it as we may, it is a matter in which blind fortune concerns herself more than in any other of our human affairs. Yes, ‘your marriage goes by destiny,’ no doubt, and sometimes the fates draw you off nectar, and sometimes wholesome bitters, and sometimes weak, insipid, flat, and stale small beer. Under any circumstances it is better not to pull a wry face at the draught. If the fairest woman the earth ever saw could not make sure of conjugal happiness, who has a right to complain?

Darnley was now Duke of Albany—the handsomest Duke in Christendom—and on the evening before her nuptials his affianced bride had somewhat prematurely caused him to be proclaimed King of Scotland. Two religions had prepared to consecrate the tie; the Pope’s dispensation, inasmuch as the lovers were blood relations, had been obtained from Rome, and the banns by which, according to the Reformed Persuasion ‘Harry Duke of Albany and Earl of Ross should be united to Mary, by the grace of God, Queen of Scots, and Sovereign of the Realm,’ had been proclaimed in the Parish Church of the Canongate.

The Queen had escaped the plot laid against her by her enemies at Leslie House, and, it is needless to say, how royal favour and ladies’ smiles were showered upon the daring rider who foundered ‘Wanton Willie’ for ever by the speed with which he brought his timely intelligence to Perth, a speed that enabled the Queen to sweep down to her capital with a strong, well-mounted escort, in advance of all the preparations made for her capture. She had quelled an insurrection at St Leonard’s Craigs since then; she had strengthened her party by all the means at her disposal, and even striven hard to listen without anger to the ill-timed remonstrances of Elizabeth, forwarded through Randolph, who, somewhat to his dismay, and much, to his disgust, found his importance waning, hour by hour, at the Scottish Court.

Everything a woman could do by persuasion, by policy, by forbearance, by her own intrinsic fascination, Mary had done to attain, if possible, a few months or even weeks of repose for the enjoyment of the present; happy, as she fancied herself, in her love, and willing to be at peace with all the world.

And while the young Queen looked about her for friends and partisans in every direction, was it likely that she would forget her stout champion on the border, the warlike Earl of Bothwell? It may be that she had long sought an excuse to pardon him; it may be that, like the rest of her sex, though prone to commit it in haste, her heart smote her sore, after awhile, for an act of injustice. She recalled him, she forgave him, she brought him back to her dangerous presence, and the flame that was consuming this wild and tameless heart, only burned all the fiercer that he must stifle it for awhile.

Moray kept aloof from the sister whom he had deceived, and the Queen against whom he had conspired. Accustomed as Mary had been for so long to depend upon her brother whenever she needed counsel or assistance, no doubt she felt his estrangement very keenly; but even Moray, notwithstanding all his offences, she would have received once more with open arms, had he abjured his devotion to the interests of the astute Elizabeth, and returned to his natural duty and allegiance.

The fairest daughter of the Stuarts was always, alas! more of the woman than the Queen. Had she been less frank, less trusting, less kindly, less affectionate, above all, less beautiful, the crown of Scotland would have sat more firm upon her head, the head itself would not at last have been severed by the cruel axe at Fotheringay.

But that dainty head never looked more nobly than to-day. With the glory of love and happiness shining round it; with the royal diadem resting on the white and gentle brow; with the soft rich hair gathered into such a coronet of splendour as no other princess, as no other woman in Europe, could boast; with a majestic form set off by the sweeping robes of black in which, as a royal widow, étiquette bade her approach the altar; above all with the atmosphere of beauty that surrounded Mary as with a charm, Old Thomas the Rhymer had never such a vision of the Fairy Queen herself as burst upon the sight of loyal Lennox and devoted Athol, when she emerged from her chamber and suffered them to conduct her to the Chapel Royal of Holyrood, at six of the clock on the summer Sabbath morning that smiled with such well-omened brilliancy upon the bride.

