Lady Alison was on her knees at her husband's altar-tomb in Tranent Church, imploring God to aid and to protect her son, when old Roger of Westmains arrived, with his eyes swollen by weeping, and his heart swollen by rage and sorrow, to detail the death of her eldest boy by the same relentless sword that slew his father! The fierce, stern woman heard him to an end, and then fell prostrate on the tomb, in a paroxysm of grief, and perhaps of remorse.
If the latter found way in her breast, it did not linger long. Three days she remained in a darkened chamber, without speaking to any one; on the morning of the fourth she came out, graver, more gloomy, and, if possible, paler than before, and said briefly to Westmains—
"Write to France—to the chateau of Anne of Vendome, and desire Florence to come home without delay. I have yet the bullets that were found in the body of his father; and if the widow of John of Albany hath kept her royal word, I may yet have sure vengeance on yonder murderer and his brood!"
"The tenants have brought their herezelds," said Westmains in a low voice.
"Remit them; but say, to put their swords to the grindstone, for the day cometh when I, Alison Kennedy, shall need them all."
The bailie referred to the gift given in case of death to the heir of an over-lord, generally the best cow, yielded by those who held of the said lord an oxgang of land.
There were now TWO places vacant at the hearth, two platters unused on the table, and two scutcheons hung in the kirk of Tranent; but the mangled images of those who were gone remained enthroned more darkly than ever in the heart of the widow and mother!
CHAPTER IV
AN OLD SCOTTISH MATRON.
Can Christian love, can patriot zeal,
Can love of blessed charity—
Can piety the discord heal,
Or stanch the death feud's enmity?
Scott.