They parted with laughter on both sides, and a bow from David. Ruthven came back.
‘You may do it when you please, sir,’ he said to the King.
CHAPTER IV
MANY DOGS
When, on 6th March, the expected stroke fell upon my Lord Chancellor Morton, and he was required to hand over the seals of his high office to the Queen’s messengers, he did so with a certain heavy dignity. As I imply, he had had time for preparation. He had not seen his sovereign for some weeks, knew that Lethington had not, knew also that his alliance (even his kinship) with the King had worked against him, and suspected finally, that what that had not done for his prospects had been managed by the Italian. So he bowed his head to Erskine and Traquair when they waited upon him, and, pointing to the Great Seal on the table, said simply, ‘Let her Majesty take back what her Majesty gave. Gentlemen, good night.’ Truly, we may say that nothing in his life became him like the leaving it: but that is the rule.
The same evening—nine o’clock and a snowy night—Archie Douglas came to his house in the Cowgate and found him writing letters—not easily, but with grunts, his tongue curling about his upper lip. The disgraced Chancellor looked up, saw his cousin, and went on writing. Archie waited. So presently, ‘Moriturus te salutat,’ says the Earl, without ceasing to labour.
‘Pshaw, cousin,’ says Archie, ‘I have come to you with a better cry nor that.’
‘Have you indeed?’ scoffed my lord. ‘Man, I would be fain to know it.’
‘’Tis Habet,’ says Archie, ‘and down with your thumb.’