"Nay, for he is only young Florence Fawside of that ilk, as I understand," said the Lord Kilmaurs, to whose right eye a savage glare was imparted, together with a spasmodic contortion of that side of his face, by a dreadful sword-wound, which he received at the defeat of the English at Ancramford.
"Only!" reiterated his father, with an accent upon the word; "Mahoun! art thou sure of this?"
"Sure as I am a living man."
"But men say he is still in France," urged the Lord Lyle.
"Nay, my lord," began the Master of Lyle, "for the old beldame his mother——"
"She is a Kennedy of Colzean, and my near kinswoman," interrupted Lord Cassilis haughtily.
"I crave your pardon, though fortunately we are not of Carrick, where all men court St. Kennedie," replied the other, bowing with a smile on his lip and a sneer in his eye; "but Dame Alison hath written letters into France to the Duchess Anne of Albany and Vendome, desiring her to send back the youth, that he might avenge the death of his brother, whom Claude Hamilton of Preston slew at the king's barresse, and in fair fight, as we all can testify."
"Ay, old Preston's sword hath been reddened alike in the blood of father and son, a strange but not uncommon fatality."
"Consanguinity, my Lord Lyle, should make that quarrel ours too," said the Earl of Cassilis; "but fortunately, I have no wish to embroil myself with Preston, and the old dame Alison hath ever disdained our aid and alliance."
"If that bedizened spark be really Fawside her son, he has been long in the service of Anne de la Tour of Vendome, widow of the late Regent Albany," said one who had not yet spoken, and whose accent marked his country as England, though he wore the badges and livery of the house of Glencairn; "and rede me, sirs, he hath some other mission to Scotland here than his mother's feud with the Prestons."