Could black fate be hovering over that gay and sparkling throng, marking them out, as it were, one by one, for her future shafts? There they stood—so many of them; the brave, the beautiful, the loyal, the gentle and the true, glowing in youth and health, towering in the pride of manhood and the pride of place; radiant in silks and velvets, blazing with gold and gems; and the red mark scored in the book of destiny against two out of every three illustrious names, and the little cloud, though still below the horizon, yet waiting none the less surely to break in fatal tempest over the proud unconscious brows, and shatter the guilty and the innocent in one indiscriminate ruin to the dust.

Even crook-backed Riccio could not forbear an exultant song of rejoicing when the ceremony was concluded, that gave his indulgent mistress to the handsome, petulant boy she had chosen for her lord.

‘Glory to God!’ exclaimed the secretary, in his deep, rich tones, as the rites were finished with a burst of chanted thanksgiving. How long was it ere those same lips, writhing in their death-pang, were gasping for mercy in hoarse, gurgling whispers choked in blood? In the meantime, the Queen is conducted back from the Chapel to the Palace, and the ceremony takes place of unrobing Her Majesty, who is now no longer a widow, but a bride, with all the established jests and noisy glee such an occasion is calculated to call forth.

First Darnley takes out a pin, then Athol, then Lennox, then each of the gentlemen of the household as he can approach the royal person, while her ladies like a guard of Amazons close round her more and more as the spoliation proceeds. The process, as is natural, soon degenerates into something like a romp, and Walter Maxwell, with a heavy heart, finds himself, to his own dismay, mixed up with such merry fooleries.

While Her Majesty proceeds with a few of her tiring-women into another chamber, whence she will presently reappear in dazzling apparel suited to the occasion, we will return to the humbler personages of the scene, who may now, like the supernumeraries in a theatre, come up to the foot-lights and display their antics, whilst their betters are off the stage.

To begin with the Maries, whom we have too much neglected whilst taken up with ruder and less engaging natures.

Those young ladies, by the very act to which they have even now been lending their assistance, have become freed from their self-imposed obligations of celibacy, and might marry, if it so pleased them, one and all to-morrow. To the philosopher who fancies he understands the nature of the sex, it will not appear surprising that at this juncture none of them should show the slightest disposition for entering that holy state, from which it has hitherto been considered such an extreme hardship they should be debarred. Hilarious, as it was their duty to appear during the performance of Her Majesty’s nuptials—hilarious, of course, be it understood, with the proper admixture of tears—for ladies esteem a wedding to be essentially an April performance of showers and sunshine—yet no sooner was the principal excitement over, no sooner were the four young beauties released from their respective attitudes of attention, and at liberty to receive the compliments and reply to the bantering congratulations of the courtiers, than a cloud seemed to come over each of them, and they looked far less inclined to laugh than to cry.

Mary Beton, perhaps, kept her spirits up with more determination and a greater show of indifference than either of her sisters in sorrow; nevertheless, Mary Beton, while she certainly enjoyed an advantage over the others, was in an uncomfortable state of uncertainty and transition.

Although it is doubtless a wise and wholesome precaution for a lady to have two strings to her bow, yet the instrument is apt to get somewhat warped and out of order in the process of taking off the old and fitting on the new. There is something softening as well as soothing in the attentions of the recent capture, and they remind us rather touchingly at times of those other looks and tones which made such fools of us not so long ago. We cannot do the same things, say the same words, go through the same exercises (and in truth there is, we believe, but little variety in the drill by which the human heart is disciplined), without experiencing very much the same kind of sensations as heretofore, and it is not always easy to distinguish between the old feelings and the new. The former come over us with an overwhelming rush when we least expect them, and our only chance is to credit the fresh account with as much of the balance as we can. That same tenant-right is a very difficult matter to get rid of when once it has been firmly established in the breast.

