"She
wishes," he concluded, "to see the meeting betwixt the Queen and me on
my return, that she may form a guess whether there is any private
intelligence or understanding betwixt us--I must be guarded."
With this resolution he entered the parlour, where the Queen, seated
in her chair, with the Lady Fleming leaning upon the back of it, had
already kept the Lady of Lochleven standing in her presence for the
space of nearly an hour, to the manifest increase of her very visible
bad humour. Roland Graeme, on entering the apartment, made a deep
obeisance to the Queen, and another to the Lady, and then stood still
as if to await their farther question. Speaking almost together, the
Lady Lochleven said, "So, young man, you are returned at length?"
And then stopped indignantly short, while the Queen went on without
regarding her--"Roland, you are welcome home to us--you have proved
the true dove and not the raven--Yet I am sure I could have forgiven
you, if, once dismissed, from this water-circled ark of ours, you had
never again returned to us. I trust you have brought back an
olive-branch, for our kind and worthy hostess has chafed herself much
on account of your long absence, and we never needed more some symbol
of peace and reconciliation."
"I grieve I should have been detained, madam," answered the page; "but
from the delay of the person intrusted with the matters for which I
was sent, I did not receive them till late in the day."
"See you there now," said the Queen to the Lady Lochleven; "we could
not persuade you, our dearest hostess, that your household goods were
in all safe keeping and surety.
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