"Because I count kindred with Clelland."
"And thou, Bolton, why wentest thou with thy fifty lances?"
"Because I claim kindred with Ormiston."
"So may ye all hang together in the end!" said the Earl, angrily; "while I, your lord and feudal superior, want you, ye are fighting under other banners. Now, Paris, my sword and salade. Summon my grooms, and let us to horse—the fellow cannot be far off yet."
Hob of Ormiston was sheathed in a favourite suit of black armour, which he usually wore to render his sobriquet more complete; but Bothwell's particular friend and ally, Hepburn of Bolton, who was captain of his castle of Hermitage, and lieutenant of Queen Mary's Archer Guard, wore a magnificent suit of polished steel, the gorget and shoulder-plates of which were riveted with rows of golded-headed nails. He was a young and handsome man, and his bright blue eyes sparkled with merriment and good humour under the uplifted visor of his helmet.
Both these gentlemen helped themselves, unasked, to wine, from a red vase of gilded crystal that stood on a buffet, and both laughed somewhat unceremoniously at the unseemly conjugal feud that had evidently taken place, and each made his remarks thereon with a blunt carelessness peculiar rather to the men than to the age.
"The Lady Bothwell seemeth ill at ease," said Ormiston, winking to Hepburn over his wine horn.
"Fore heaven! he must have been a marvellous sorcerer, this Konrad," laughed the young knight, showing all his teeth under a brown mustache; "and if I come within a lance length of him, he will have reason to remember Jock of Bolton for the short remainder of his days."
"Adieu, my bonnibel!" said the Earl, in a low voice, as he laid his hand caressingly on the shoulder of the countess, who never raised her drooping head.
"Adieu!" she sobbed; "and may it be for ever."