Maxwell felt his sovereign’s letter lying safe within his doublet. He examined, too, the priming of his pistols, and turned his sword-belt a little more to the front. Then he proved the mouth and mettle of his charger with rein and spur, deriving from the experiment all the confidence felt by a good horseman on a well-bitted steed. Satisfied at length on these important points, his spirits rose with the morning air and the excitement of his mission. Even Mary Carmichael’s falsehood seemed less black in hue than it appeared yesterday. The future once more showed promise of something beside a dull apathetic response to the call of duty alone. He looked along its dim vistas, and saw the light shining, though faintly, at a distance. The mission was already in imagination half-fulfilled. He had made his journey prosperously through the rich districts of middle England, and gained the capital with unprecedented rapidity, thanks to good luck in procuring horses, and his own untiring powers in the saddle. He had delivered his credentials to Lady Lennox, and presented himself at Greenwich Palace to the Maiden Queen. He could even conjure up a picture in his mind of that redoubtable lady; could imagine the flaxen curls, the stately figure, the harsh yet not uncomely features, and the dignified gestures that veiled a woman’s vanity beneath the majestic bearing of a British sovereign. He became a courtier for the occasion, and thought how he could serve his own dear mistress with a well-timed compliment, and a little apt flattery to her rival ‘Good Sister.’ He saw himself dismissed with honour, and speeding back to the North, triumphant at the safe accomplishment of his mission. Then he fell to thinking of Mary’s kindly thanks, delivered with all that charm of manner which made a word from her better than a jewel from another, and his welcome reception at Holyrood by all the loyal and well-disposed party to whom it was of no small moment to see their Queen happily married.