"Pooh, pooh!" answered Beatrice, tossing her head with a somewhat scornful smile. "The king never made atonement to any one. The king always thinks he is right, and has been ever right, and will be right to the end of his life. He never dreams for a moment that he can have been wrong, though he may take means to lull the objects of his dislike or his doubts till they are wholly in his power.--But now come, Alex, do not let us pursue this subject any farther, but return quietly to the palace."
Then bidding her elder brother adieu, the lady left him, and, accompanied by Alexander, walked back almost in silence to Holyrood; for she herself was full of doubts and anxieties, and Alexander Ruthven was in that state of irritation which is often produced, especially in a young mind, by a conflict between a wish to do right and strong temptations to do wrong.
I need not pause to detail the passing of the day with Gowrie. The law's delay is proverbial as one of the banes of human existence in the blessed land wherein we live.--It was so even in his time; and he found, on consulting with those who had to deal with such matters, that the drawing up of the renunciation, simple as it seemed, would require the labour and attention of several days, in order to couch it in the full and ample terms which he knew would be required by the king. He had to give long explanations, and to enter into details which he had not previously considered, so that the greater part of a spring day was consumed before he left the dim and dingy den where the man of law held his abode. On his return to his own house he passed more than an hour in walking up and down the large and handsome sitting-room, and meditating over the past and the future. If it be asked whether his thoughts were sad or bright, I must answer, very much mixed, as is ever the case with a man of strong sense and active imagination. But Gowrie, it must be remembered, was in the spring of life, in that bright season when the song of the wild bird, hope, is the most loud and sweet and seducing. The circumstances which surrounded him might alarm or sadden him for the time, but the cheering voice still spoke up in his heart, and the syren sang not in vain. At length he ordered lights to be brought, and casting himself into a chair, took up a book--his favourite Sallust--and began to read. The pages opened at the Catiline, and the first words struck him, as strangely applicable to the half-formed resolution which had been floating vaguely in his mind, of passing life in peaceful retirement.
"Omnis homines, qui sese student præstare ceteris animalibus, summa ope niti decet vitam silentio ne transeant, veluti pecora, quæ natura prona, atque ventri obedientia, finxit."
"And yet," he said, "methinks many a man can raise himself above the brute without mingling in the busy turmoil of the world's affairs--nay, do more real service to his country and his race in the silence of deep but peaceful thought than in the noisy contests of courts and cities."
Then he went on to read, till he came to the splendid description of Catiline.--"Lucius Catilina, nobili genere natus, magna vi et animi et corporis, sed ingenio malo provoque," &c.
"What a picture of wickedness," he thought, as he read on; "ay, and what a picture of the state of Rome under the republic, when it was possible to say of any one man's life, 'Huic, ab adolescentia bella intestina, cædes, rapinæ, discordia civilis, grata fuere; ibique juventutem suam exercuit.' Is this the fruit of free and democratic institutions?" he thought. "Is a state so nearly approaching to anarchy, the result of popular government? A despotism were better! But yet it cannot be so. There must be a mean between the licence which destroys and the authority which oppresses society, when the people have sufficient power to guard and support their liberties, and the magistrates of the land are armed with the means of checking lawless violence without trenching upon lawful freedom. I am not a free man if there be others in the land who have the power to injure me unpunished: my freedom is as much controlled by them as it could be by any king. It is laws which make real freedom, laws justly framed and firmly executed, laws above kings and subjects both.--But let me see what he says more."
He had not time, however, to turn the pages of the book before the door quietly opened behind him, and a step was heard upon the floor. He did not turn his head, however; and the person who came in proceeded round the table to the opposite side of the fireplace, when Gowrie, suddenly looking up, beheld his servant, Austin Jute.
"Why, how now, Austin?" he exclaimed. "What has brought you to Edinburgh? Has anything happened?"
"Nothing to my lady, sir," replied the Englishman, comprehending very well that his sudden appearance might alarm the earl for Julia's safety, "but a good deal to myself; and I thought it much better to come and tell you, my lord, rather than go back to my duty, for nobody can tell how much what happens to one man may do for another. I'm not in Edinburgh by my own good will, you may easily believe, for you told me to stay, and I would have stayed; but necessity has no law, and what can't be cured must be endured. If other legs run away with me, my legs aren't in fault, and might makes right, as people say.--Well, my lord, I'm going on. I came against my will, as I shall set forth presently. The way was this: it is just four days ago that we saw three or four men riding in that long dark valley to the north west, and old Mac Duff, your baron bailie, was thinking to go forth and see what they were about; but knowing very well that if he were taken and the place attacked, I could not command the men, or, at all events, that they would not obey, which comes pretty near to the same thing, I rode out alone to reconnoitre. I did not think I could be so easily taken in, but this is a devil of a country, my lord, for such matters. I looked sharp enough round, as I thought, all the way I went; but it was impossible to go in and out amongst all the rocks and big stones, and I still caught sight of the men I had seen from the tower. When I came within about half a mile of them, they turned round and began to ride away, as if they were afraid of being caught, and thinking they had only been upon some marauding expedition with which I had nothing to do, I did not ride after them more than a couple of hundred yards; but when I turned to go home again, I saw five men on foot blocking up the road behind me. I made a dash at them, thinking to get through, but they were too much for me, my lord, and they soon had my horse by the bridle, commanding me to surrender in the king's name. I asked for their warrant, but they only laughed at me; and the other men on horseback coming up, they tied my feet under the saddle, and my hands behind my back. The horsemen rode with me, but the men on foot disappeared."