The little crooked secretary had been educated in an atmosphere of political agitation and intrigue. To his native Italian shrewdness David Riccio added that quickness of perception, that power of reading men’s characters at a glance, which can only be acquired by those who are compelled, amidst the storms through which they guide their bark, to watch every aspect of the horizon, to press every instrument into their service, and take every advantage that shall enable them to weather the gale.

During the Feast of the Bean, whilst the majority of the courtiers were but intent on the merriment of the moment, whilst ladies sipped flattery and lords quaffed wine, it had not escaped the notice of a pair of black southern eyes that Maxwell seemed unusually restless and unhappy; that, in spite of his outward composure, there was something wild and defiant in his glance: nay, that he wore the look of a man in the right mood for a desperate undertaking—one to whom a dangerous enterprise would appear in the light of a relief.

Either purposely, or by chance, Maxwell, returning giddy and half-stupefied from the Abbey-garden, found himself confronted in one of the galleries of the Palace by Her Majesty’s private secretary. The revel was dying gradually out; most of the ladies, following the example of their Sovereign, had retired, and but a few staunch wassailers were left, collected round the buffets and tables, at which wine was still flowing with a lavish hospitality more regal, perhaps, than judicious.

The secretary (though he had to rise on tiptoe to do it) clapped the soldier familiarly on the back.

‘Not to bed, Master Maxwell,’ he exclaimed in jovial tones, ‘not yet to bed, without one cup of sack to wash the night air out of thy throat and wet the wings of sleep, as we say in Italy, so that she cannot choose but fold them around thine head!’

While he spoke he desired one of the Queen’s cellarers, who was passing at the moment, to pour him out a measure of the generous liquid, and the man, more than half-drunk, gladly filled his goblet to the brim.

Maxwell, though in no mood for revelry, was still less disposed for solitude. Half-stunned by the blow he had received, he yet dreaded the moment at which he must stand face to face, as it were, with his great sorrow, and caught eagerly at any interval of delay as a respite from his sufferings. A draught of the rich, generous wine seemed to restore him somewhat to himself. Riccio, meanwhile, trolled off, in his mellow southern voice, a few notes of an Italian drinking song.

He was no mean physiologist, the little secretary, and he saw that his man was weary and saddened, and both morally and physically overpowered. So he gave the charm time to work, and when his companion had emptied the cup, poured him out another forthwith.

‘Master Maxwell,’ observed Riccio, as he marked the eye of the former brightening and the colour returning to his cheek, ‘the ladies of the Court vow you are a true knight. Like our chevaliers of Italy, sworn before the Peacock to do them service, you are bound to refuse no adventure in their behalf. Is it not so?’

Maxwell winced a little. The subject was no pleasant one, and he was at this moment particularly sore on that point; so he answered in a cold, hard voice—

‘I have little respect for the mummeries of chivalry, Signior Riccio. A man should do his duty, whatever it be, for its own sake. And as for the ladies,’ he added, with a sad smile, ‘I leave it to younger and happier men to fulfil their wishes; if indeed they are fortunate enough to be able to find them out.’

The secretary laughed gaily.

‘Is it so?’ he said; ‘must all men alike discover that the little finger of a white hand is heavier than the arm of a Douglas sheathed in steel? I thought it was a lesson only learned by the dwarfed, the misshapen, the unsightly, like me. But you, Master Maxwell, the handsome, the straight, and the tall; can it be that a woman listens unmoved to such men as you?’

There was no covert sarcasm, no leavening of ill-nature in his voice—nothing but the good-humoured banter of a laughing boon companion. And yet it may be, that even under his jest, David Riccio was glad to learn that the prizes of life did not fall so readily to those personal advantages which he coveted with the longing of deformity.

‘Enough of this!’ replied Maxwell, interrupting him rudely, and holding out his cup to be filled yet once more. ‘Months of Holyrood have not succeeded in making me a courtier. I love the free open sky better than these tapestried walls. I love the sound of a trumpet better than a woman’s false whisper, and the shaft of a Jedwood-axe better than an ivory fan. I can hearken to a plain tale, and accept a defiance given in my teeth, but I have no skill in reading the thoughts of others by the rule of contrary, and I never could understand our Scottish proverb that averreth how “Nineteen nay-says make half a grant.”’

He was still chafing under his ill-usage, and talking more to himself than his companion.

The latter looked at him long and eagerly. Apparently satisfied with his scrutiny, he patted him on the shoulder once more.