Mary Beton had broken with her old lover for good and all. She had convicted him of treason to her Queen; and although this offence she might possibly have forgiven, she had found him out in treachery to herself. It is needless to say that she would have nothing more to do with Randolph, and was prepared to listen with no unwilling ear to the suit of Alexander Ogilvy. But the latter was distant and offended still. He had not forgotten certain rebuffs, certain black looks and cold answers, that had piqued and irritated him long ago. He loved her indeed very dearly, therefore he did not mean to hold out for any great length of time, but still it was his turn now, and he could not be expected to forego his share of advantage in the merciless game. It is an old saying that ‘many a heart is caught on the rebound,’ and perhaps he was sure of his prey, and content to wait a little and enjoy the excitement of the capture.

Proud Mistress Beton, too, had become far more docile and womanly of late. Pained and humbled by the treatment she had experienced from Randolph, it would have been inexpressibly soothing and delightful to encourage and return an attachment she could trust, and on which she could lean, so to speak, without fear of mortification. Great liberties are sometimes taken, great risks run, in these affairs. Tempers that are imperturbable on all other topics, blaze up with reckless violence against the nearest and dearest. When the wild bird has ruffled her plumes in anger, and broken her jesses in pique, the observant fowler, who watches his opportunity, finds every facility afforded for his lure. There is no time at which the human heart is so susceptible to kindness as when writhing under a sense of injustice and ill-treatment which it has not deserved.

So Mary Beton was less haughty, less overbearing, and consequently looked ten times lovelier than usual on her mistress’s wedding-day.

She stands now nearest the door, waiting for the Queen, and whispers gently and lovingly to Mary Seton, who seems to cling to her senior as to an elder sister, and whose fair face has of late assumed a sad and thoughtful expression very different from that which it used to wear.

The arch looks are downcast now, and the merry voice is hushed and low. The girl is not unhappy, only grave and saddened perhaps a little by her experiences. She has bid Walter tell her over and over again how poor Dick Rutherford laid him down to die in the moonlight and spoke of her—of her, the vain, frivolous girl!—with the last breath he ever drew. What had she done to win so entirely the devotion of that great honest heart? Had she suspected it? Had she triumphed in it? Had she prized it? Ah! never so much as now, when all the wishing in the world would fail to bring the trusting kindly nature back to her feet.

She was a noble damsel, and Dick but the mere retainer of a warlike lord, ranking scarce above a man-at-arms. And yet it was something, surely, to have been so loved by any one human heart: to have taken everything and given nothing in return. She could weep now to think that never—never would she be able to make him amends.

Ay, he was a man that was brave and strong and single-minded, daring, patient, resolute, fearing nothing under heaven, humble and child-like only with her. How often might she unwittingly have wrung the gentle, uncomplaining heart; how often purposely, just to essay and feel her power! She could hate herself to think of a hundred trifles now! Ah! too late—too late! He was gone where neither foeman’s lance nor lady’s look could reach; where cold words and bare steel were alike powerless to wound. Gone—gone altogether, and she would never see him more.

It seemed to Mary Seton, as she stood there and looked at her comrades, that she alone would fulfil that vow of celibacy from which to-day’s festival had enfranchised the Queen’s Maries. Where could she expect to find hereafter such an affection as she had neglected and lost? No; henceforth she would devote herself heart and hand to the service of her mistress; cling to the Queen through rain and shine, calm and storm, good and evil. If prosperity blessed her dear mistress, she would rejoice; if adversity frowned, she would console her; if danger or calamity came, she would share it. Let the others marry, an’ they must; for her, she would belong to her Queen! And nobly, in after years, Mary Seton redeemed her vow.

But there was one of the maids-of-honour whose wedding was indeed to succeed Her Majesty’s, who looked forward to its arrival with more than maidenly longing; who hoped for it, and relied on it with more than a woman’s trust. Mary Hamilton, with her pale face and wasted form, had continued her service with the Queen, silent and uncomplaining, never unbosoming herself to her companions, not even confiding her sorrows to her mistress until now. To-morrow she would be free; to-morrow would be the day of her espousals, and the poor weary head would lay itself to rest, the poor sore heart find comfort and relief at last. It was for this she had been waiting so patiently, for this she had borne her burden so uncomplainingly. To-morrow she would become the Bride of Heaven, and the veil she would then put on must never be taken off again this side the grave!

