Sir Patrick’s astonishment had been too great to permit him to remark the page’s trepidation when first surprised by him, and before his amazement had subsided, Maurice de Grey had time to recover himself.
“’Tis true,” said he, “Sir Knight, that I have always worn my hair long, and put up in a silken net, being loth to cut it away, seeing it was the pride of my mother’s heart; but, nathless, if thou dost think it unmanly in me to wear it so, verily it shall be cut off before to-morrow morning, that it may no longer offend thee. Yet I marvel much what could possibly make thee to think that my cousin, the Lady Eleanore, could be here in the Castle of Lochyndorbe; or how hast thou perchance set thine eyes on her, so as to have so perfect a remembrance of her figure as thou dost seem to preserve? I know that her father, Sir Walter, doth take especial care that she shall never be seen by any Scottish knight. Then by what accident, I pray thee, didst thou behold her?”
Hepborne was considerably puzzled and perplexed by these naif questions from the page. To have refused to reply to them at all would have been the very way to have excited a thousand [[226]]suspicions in the boy’s mind; he, therefore, thought it better to answer him, and he wished to do so in a calm and indifferent manner. But it was a subject on which he could not think, far less talk, with composure, and, ere he wist, he burst into an ecstacy of feeling that quite confounded the page.
“See her!” said he; “alas, too often have I seen the Lady Eleanore de Selby for my peace. Never, never, shall peace revisit this bosom. She is another’s; yet, nathless, must this torn heart be hers whilst it shall throb with life.” And saying so, he covered his face with his hands, and retreated some steps to hide the violence of his emotions; but becoming ashamed of having thus exposed his secret to the page, and made him privy to the extent of his weakness, he returned to the boy, and found him weeping bitterly, apparently from sympathy.
“Maurice,” said Hepborne, calmly addressing him, “accident hath made thee wring from me the secret of my love, as chance did also make me tell thee yesternight, that I had cause to fear that the demoiselle who hath so deeply affected me was not in truth altogether what she at first appeared to me. As she is thy cousin, and so dear to thee as thou dost now say she is, I would not willingly allow thee to suppose that I have been estranged from her by mere caprice. I shall therefore tell thee that the Lady Eleanore de Selby did give me good cause to believe that my ardent protestations of love were not unpleasing to her; nay, she even held out encouragement to the prosecution of my suit; and yet, after all this ground of hope I did discover that she was affianced to another knight, in whose arms I did actually behold her, as they parted from each other, with many tears at the keep-bridge of Norham, on the very morning when I and my friend left the place. Her emotions were too tender to be mistaken. She it was who sported lightly with my heart, not I with hers, for, had she not been faithless, I would have sacrificed life itself for her love, and would have considered the wealth of a kingdom but as dross compared with the possession of a jewel so precious. Even as it is, I am doomed to love her for ever. I feel it—I feel it here!” said he, passionately striking his heart—“I can never, never cease to love her.”
The page seemed petrified with the charge brought against his cousin. He grew faint, and staggered back a pace or two, until he was stayed by the support he received from the balistæ; then panting for a moment he was at length relieved by a flood of tears.
“Thou seest, Maurice,” said Hepborne, “the facts are too damning. It would have been better for thee to have inquired [[227]]less curiously. But what figure is that which cometh yonder from the farther end of the rampart?”
“Blessed Virgin,” cried Maurice de Grey, “’tis my perpetual torment, the Lady Mariota. What shall I do? Methought I had escaped from her importunity for this night at least.”
“Why shouldst thou not be able to bear with her?” said the knight; “’tis a part of thy schooling, young man, to submit to mortification, and, above all, to bear with unpleasant society, without losing a jot of thy courtesy, especially where women are in question.”
“True, Sir Knight,” said the page, half whimpering, “but the Lady Mariota hath actually made violent love to me. Oh, I cannot bear the wretch.”