"Your Majesty will excuse me—I am sufficiently rebuked by that glance of displeasure. But this man is only a rascally border pricker."
"True, my lord," said Hepburn; "but one over whom thou hast no control."
"How! doth he not follow my banner?"
"Yes—but merely as an excuse to plunder the Elliots on the one hand and the Armstrongs on the other. He brings twenty tall troopers, all well-lanced and horsed; his kinsman, Watt of the Puddingburn, brings as many more from his tower on the Liddle; and these would each and all be notable disturbers of the wardenrie, did it not suit Pate's humour at present to follow your banner."
"Droll personages!" said the Queen; "but, Lord Bothwell, thou shouldest feel nought but gratitude to this moss-trooper, when it is to his mistake alone thou art indebted for this visit from me."
"I was upon the point of saying so," rejoined the Earl, who felt, he knew not why, a confused sense of awkwardness and timidity, hitherto unknown to him; and this caused pauses in the conversation which served to increase his confusion; for the more he taxed his mind for gay topics, the more seriously he became embarassed.
"Fidelé," said the Queen, in her softest tone to a favourite Italian greyhound, which, with a silver bell jangling at its neck, leaped gracefully upon her brocaded dress. "Fair Fidelé, of all the world thou alone lovest thy mistress best; and in good sooth I may well love thee better than the world, for thou lovest me for myself alone. Ah! Monsieur Bothwell, thou knowest not how dearly I love all little dogs, and parrots, and pigeons, and every little animal. I have quite a large family to feed every morning at Holyrood. Monsieur my uncle, the Cardinal de Guise, has sent me a beautiful cage full of red-legged partridges; and my kinsman, the Marquis d'Elboeuff, has brought me from Madame my aunt, the good Prioress of Rheims, a vase full of the most beautiful little fishes, which I mean to put into Lochmaben. I fear thou wilt think all this very childish in me, who am a queen—and queen of such an austere people;" and, while shaking a bunch of grapes at the leaping hound, she began to sing—
"Bon jour, mon coeur,
Bon jour, ma douce vie!
Bon jour, mon oeil,
Bon jour, ma chere amie!"
She ceased suddenly; the hound looked up wistfully in her face, her eyes filled with tears, and Bothwell seemed disturbed.
"Your Majesty is thinking of France?" said he in a low tone.