In her cell (so her religion taught her, hopeful even in death), in her cell she could pray for the soul of him she had loved so fondly; could believe, when his fiery sufferings and her own prayers and tears had obliterated his crimes, she would meet him, never again to part, on the shining hills beyond the dark shadowy valley that she feared no whit, nay, that she only longed to tread.

Mary Hamilton took the vows on the day subsequent to the Queen’s marriage, at the bright midsummer season, when the blooming world should have looked fairest and most captivating to her who turned her back upon it so willingly for evermore. During a twelvemonth, so the Romish Church enforced, she must make trial of her new profession, and at the expiration of that period, should she continue in the same mind, the novice was to become a nun.

There is little doubt she would have fulfilled her intention had the occasion ever arrived.

It was an early harvest that year in Scotland, but ere the barley was white, Mary Hamilton had done with nuns and nunneries, vows and ceremonies, withered hopes and mortal sorrows, and had gone to that place where the weary heart can alone find the rest it had so longed for at last.

There is but one more of the Maries with whom we have to do: Mistress Carmichael must speak for herself in another chapter.

CHAPTER XXXIX.

Perhaps of the four young ladies who had thus devoted themselves to the service of the Queen, Mary Carmichael was the least changed in demeanour and outward appearance at the auspicious period which gave them their freedom, and entitled them to assume that temporary dominion over the other sex which is a woman’s birthright. She was still beautiful as ever; her sorrows, if she had any, did not veil an atom of brilliancy in her eye, or take a shade of colour from her cheek; her figure was no less rounded and symmetrical in its full flowing lines, her step no less firm and haughty, her manner, if anything, colder and more self-reliant. If there was any change observable in Mary Carmichael, it was that she seemed to become harder, prouder, less sympathising and less womanly day by day.

On some natures anxiety and distress produce a bracing, and as it were a petrifying effect; they will not have it thought that they can be affected by such morbid influences as the feelings. There are women of ice and women of fire, women of wax and women of marble. It is possible that, if the truth were known, these strong beauties suffer as much as their more impressionable sisters, and yet the proud face never falls, the hard eyes never soften. Try her with words that ought to stab, each of them, to the quick; if she winces you never know it, for the white bosom heaves no higher, the colour neither fades nor deepens on the fair, provoking cheek. It is maddening to the assailant; perhaps also the one attacked is not quite so comfortable as she looks; perhaps if you were to alter your tactics, to change your mood, and take up the cool, indifferent line yourself, she might be goaded out of this unnatural calm into a tempest that, if it did break out, would probably be very terrible. It is better not to try. ‘Touch not the cat but a glove,’ says the motto of a noble Scottish family; ‘Never drive a woman into a corner,’ is the maxim of every philosopher who would escape scaithless from those contests in which the rougher and honester nature is almost sure to come by the worst.

Walter Maxwell was not the man to persevere in a wooing that he once had reason to believe was unwelcome; he, too, could hide a warm, loving heart, under a grave, impenetrable brow—could bear the pain of seeing the idol of his fancy day by day more and more estranged, yet never wince nor writhe under the torture, far less upbraid or complain. For weeks he had been habitually in her society, himself the hero of the hour, the man whom the Queen favoured as her deliverer, whom lords and ladies greeted as her champion, yet never hazarded a word nor look that could lead Mary Carmichael to believe he still cared for her, far less sought an interview, as doubtless she often hoped he would, that should bring about reproaches, tears, a quarrel, an explanation, and a reconciliation.

These two proud dispositions were like the parallel lines which, similar in all their properties, are for that reason incapable of meeting. How the woman’s heart swelled and ached when she watched him always so calm, so courteous, so impassible, so indifferent; how she longed for him to be rude, fierce, angry, even unjust and unreasonable! she would rather he had struck her than thus passed her by with that studiously gentle manner, that hateful iron smile. Oh! it was hard to bear—hard to bear; and yet she must bear it, and none must know her weakness or her sufferings.

