“No traitor?” he demanded rigidly.
The man gave a short laugh.
“No traitor to my own principles,” he said, “which are to free Judea of the last of thy house and dynasty.”
Sir Edward ground out a killing oath; but the King silenced him. Here was evidently a survival of the fierce fanaticism of the ’forties, and still unappeased by the blood of an ancient holocaust. It seemed a significant, an ominous chance to have encountered him at this pass. A profounder dejection settled upon James’s heart. He spoke as if appealing:
“You wish us gone, my friend?”
“Aye,” said the creature, “I wish you gone.”
“For what reason?”
“So that I may live again.”
“Live?”
“Other than as the scapegoat that bore upon his head the iniquities of the unclean. For twenty-eight years have I sojourned in the desert, nameless, hungry, and abhorred—I, that delivered Judah of her sins. Yet the hour is mine at last. The elect shall receive and justify me. Thy deposition is my restoration, James Stuart. Judge if I rejoice to speed thee on thy way.”