The widow came, feeling her way down the hall; distracted with grief, using her hands like a blind man. Beside her, really leading her, was a tall girl, exceedingly handsome, dark-haired, pale, with proud, shut lips. She looked before her, at nothing in particular—neither at the young Queen stormy on her throne, nor at the circle of watchful men about her, nor at her brother’s bowed head, nor at the full doorways. She saw nothing, seemed to take no part, to feel no shame. Except the Queen only, she seemed the youngest there; with the Queen, whose eyes she held from the beginning, she was the only girl among these grim-regarding men.
‘Who is that? Who is that girl?’ the Queen asked Lethington, without ceasing to look.
‘Madam, it is the Lady Jean Gordon.’
‘She has a frozen look, then. Why does she not see me? Is she blind?’
‘They say she is proud, madam.’
‘Proud? What, to be a Gordon?’
She watched her the whole time of the process, finding her a cold copy of her brother, admitting freely her great beauty, admiring (while she grudged) her impassivity. She herself was all on edge, quivering and intense as a blown flame, her face hued like the dawn, her eyes frosty bright. The other was so still! But the Queen was never quiet. Her eyelids fluttered, the wings of her nose; her foot tapped the stool; she saw everything, heard every breath. Jean Gordon had no colour, and might have been carved in stone—a sightless, patient and dumb goddess, staring forward out of a temple porch. Huddling in her great chair, resting her chin on her hand, her elbow on her knee, Queen Mary watched her closely, sensing an enemy; and all this while Lady Huntly called upon God and man to testify to Gordon’s bane.
‘Malice,’—thus she ended her wailing,—‘Malice hath wrought this woe; far-reaching, insatiable malice! There was one that craved a fair earldom, and another the fair trappings of a house: there was one must have the land, and another the good blood. Foul fare they all—they have their desires in this world! Where is Huntly? He is dead. Where is my fine son John? Dead! dead! Where is Adam, my pretty boy? Fetters on his ankles, madam, the rats at his young knees. Come, come, come: you shall have all the Gordons. There you have the heir, and here the widow, and here the fatherless lass. Let them plead for your mercy if they care. I have no voice left but a cry, and no tears but bloody tears. What should I weep but blood?’
The Queen still looked at Jean Gordon. ‘Do you plead, mistress?’ she asked her.