‘You are young,’ he said; ‘you have life before you; you are quick-witted, brave, and adventurous. What, man, there are more prizes than one in the lottery! If love be a false jade, ambition is a glorious mistress. Is it not better to sit at the back of the stage and pull the strings than to be one of the puppets and dance because another moves you; perhaps a fool’s dance, with a fool’s guerdon, for your pains at the end?’

Maxwell shook him off impatiently.

‘You speak in riddles,’ said he, ‘and I have no skill in expounding such parables. If you have aught to say, out with it, like a man. Midnight is already past.’

‘And a fresh day begun,’ added Riccio,—‘a fresh day, a fresh scheme, a fresh triumph. What say you, Master Maxwell, have you stomach for an adventure? Have you a mind to draw your riding-boots on for those silken hose, and don corslet and head-piece on a Queen’s errand? Or are you, too, under the spell that paralyses youth and strength and manhood? Are you, too, bound to some slender wrist by the jesses you dare not break, and a prisoner here at Holyrood because the rosy-lipped jailer will not let you go?’

Maxwell laughed a fierce, wild laugh, and dashed his goblet down upon the board with an emphasis most unusual to him. Though habitually possessed of much self-command, for an instant the tide of his feelings surged up beyond control.

‘Holyrood!’ he exclaimed, mockingly; ‘what is Holyrood to me? One place is like another, and all are barren! Talk not to me of jesses. Your wild-hawk soars her pitch, and strikes her quarry, and buries beak and singles in the dripping flesh; but, bird of the air though she be, she knows the false from the true, and will not stoop to the lure. There is no spell can fetter the limbs of a brave man who is determined to be free; and be the jailer never so fair, I would not waste a look over my shoulder at my prison-house for the sake of the rosiest pair of lips that ever were kissed on the dawn of St Valentine! Again, what is it you would with me, Signior Riccio? Were it an errand to the gates of hell, I think I have spurs that would serve me to ride there; and in good faith,’ he added in a lower tone, ‘a man need hardly wish to come back even thence to such a dreary world as this.’

Not a whisper of his voice, not a shade on his countenance, escaped his sharp little companion. What cared he how hot the furnace were, so that it tempered the tool aright? Nay, he was even willing to burn his own fingers a little, rather than fail in perfecting his instrument. At heart he thought how lucky it was that there should be men who allowed themselves to be influenced by less rational feelings than those of self-interest and ambition. Perhaps he felt something between pity and ridicule for that morbid state of mind which could forget its own advantage in anger, or pique, or sorrow. His swarthy face, however, wore nothing more than its usual expression of comical good-humour, as he linked his arm in Maxwell’s, and fixing his twinkling eyes upon him, said—

‘You are more trusted than half the peers in Scotland—ay, and more trustworthy too. Come with me to the Queen’s chamber.’

Thus speaking, he led Walter out of the banqueting room and along the dim passages, in which the lamps were now expiring, to the foot of a winding stair, the same up which ‘Dick-o’-the-Cleugh’ had twisted his great body under the guidance of Mary Seton. Here the secretary paused for an instant and listened cautiously. It was pitch-dark, and he gave his companion a hand to guide him through the obscurity, then opening a narrow door, and pushing aside a heavy curtain of tapestry, ushered him into a blaze of light and the presence of four ladies, crowded together in so small an apartment that Maxwell actually touched the robe of one of them while he entered, and was somewhat abashed to discover that its wearer was no other than the Queen.

It was Mary’s custom, when the pageantry or duty of the day was over, to retire to this narrow retreat and sup in the strictest privacy, with two or three of her ladies at most. The proportions, indeed, of the apartment would admit of no larger party, as its area was little more than twelve feet by eight, and of this circumscribed space, a wide chimney and a window occupied a large share. It was here that, at a latter period, the shrieking Riccio clung to his Queen for the protection she strove to extend to him with all a woman’s pity, and more than a woman’s courage; it was here that, in brutal disregard of her majesty, her beauty, and her situation, the high-born ruffians of the Scottish peerage butchered their victim before her eyes, nay, clinging to the skirts of her garment, and laid the weltering body down, within a few feet of her, to soak with its blood the very planks of their Sovereign’s bed-chamber.

But to-night all was a blaze of light and warmth and comfort. The table, with its snowy cloth, was drawn close to the crackling wood-fire, which sparkled and glowed again in the cut crystals and rich plate that adorned the choice little repast; an odour of some rich incense, such as is burnt in Roman Catholic churches, pervaded the apartment; and the strings of a lute that had just been laid aside were still vibrating from the touch of a fair and skilful hand.

