"And he asked if you had missed him, and you made a sign for me not to speak, just as you used to do at Castle Thrieve, and answered, 'No, not a little bit! Margaret and I were quite happy. We hoped you would not come back at all this night, for then we could have slept together.'"
Maud Lindesay drew a long, soft breath, and looked out of the window of the White Tower into the dark.
"That is a sweet dream," she murmured. "Ah, would that it were true, and that Sholto—!"
She broke off short again, for the maid clapped her hands gleefully. "You said it! You said it!" she cried. "You called him Sholto. Now I know; and I am so glad, for he is nearly as good to play with as you. And I shall not mind him a bit."
Little Margaret stopped short in her turn, seeing something in her friend's face.
"Why are you suddenly grown so sad, Maudie?" she asked.
"It came upon me, dear Margaret," said Maud, "how that we are but two helpless maids in a dreadful place without a friend. Let us say a prayer to God to keep us!"
Then Margaret Douglas turned and knelt with her face to the pillow and her small hands clasped in front of her.
"Give me your silver cross," she said, "I lent the little gold one that was William's to the Lady Sybilla, and she hath not returned it me again."
Maud gave her the cross and she took it and held it in the palm of her hand looking long at it. Then she repeated one by one the children's orisons she had been taught, and after that she made a little prayer of her own. This is the prayer.