"Say not so!" replied Sir James Tarbet, with animation, for at such a crisis of the Catholic church such sentiments were priceless to its upholders. "Youth lendeth additional grace to the practice of religion. Of this I will talk with thee more anon; and I trust that the day may come when I shall see thee hold aloft the blessed sacrament, on that holy altar which this infatuated people have prostrated for a time—I say, but for a time; for lo! again I see it rising phoenix-like from its ashes, in greater splendour than ever the middle ages saw!"
Fired by the energy of the priest, who seemed like something ethereal, as the noon-day sun streamed in a blaze of glory through the grated window on his kindling eyes and silver beard, and soothed by his manner and discourse, Konrad felt a new and hitherto unknown glow in his bosom, especially when the old man knelt down, saying—
"Pray with me, for this is the festival of Saint Edmund, the king and martyr; but, like many another consecrated day, it passes now in Scotland's hills and glens, unmarked by piety and prayer; for now, her sons can view with apathy the ruins of her altars, and the grass growing green in the aisles where their fathers prayed, and where their bones repose."
CHAPTER XXII.
THE WHISPER.
Thence rugged toil attends his mazy way,
And misery marks him for her prey;
Sedition, envy, murder, passion, strife,
Spread horror o'er his path of life;
These to the hated mansion lead,
Where cheerless age reclines his drooping head.
Sophocles.
The whisper of Hob of Ormiston had not been lost on the Earl; hourly it haunted him; he thought of it by day, he dreamt of it by night.
Amid the pleasures of the table, the noise of the midnight revel, the ceremonies of the court, the debates of the council, the solemnities of the church, in the glare of the noonday sun, and, worst of all, in the silence of the voiceless night, that fatal whisper was in his ear, and fanning the latent spark of hell that lay smouldering in his heart.
He deemed himself predestined to accomplish that terrible advice; but still his soul recoiled within itself, and even the ardour of his love for Mary, and his hatred of her husband, were stifled for a time at the terrible contemplation. Life lost its pleasures—power and feudal splendour their zest; his employments were neglected; his attire, usually so magnificent, was never as it used to be—for a change had come over him, and that change was apparent to all. Mary could perceive that, at times, a dusky fire filled his dark and gloomy eyes, and then she immediately shunned their gaze. His brow had become pale and veined, and marked by thought and care. The gentle queen pitied him; and when compelled to address him (for he was still her most distinguished courtier), she did so with a kindness and reserve that only added fuel to the secret flame that preyed upon the Earl's heart.
The coldness, separation, and unconcealed dislike between Mary and King Henry still continued, and they were, to all appearance, irreconcilable; till he, after running headlong on a frightful career of luxury and mad riot at Glasgow, where he was residing at his father's mansion of Limmerfield, was seized with a deadly fever, which ended in that dreadful and loathsome disease, the smallpox, then very prevalent in the west country. And now, when prostrated in all his energies, abandoned by friends and foes, by the panders, and jockies, and boon companions among whom he had squandered his health and wealth, his own peace and the peace of his queen and wife—she nobly was the first who flew to his succour.