The Queen herself, all the more lovely from the slight languor of fatigue, sat at the supper-table with her relative the Countess of Argyle, a lady whose flaxen locks and ruddy, laughing face formed no bad foil to the delicate colouring and deep, thoughtful beauty of her mistress. Mary Seton, all coquetry, animation, and vivacity, as usual, busied herself in arranging and disarranging everything on the table; whilst another lady, turning away from the rest, with her head bent low over her task, was disposing some winter flowers in a vase with peculiar care and attention. It needed not the turn of her full white arm and dimpled elbow, nor the curl of rich brown hair that had escaped over her shoulder, to tell Walter this last was his hated love, Mary Carmichael.

The Queen gave him her hand to kiss as he entered the room.

‘Welcome, Master Maxwell,’ said she, ‘rather to the simple dame who has bid you visit her here, in private life, than to the Scottish Queen at Holyrood. We have put off our royalty with our robes. To-night we shall charge you with an errand that affects the woman far more than the Queen; to-night you must be less than ever our subject, more than ever our friend. You are faithful and trustworthy, we know; and, indeed, there are few men on whose truth a lady would offer to stake her life,’ she added, smiling, ‘as one of mine did, not five minutes ago, on yours.’

Mary Seton laughed and pretended to hide her face in her hands.

Walter looked wistfully in the Queen’s face; he did not turn his eyes towards Mary Carmichael, or see how the white neck had turned crimson while Her Majesty spoke.

‘I can trust you, Maxwell?’ added the latter after a pause, in her frankest and most engaging manner.

‘To the death, Madam!’ answered he, in a tone of suppressed emotion; ‘I have but little merit, I know, but I am as true as the steel I wear; I would give my life for your Grace willingly, now, this very minute!’

‘I believe thee,’ said the Queen, exchanging at the same time a rapid glance with Mary Seton; ‘I trust, however, mine errand may be done without shedding of blood. Nevertheless, Maxwell, it requires courage, discretion, above all, a silent tongue and a faithful heart. Listen! My good sister entertaineth causeless grudges against me; she will endeavour to thwart my aim and cover the mark I shoot at; she liketh not of marrying or giving in marriage. It may be that she mistrusteth her own power to rule in that state,’ added Mary, while a gleam of feminine vanity crossed her brow. ‘It may be that Elizabeth hath more dominion over men’s heads than their hearts; nevertheless, if she and her agents were to suspect thee of bearing such a secret of Mary Stuart’s about thee, they would probe for it with their daggers but they would find it ere thou wert a dozen leagues across the Border. Bethink thee, man, ’tis a dangerous burden; art not afraid to carry it?’

‘Your Majesty is jesting with me,’ replied Maxwell, raising his head proudly, almost angrily, ‘and I can but answer with a jest; yes, I fear to do your bidding as I fear a good horse when I am in haste, a cup of wine when I am thirsty, or a down pillow when I am weary and would fain lay my head down to rest.’

Mary Carmichael shot at him one glance of ineffable pride and tenderness, then busied herself amongst the flowers deeper than before. He could not see it; his head was turned towards the Queen; he had not forgotten, no, he never would forget, the embrace of that stranger in the Abbey-garden.

‘I knew it,’ exclaimed Her Majesty, triumphantly, ‘believe me, I was indeed only jesting with my brave and well-tried servant. Listen then, Walter! To-morrow you must be in the saddle at daybreak; I reckon on your arriving at Hermitage before nightfall.’

At the name of Hermitage the Queen lowered her eyes for an instant, and looked somewhat confused ere she continued—

‘In that stronghold you will find the Earl of Bothwell, who has returned with no leave of mine from his well-merited banishment in France; nevertheless, “a Queen’s face should show grace,” and we women forgive more readily than you of the sterner sex. You will summon him to appear before his Sovereign in Holyrood, so shall he receive pardon for his errors. Or stay! this were an ungracious behest to so tried a servant for one venial offence; you shall bear him Mary Stuart’s full and free forgiveness, and bid him, as he loves his Queen, bid him on his loyalty and allegiance, that he speed with all his heart and all his strength the object of your journey.’

‘And that object, madam?’ inquired Maxwell, observing that Mary paused, blushing rosy red and averting her eyes from his face.

‘Is my coming marriage,’ proceeded the Queen, hastily, whilst Lady Argyle and Mistress Seton interchanged an arch glance and smile. ‘An alliance that I take heaven to witness, I contemplate more for the welfare of my people than for any foolish longings of my own weak heart. Henry Stuart is of royal blood, no unworthy mate for the proudest princess in Europe. Lord Darnley is a comely, gentle, and well-nurtured youth, of whose affection any lady in the land might well be proud. You will explain this to Bothwell; you will teach him that Mary has made no unworthy choice; you will tell him that she has confided in him, her old and tried servant, because she can depend upon him more securely than on any other lord in Scotland.’

