Scornfully the Monarch turned away, and commanded the gayeties to proceed. He flung aside cloak and sword, and gallantly led Dame Heron in the dance, as the minstrels, at the King's command, struck up "Blue Bonnets o'er the Border."
[Illustration: SCOTT'S MONUMENT, EDINBURGH.]
CHAPTER VI.
Now we leave the royal revels, and return to Saint Hilda and her maids. As they sailed back to Whitby, their galley was captured on the high seas by the Scotch, and the ladies were held at Edinburgh until James should decide their fate.
Soon, however, they were informed that they must prepare to journey to England, under the escort of Lord Marmion. At this, terror seized the heart of the Abbess and of Clara. The aged, saintly lady knew the fate of Constance, and for this, feared Lord Marmion's wrath. She told her beads, she implored heaven!
The Lady Clara knew the sword that hung from Marmion's belt had drawn the blood of her lover, Ralph De Wilton! Unwittingly the King had given these defenceless women into the care of the man they most dreaded. To protest was hopeless. In the bustle of war, who would listen to the tale of a woman and a nun?
The maids and the Abbess were assigned lodgings joining those of Marmion, their guardian. While there, the unhappy, but alert, holy woman caught sight of the Palmer. His dress made her feel that she would here find a friend. Secretly she conveyed to him a message, saying she had a secret to reveal immediately concerning the welfare of the church, and of a sinner's soul.
With great secrecy she named as a meeting place, an open balcony, that hung high above the street.
Night fell; the moon rose high among the clouds; the busy hum of the city ceased; the din of war and warriors' roar was hushed. The music of the cricket, the whirr of the owlets, might easily have been heard, when the holy Dame and the Palmer met. The Abbess had chosen a solemn hour, to disclose a solemn secret.
"O holy Palmer!" she began,—"for surely he must be holy whose feet have trod the ground made sacred by a Redeemer's tomb,—I come here in this dread hour, for the dear sake of our Holy Church. Yet I must first speak, in explanation of a worldly love." Here was related by unwilling lips, the story of Constance's fall, of De Wilton's death or exile after being proved a traitor, of Lady Clara's faithfulness to the memory of De Wilton, and of her desire to enter the convent of the Abbess.