And he, too, longing only to forgive everything in which he felt himself aggrieved, believing he could be quite content now if they were but friends and nothing more, thirsting for one kind look from her eyes, one cordial word from her lips, felt bound perforce to treat her with the calm, courteous, defiant bearing of those who are enemies to the death.

Ludicrous as it might have been to the bystanders, it was an uncomfortable state of things to the performers themselves in the little drama,—tragedy, comedy, farce, call it what you will, and your nomenclature will probably depend upon your time of life: lovers’ quarrels look so different as the decades roll by. An uncomfortable state of things, doubtless, and it might have gone on for a lifetime but for one of those accidents to which such sufferers are peculiarly susceptible.

Accidents, like the fresh breeze that springs up on a sultry summer’s day. The heavens are dark and lowering, there is an oppressive weight in the atmosphere, the very birds sit hushed and sullen behind the motionless leaves, and the earth looks saddened and weary, mourning as if she had made up her mind that the sun was never to shine again. Suddenly the breeze wakes up and comes laughing out of the west; the clouds fly scattered before him, the young leaves flicker in the golden sunshine, the birds burst forth in those joyous strains which, to do them justice, they are ever ready to strike up on the slightest provocation, and the whole landscape shines and smiles and quivers in life and light once more.

When the Queen emerged from her tiring-room in the magnificent apparel best befitting such a bride, another courtier, in addition to the party that had thronged the Chapel, entered the royal circle to tender his homage as in duty bound, and congratulate Her Majesty on her nuptials.

This new arrival was a tall, handsome man of middle age, perhaps a little past that delusive epoch, yet still bearing the traces of considerable beauty of feature, and distinguished for peculiar fascination of manner and grace of bearing. He was dressed, too, with the utmost splendour, and obviously in the very latest fashion of the French Court. Several of the Queen’s immediate attendants seemed to know him well, and greeted him with a warm assumption of cordiality and interest, although in the outer circle, so to speak, inquiring glances were shot at the welcome stranger, and whispers of ‘Who is he? who is he?’ passed unanswered from mouth to mouth.

It was chiefly among the younger courtiers and those whose rank did not entitle them to share the secret councils of Her Majesty that this curiosity was observed to manifest itself. Two or three of the seniors accosted him with obviously suppressed warmth and mirthful looks that denoted a world of intelligence only known to themselves, but Mary Carmichael’s eyes rested on the distinguished stranger with an expression of the utmost love and confidence those very expressive eyes could convey. Had it not been for this, Maxwell might never have remarked the late addition to the royal circle, so absent was he and preoccupied, truth to say, so utterly weary and sick at heart. Watching, however, as he had accustomed himself to do, by stealth, the direction of his mistress’s glances, he could not but be aware of the stranger’s presence, and it needed no second look to satisfy him that this was the identical cavalier whom he had seen that starlight night in the Abbey-garden, whose face and figure he was not likely to forget should he live for a hundred years. On that memorable occasion he remembered to have experienced a vague and puzzling sensation that he had met his rival before. To-day, in the Queen’s presence-chamber, it came back again; but he was in no mood now to speculate on such random fancies and probabilities.

No, in five seconds of time he had made up his mind to the worst, and had resolved upon the line of conduct he should adopt.

Of course it was all over at last. Never till this moment, when it crumbled and fell to ashes, had he been aware how much of hope there was mingled with his suspicions and his pique. Hope! the word itself seemed an absurdity now. Nevertheless, there is no such utter composure as a brave mind borrows from the total annihilation of all it has loved and cherished most. Men can have no anxieties when there is nothing left to lose, and even a coward will sometimes die gracefully enough if there be an obvious impossibility of escape.

