‘Or mine, would you say?’ she flashed back at him—one of her penetrative flashes, following a quick turn of the head. Remember, she knew nothing of his brawl with the Prince.
He disregarded her riposte, and pursued his suspicions. ‘Madam, madam, I very well know—for I still have friends in Scotland—in what danger I stand. I very well know who talked together against me behind the back-gallery at Perth, and can guess at what was said, and how this late discreditable scene was laid——’
‘Oh, you guess this, brother! you guess that!’ the Queen snapped at him; ‘I am weary of your guesses against my friends. There was the Earl of Bothwell, whom you guessed your mortal enemy; now I suppose it is the Prince, my husband. Do you think all Scotland finds you in the way? It is easy for you to remove the suspicion.’
His looks reproached her. ‘Did you send for me, madam, to wound me?’
‘No, no. You have served me well. I am not unmindful.’ Her eyes grew gentle as she remembered Wemyss and the hasty mysteries of the night—the hurry, the whispered urgings, the wild-beating heart. She held out her hand, shyly, as befitted recognition of a blushful service. ‘I can never quarrel with you, brother, knowing what you know, remembering what you have seen.’
Whither was fled the finer sense of the man? He misunderstood her grossly, believing that she feared his knowledge. He did not take her proffered hand—she drew it back after a while, slowly.
‘You say well, sister,’ he answered, with cold reserve. ‘There should be no quarrel, nor need there be, while you remember me—and yourself.’
‘It was not at all in my mind, I assure you,’ she told him, with an air of dismissing the foolish thing; and went on, in the same breath, to speak of the vexatious news from England—as if he and she were of the same opinion about that! Her ‘good sister,’ she said, was holding strange language, requiring the return of ‘subjects in contumacy,’ showing herself offended at unfriendly dealing, and what not—letters, said Queen Mary, which required speedy answer, and could have but one answer. The Contract of Matrimony, in short, had been prepared by my Lord Morton, was ready to be signed; the high parties were more than ready. Should she send for the treaty? She wished her brother to see it. That was why she had summoned him.
He was seldom at a loss, for when direction failed him he had a store of phrases ready to eke out the time. But now that he was plumply face to face with what he had come both to hate and to fear, he stammered and looked all about.
She rang her hand-bell, and bade the page call Signior Davy ‘and the parchment-writing’; then, while she waited in matronly calm, sedately seated, hands in lap, he wrestled with his alarms, suspicions, grievances, disgusts; saw them flare before him like shapes—lewd, satyr shapes with their tongues out; lost control of himself, and broke out.