"And quite right, too!" cried Mary Stuart, as if carried away by an irresistible impulse. "Noble and grand this silence is! It is the course of a gentleman who does not even choose to repel suspicion for fear that suspicion may fall upon him. I say, for my part, that this very refusal to speak is the most eloquent and convincing of justifications!"
During this outburst the old queen was gazing at the younger one with a stern and angry expression.
"Yes, I may be wrong to speak thus," continued Mary; "but I care not! I speak as I feel and as I think. My heart will never allow my lips to remain closed. My impressions and my emotions must find vent. My instinct is the only policy that I recognize, and it cries out to me now that Monsieur d'Exmès never conceived and executed such a crime in cold blood, but that he was only the blind instrument of fate, and believes himself to be above any other supposition, and therefore scorns to justify himself. My instinct tells me this, and I give it voice. Why not?"
The young king gazed joyfully and affectionately at his mignonne, as he called her, while she expressed herself with an eloquence and animation which made her twenty times more fascinating than usual.
Gabriel cried in a touched and penetrating voice,—
"Oh, thanks, Madame! I thank you! And you have done well; not on my account, but your own, you have done well to act thus."
"Indeed, I know it," replied Mary, with the most gracious accent that one could dream of.
"Well, have we reached the end of this sentimental childishness!" cried Catherine, indignantly.
"No, Madame," said Mary Stuart, wounded in her self-respect as a young wife and a young queen, "no; if you have made an end of your childishness, we, who are young, thank God! are only just beginning. Am I not right, my gentle Sire?" she added, turning prettily toward her youthful spouse.
The king did not reply in words, but touched with his lips the ends of the lovely fingers Mary held out to him.