and bending her pretty fingers backward against an obstinate buckle, was fain to apply to Walter Maxwell for his help; and although it was rendered in the gravest and coldest manner possible, thanked him with a bright and kindly smile. It was, perhaps, the most provoking way to treat him. Had she quarrelled with him outright, he would have known how to act, for he was hurt and angered to the depths of his loyal and resolute heart, but this off-hand good humour was irritating in the extreme. It was treating him like a child, he thought, and he chafed under it inwardly, the while the girl herself was only striving to avoid a final rupture, and longing to be friends with him as before. ‘Do you journey with us to St Andrews?’ said she, glancing timidly at his immovable face; ‘or do you return to Holyrood from the waterside?’ and her heart beat faster while she waited for his answer. ‘As the Queen shall direct,’ he replied, it must be admitted, not with his natural sincerity. ‘I confess I am profoundly indifferent myself.’ He spoke in a hard, dry tone, and she made her horse bound forward from his side, and bent her head down to caress the animal, till her bright hair mingled with its mane. The others rode gaily on, talking and laughing joyfully, all but the Queen. Mary Stuart was a thought paler than her wont, and unusually silent and preoccupied. Was it that her remonstrances of Master Knox had sunk into her heart? or was she overladen with the cares of her kingdom? or was there some feeling of pity and compunction gnawing her, foreign to the weightier considerations of religion and policy, yet, perhaps, keener and more engrossing than these? Whatever might be the reason, she, who was generally so eager, so buoyant, on an expedition like this, now rode listlessly and carelessly with her hand resting idly on her knee, and her rein lying loosely on her horse’s neck. ‘Black Agnes,’ however, by no means shared the dejection of her mistress. That favourite palfrey, a gift from her brother Moray, and called after the famous Agnes of Dunbar, who was Countess of Moray in her own right, was in the highest spirits at her release from the stable, and, sharing the mettle of the tameless heroine whose name she bore, was no eligible conveyance for an inattentive horsewoman. Ere the gleaming waters of the Firth were in sight, the black mare shied at a beggar on the road-side, and swerved from him with such activity, that Mary, unprepared as she was, must have been unseated had a dexterous hand not seized her bridle-rein at the decisive moment, and a ready arm supported her till she regained her balance in the saddle. ‘It is the last service I may render my Queen,’ said Chastelâr’s low, sad voice in her ear. ‘O madam, send me not away from you, I beseech you!’