The most accomplished gallant of the French Court could not have moved through the circle of ladies that crowded the Queen’s ante-room with a more assured air than did Walter Maxwell; the most consummate fop could not have shown less agitation than was betrayed in the few words he addressed then and there to Mistress Carmichael.

‘We were old friends once,’ said he, ‘though now we seldom even speak. Shall I find you in the gallery before the banquet. I should like to be friends again once for all.’

He might have been criticising the pattern of her dress, so cold and quiet were his tones. The lady did not show quite so much self-command. She turned very pale, and her lip trembled so that she did not dare trust her voice; but she bowed her head in the affirmative, and was glad to screen herself from observation meanwhile amongst the ample dresses of her companions.

You see she had by no means made up her mind that all was over; perhaps, too, a horrible misgiving came across her that she might have driven him too far.

While the rest of the household were preparing for the banquet, they had the gallery to themselves. Strange to say, the lady reached the trysting-place first. Though the colour deepened on her cheek when she heard his step, she never turned her head till he came close to her, and by that time she had recovered her self-command. They were standing on the very spot where she had dropped the roses long ago. If this coincidence occurred to her, be sure she did not think it worth while to mention it.

He spoke first, very gravely and kindly, in the tone of a man who feels he has a reparation to make.

‘Mistress Carmichael,’ said he, ‘I have treated you unfairly and unlike a friend. I may have thought I had a right to be angry with you; now I know for certain that is all over. I am no longer angry. I ask you to forgive me, and to shake hands before we part.’

She scarcely dared look at him, standing there tall and manly before her, with his kind eyes, and bold, frank brow. No fopling lover to be given up lightly and at a moment’s notice, forsooth? Over, was it? Perhaps she did not see it at all in that light!

‘What do you mean?’ she gasped, trying hard not to tremble, nor to laugh, nor indeed to cry.

‘I am reconciled to it all,’ was his answer, ‘because I see you love him, and that you are happy. It is but a selfish affection that cannot rejoice in the welfare of its object. To-day,’ he added, with rather a sad smile, ‘the maiden’s vow is at an end. Never mind what follies may have once crossed my brain. Prove to me that you forgive them by confiding in me as if I was your brother.’

She looked up at him with a quick, searching glance.

‘You mean you think I am going to be married?’ said she, ‘and you are wishing me joy?’

‘I am indeed,’ he replied, with another smile yet sadder than the last. ‘Somewhat awkwardly, I fear, yet none the less honestly for that. Listen! I shall never tell you so again. I loved you as dearly as it is possible for man to love woman; so dearly that even now I can rejoice that you are happy. I can give you up to one you love. I can ask you now at this moment, when everything is at an end between us except friendship, the purest and most loyal, to let me serve you all my life; though it will be years before I shall have courage to look on your face again.’

The last sentence came out in spite of him. It spoke volumes to a woman’s perceptions. Perhaps she liked that involuntary confession of weakness better than all the strength and self-denial she had so admired a while ago.

‘You do really love me,’ said she, trembling indeed still, but pale no longer, ‘so well, that for my happiness you would give up everything, even myself?’

‘Had it not been so,’ he answered, ‘do you think I should have been so angry with you for what I saw in the Abbey-garden? Well, he may claim you now before them all. God bless you and him! Farewell! Will you not give me your hand once more for the last time?’

She must have been a strangely unfeeling lady, Mistress Mary Carmichael, to resist such an appeal, and yet the tears were brimming in her eyes despite of a roguish, happy smile on her red lips. She withheld her hand, however. Perhaps she did not wish to part quite so abruptly.

‘You are generous,’ said she, between tears and laughter, ‘and you used to be obedient—at least sometimes. Wilful always, you know, or I should not have had to chide you so often. Will you shake my—my future husband by the hand, and assure him of your good-will?’

He thought she might have spared him this, but he assented cordially. What mattered it, a little suffering, more or less? At least it would put off the parting for a few minutes.

