“You are as great a fool as Fleming,” returned the impatient maiden; “know ye not, that on the night of Henry Darnley's murder, and at the blowing up of the Kirk of Field, the Queen's absence was owing to her attending on a masque at Holyrood, given by her to grace the marriage of this same Sebastian, who, himself a favoured servant, married one of her female attendants, who was near to her person?”
“By Saint Giles,” said the page, “I wonder not at her passion, but only marvel by what forgetfulness it was that she could urge the Lady Fleming with such a question.”
“I cannot account for it,” said Catherine; “but it seems as if great and violent grief and horror sometimes obscure the memory, and spread a cloud like that of an exploding cannon, over the circumstances with which they are accompanied. But I may not stay here, where I came not to moralize with your wisdom, but simply to cool my resentment against that unwise Lady Fleming, which I think hath now somewhat abated, so that I shall endure her presence without any desire to damage either her curch or vasquine. Meanwhile, keep fast that door—I would not for my life that any of these heretics saw her in the unhappy state, which, brought on her as it has been by the success of their own diabolical plottings, they would not stick to call, in their snuffling cant, the judgment of Providence.”
She left the apartment just as the latch of the outward door was raised from without. But the bolt which Roland had drawn on the inside, resisted the efforts of the person desirous to enter. “Who is there?” said Graeme aloud.
“It is I,” replied the harsh and yet slow voice of the steward Dryfesdale.
“You cannot enter now,” returned the youth.
“And wherefore?” demanded Dryfesdale, “seeing I come but to do my duty, and inquire what mean the shrieks from the apartment of the Moabitish woman. Wherefore, I say, since such is mine errand, can I not enter?”
“Simply,” replied the youth, “because the bolt is drawn, and I have no fancy to undo it. I have the right side of the door to-day, as you had last night.”
“Thou art ill-advised, thou malapert boy,” replied the steward, “to speak to me in such fashion; but I shall inform my Lady of thine insolence.”
“The insolence,” said the page, “is meant for thee only, in fair guerdon of thy discourtesy to me. For thy Lady's information, I have answer more courteous—you may say that the Queen is ill at ease, and desires to be disturbed neither by visits nor messages.”