This obvious want of
confidence was accompanied with a correspondent change in their
personal demeanor towards the unfortunate page. The Queen, who had at
first treated him with marked courtesy, now scarce spoke to him, save
to convey some necessary command for her service. The Lady Fleming
restricted her notice to the most dry and distant expressions of
civility, and Catherine Seyton became bitter in her pleasantries, and
shy, cross, and pettish, in any intercourse they had together. What
was yet more provoking, he saw, or thought he saw, marks of
intelligence betwixt George Douglas and the beautiful Catherine
Seyton; and, sharpened by jealousy, he wrought himself almost into a
certainty, that the looks which they exchanged, conveyed matters of
deep and serious import. "No wonder," he thought, "if, courted by the
son of a proud and powerful baron, she can no longer spare a word or
look to the poor fortuneless page."
In a word, Roland Graeme's situation became truly disagreeable, and
his heart naturally enough rebelled against the injustice of this
treatment, which deprived him of the only comfort which he had
received for submitting to a confinement in other respects irksome. He
accused Queen Mary and Catherine Seyton (for concerning the opinion of
Dame Fleming he was indifferent) of inconsistency in being displeased
with him on account of the natural consequences of an order of their
own. Why did they send him to hear this overpowering preacher? The
Abbot Ambrosius, he recollected, understood the weakness of their
Popish cause better, when he enjoined him to repeat within his own
mind, _aves_, and _credos_, and _paters_, all the while
old Henry Warden preached or lectured, that so he might secure himself
against lending even a momentary ear to his heretical doctrine.
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