‘Wait here an instant while I bring him!’ said she, and darted off, leaving Walter in that frame of mind which is best described by the metaphor of ‘not knowing whether he stood on his head or his heels.’

He had not long to wait, though in truth he kept no account of time. A light hurrying footstep trod the gallery once more, followed by a heavier and manlier stride. Maxwell turned round to confront his lost love, closely followed by the individual she had promised to bring.

’Tis strange how a vague, misty idea, that has puzzled us for long, will sometimes shine out on a sudden as clear as day. There was a frank, joyous expression on the stranger’s brow, a sparkle of excitement in his eye, that brought back to Maxwell’s recollection for the first time where he had seen him before the well-remembered night in the Abbey-garden. It was the same tall cavalier who had spurred his horse so gallantly into the skirmish near Hermitage, shouting his war-cry the while. It was a kinsman, then, whom she was going to marry after all.

Mary Carmichael stood silent for an instant looking from one to the other. Then she spoke out very quick, as if anxious to tell her story while she could.

‘Farewell, Master Maxwell! farewell, if indeed you mean to leave us all at such short notice. You shall not go, however without knowing my father, my dear father, who has never dared show himself openly in Scotland till to-day. And none of you ever found him out—not even you, with your sharp, suspicious eyes,’ here she began to laugh; ‘and—and—Walter, if I have seemed unkind to you, I am sorry for it now,’ here she began to cry, ‘and I hope you will forgive me, and love my father as well as I do. My dear, dear father, who has got home safe at last!’

And then she flung herself on the paternal breast and hid her face there, laughing and crying together, in a strange, wild mood, very unlike the proud, self-reliant Mary Carmichael whose tears Walter had so often wished he had the power to call forth, if only for the pleasure of drying them; but then these natures, like frozen streams melting in the sun, are proof against everything but the warmth of a great happiness.

Sir Patrick Carmichael, for such was the name of Mary’s adventurous father, had probably some inkling of how matters stood. Whether she had explained to him that she had a slight regard for this loyal servant of the Queen, or whether, as is more likely, she had confined herself to talking of him on all occasions, and constantly finding fault with him most unjustly rather than not mention his name, is matter for conjecture; but Sir Patrick, grasping Maxwell warmly by the hand, assured him of his own good feelings towards him, and his sincere respect for so brave and devoted an adherent of their Sovereign.

It was this latter quality that had won its way so triumphantly into Sir Patrick’s heart. A staunch Catholic himself, Walter Maxwell was probably the only Protestant in Scotland to whom he would have intrusted the happiness of his daughter, but the stout Queen’s-man was only bigoted in his loyalty, and he could have refused nothing to the man who saved Mary Stuart from the treachery of her intriguing brother, and the violence of her own subjects.

He had himself been carrying on a secret correspondence with the Guises on the part of his Sovereign for years, a correspondence that involved continual disguises and many hair-breadth ’scapes from the emissaries of those unscrupulous statesmen, who would not have hesitated for an instant to take his life. Such an exploit as the attempt to rob Randolph of his dispatches was but an amusing interlude in a career like his, but it was seldom indeed Sir Patrick could enjoy a ride, either for sport or strife, in the society of his own countrymen.

His daily existence was one of imminent peril, only warded off by constant vigilance and acuteness: his only pleasures, and even these were subservient to political purposes, the stolen visits to his daughter, which had so excited Maxwell’s jealousy and distrust. He was a bold, nay, a reckless man enough, but he loved that daughter in the corner of his fearless heart better than anything on earth, except the cause of his Queen; also, Sir Patrick was a person of delicacy and kind feeling withal, owning that sympathy for a love affair which those cannot but entertain who have themselves passed, more or less scorched, through the fire.

So he left his daughter and Maxwell together in the gallery, and when they all met at the Queen’s table an hour afterwards, he observed that the pair never exchanged a word, but looked as if they had some mutual understanding nevertheless, and were so happy they could neither eat, nor drink, nor converse rationally, nor sit still.

CHAPTER XL.