"By whom?"
"The devil, who, as thou knowest, never lies dead in the ditch. Approach me"—and, raising his visor, Ormiston whispered something to the Earl, who started; and Hepburn, who watched them with a keen eye, exclaimed—
"Speak forth, Hob of Ormiston; for I see there is assassination in thine eye, and here stand I, John Hepburn of Bolton, ready to be thine abettor, in any deed of stouthrief or bloodshed; for I am frantic in heart, frenzied in head, and ready to ride above my stirrups in the blood of the Stuarts of Lennox!"
"No, no," replied the Earl; "Hepburn, thou hast thine own wrongs, and mayest avenge them; but Ormiston, what is this thou hast said to me? No, no, get thee behind me, thou tall limb of Satan, I will have none of thy tempting."
Ormiston gave one of his deep hoarse laughs that shook every joint of the mail in which his muscular figure was sheathed; and, spurring their steeds, they rode furiously back to the city, by the old road that then passed close to the solitary chapel of St. John the Baptist, on the burgh-muir, and entered Edinburgh by the Old Horse Wynd, a street that led to the porch of Holyrood Palace.
CHAPTER XXI.
FATHER TARBET.
Let us be patient! these severe afflictions
Not from the ground arise;
But often times celestial benedictions
Assume this dark disguise.
Longfellow.
Three months passed away, and the spring of 1567 was at hand.
Bothwell's love for Mary had grown more and more a part of his existence, fostered as it was by the cunning of her brother the Earl of Moray, whose boundless ambition made him hope that ultimately something great might accrue to himself, were this wild passion properly moulded; for Moray had early formed a hope of usurping the throne—a hope based upon the queen's unpopularity as a catholic, his own great influence, and the helpless infancy of his nephew, James, the little crown prince of Scotland.