The monastery; The abbot.

480 WAVERLEY NOVELS.
yet knows so little how to express her love, that were the Queen to ask her
for very poison, she would deem it a point of duty not to resist her commands. I could have torn her starched head-tire from her formal headThe Queen should have as soon had the heart out of my body, as the word
Sebastian out of my lips - That that piece of weaved tapestry should be a
woman, and yet not have wit enough to tell a lie!"
"And what was this story of Sebastian?" said the page. "By Heaven,
Catherine, you are all riddles alike 1"
"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 IIolyrood, 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:lae accomlpanied. 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 vasquinc. 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 l)y 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."
"I conjure you, in the name of God," said the old man, with more solemnity in his tone than he had hitherto used, "to let me know if her malady
really gains power on her!"
"She will have no aid at your hand, or at your Lady's-wherefore,
begone, and trouble us no more-we neither want, nor will accept of, aid at
your hands."
With this positive reply, the steward, grumbling and dissatisfied, returned
down stairs.