“Sir Patrick Hepborne,” said the Earl of Moray, “wilt thou vouchsafe to honour us with a cup to the fair enslaver of thine affections?”
Sir Patrick arose, and, putting his right hand over his heart, bowed gracefully, and then seated himself in silence. In the former instances, where knights had declined to speak, the Earl of Moray had passed them by without further notice, but he was himself so disappointed, and perceived disappointment so legibly written on the faces of the company after Hepborne’s silent bow, that he could not resist addressing him again.
“What, Sir Patrick,” said he, “hast thou then no lady-love, for the sake of whose bright eyes we may hope to see thee bestirring thyself sturdily in the lists?”
“My Lord Earl,” replied Hepborne, risingly modestly, “it will give me joy to break a few spears, out of mere courtesy, with any knights who may esteem mine arm worthy of being opposed to theirs.”
The Earl saw that it would be indelicate to press him further, and went on to the conclusion of his circle of healths. The choir of minstrels, who had already occupied the music gallery, had begun to make the antique Hall of Randolph resound with their pealing preludes, when their harmony was interrupted by a clamouring noise of voices from without; and immediately a crowd of squires and domestics of all kinds came rushing into the hall, exclaiming, “Fire, my Lord Earl of Moray, fire!”
“Where—where—where is the fire?” burst from every mouth; and the ladies shrieked, and many of them even fainted, at the very mention of the word.
“The town of Forres is blazing,” cried half-a-dozen voices at once.
The utmost confusion instantly arose amidst the assemblage of nobles, knights, and ladies. Out rushed the Earl of Moray, and out rushed such of his guests as had no lady to detain them within. Hepborne, for his part, happened by accident more [[270]]than anything else, to follow his host up a staircase that led to the battlements, which in daylight commanded a view over the whole surrounding country; but the landscape was now buried in darkness, save where a lurid blaze arose at three or four miles’ distance in the direction of the eastern horizon, through which appeared some of the black skeletons of the consuming tenements of Forres, or where the broad and full estuary of the river reflected the gleam which cast its illumination even over the houses of the seaport of the distant point, and the wide ocean beyond it. Far off, shouts and yells arose from different quarters of the circumjacent forest, as if from people who were collecting, and hastening in dismay towards the scene of the conflagration.
“Holy Virgin, defend us! what can have caused so sudden and unlooked-for a calamity?” cried the Earl of Moray, in a tone of extreme distress.
“Meseems it can hardly be the result of accident,” replied Hepborne, “for the fire doth blaze in divers parts at once. Can it have been the work of some enemy?”