‘Would it not be well, madam, to write the earl a few lines with your own hand apprising him of your intentions?’ hazarded Maxwell, who was sufficiently a man of the world to appreciate the delicacy of his mission; and who, in good truth, was sufficiently familiar with the temper of his powerful kinsman to relish not the least the delivery of the message with which he was charged.

Mary, however, would not entertain such a proposition for a moment, and hurried on with far more of agitation than the occasion seemed to warrant.

‘Letters may be intercepted, changed, forged, misunderstood. Master Maxwell, you will fulfil my bidding as I charge you, or leave it alone. I can trust you, I feel. I know you will do justice to the fair intentions of your mistress. I know you will not allow Bothwell to misunderstand my motives, or my feelings—Bothwell, who has always believed so implicitly in his Queen! Nay, for letters,’ added Mary, with her own sweet smile softening and brightening her whole countenance, ‘I will charge you, indeed, with this one for my Lady of Lennox, and with this token, always subject to his mother’s approval, to be given as an earnest of my good-will to her son. Take them carefully, Master Maxwell. Our warden’s strong hand will pass you safely through the thieves that infest the Border, and when you get among the southrons, I know you will guard them with your life. I pledge you, my trusty messenger, to the success of your mission!’

While she spoke, the Queen filled out a cup of wine and put her lips to the brim, handing him, at the same time, a packet carefully sealed and secured with a silken thread, which wound in and out through the folds of the missive, so that the silk must be cut before the letter could be opened. Also a small casket, containing a beautiful antique ring, representing a cupid burning himself with his own torch, as a keepsake for her future husband. The messenger received them on his knees in token of his fidelity and obedience, and the Queen, according to the custom of the age, bade him finish the cup of wine in which she had recently pledged him, and refresh himself ere he departed.

‘It must be a stirrup-cup, your Grace,’ said Maxwell, with a smile; ‘I shall hope to be out of sight of Holyrood ere the sun rises. Have I received all your Majesty’s directions?’ he added, preparing to take his leave.

‘There is no such hurry for a few minutes,’ replied Mary, graciously. ‘Do you sup with royalty every night, Master Maxwell, that you are in such haste to be gone?’

But Maxwell was enduring an amount of pain to which he would willingly put a period. To be in the same room with Mary Carmichael, nay, so close that her very dress touched him when she moved, and yet to feel, by her averted face, by his own offended and aching heart, that they were completely and irrevocably estranged, was a trial to which he had no wish to subject himself for a longer time than he could help.

‘I must crave your Grace’s license to depart,’ said he; and added, looking round with a forlorn hope that just this once he might meet the eyes that he had resolved should never gladden him again, ‘Have none of your ladies any commands for merrie England or the Border?’

Mistress Carmichael stirred uneasily, and grew very pale, but she neither looked at the speaker nor answered him. Mary Seton, however, with rather a noisier laugh than common, charged him with a message on her own part, of which, as she said merrily, he was not to purloin nor spill any portion by the way.

‘If you should chance to see that rude giant who calls himself Lord Bothwell’s henchman,’ said that young lady, ‘tell him from me, that I hope he has not forgotten, in his wild glens, all the polish we had such difficulty in imparting to him at Holyrood. Commend me to him, in sober earnest,’ added she, demurely; ‘I would send him my love had I not the fear of Mistress Beton before my eyes, for, in good truth, he is the only honest man I know in Scotland, except yourself, Master Maxwell, and you are so stern and unforgiving, that I am quite afraid of you. If a woman loved you ever so dearly, I think you would give her up for the slightest misunderstanding.’

The shaft might have been shot at random, but it pierced home to at least two hearts in that little supper-room. For an instant his eyes met hers, and that sad, reproachful imploring glance haunted him afterwards for months. Then Mary Carmichael, pale, proud, and sorrowful, turned away from him once more to her former occupation, and Walter Maxwell, taking a respectful leave of the Queen, was ushered by Riccio from the presence.

As he sped southward through the chill air of morning, after the few hasty preparations had been completed for his departure, he could not but acknowledge that the world had never seemed so dreary, that he had never felt so sick at heart before. Perhaps it would have cheered him though, to know that another’s sufferings were even keener than his own, lying broad awake behind him there at Holyrood, pressing a pale cheek against a pillow wet with tears.