“I should like to have her say, ‘Guy, I love you, and am yours forever!’ But what do you think she would say?” Low and tenderly she whispered: “Guy, I love you, and am yours forever!” At that moment a fine courtier pushed in between the pair. “Your majesty, your fair hand was promised me for this dance,” he reminded her; and with a slight, imperial bow to the young minstrel, the Queen of Scots swept away on the arm of her partner. And then a great horror of remorse struck coldly to her heart. Oh, what had she done? Betrayed her heart to the man who loved her so well, but whom to love in return was to doom to a cruel death. Oh, horror of horrors! The lights danced before her, the ballroom whirled around in a fantastic measure, the sea of faces grew dim and faded. She gasped for air, threw up her arms with a feeling of suffocation, and fell back fainting. The handsome courtier caught her in his arms and bore her to the door. “Give her to me. She is _mine_!” cried a passionate voice; and the strong arms of the minstrel took her forcibly from the other’s clasp. Presently, with a weary sigh, she drifted back to life. “The dressing-room,” she murmured, and the minstrel’s arm was again at her service. He left her with her maid, and mingled, as before, with the crowd. “A word with you, Sir Poet,” said a stern voice in his ear. It was the jeweled courtier. His eyes burned balefully beneath his mask. “You forcibly took Mary Stuart from my arms--an insult for which I demand instant satisfaction.” Two fiery spirits confronted each other in the wide grounds the next moment, two swords leaped from their scabbards, and two men struck at each other with vengeful fury. The silver moon looked down on a scene of strife and bloodshed, and presently on a still form bathed in gore, around which a crowd was gathering, shouting, gesticulating, uttering all sorts of frenzied cries, while some struck out in hot haste after the murderer who had thrown away his sword and rushed headlong from the scene of his dastardly crime. Presently, through the moving throng of excited maskers rushed the form of a beautiful woman. She flung herself on her knees by the dead man and tore the shrouding mask from his face. As the moonlight fell on the closed eyes and pallid, handsome face, the Queen of Scots uttered a cry of sharp despair. “The curse, oh, God! the curse! It is I--it is I who have killed him!” Some one lifted the swooning form away, some one else knelt there by the still form and felt for the heart. “He is not dead,” proclaimed the authoritative voice of a physician. “Let a litter be brought immediately and we will carry him into the house.” The ball broke up in confusion as the wounded man was taken into Lady Heathcote’s house, and a stream of carriages marked the departure of the guests. In one of them was the weeping Lady Edith, attended by her uncle, who was also her guardian. _PART III._