Rothes was, as usual, gay and careless in demeanour; his handsome face flushed with wine, was not out of keeping with the disordered bravery of his apparel. He could break his jest on treason as on any other crime; could pass through life and its most important avocations as though it were but one long feverish debauch in which the merriest and wildest roisterer bore his part the best. Argyle, who repressed his host’s ill-timed mirth whenever opportunity offered, and listened attentively to the calm, measured accents of the third person present, seemed thoughtful and ill-at-ease. Though of a courageous character, his was a nature that weighs well every scheme on which it enters, and loves not to put forth its full powers unless it sees its way clearly to success. He could not go hand over head into a plot like Rothes, simply for the excitement and amusement of the turmoil. Grave in demeanour as the man to whom he was now listening so attentively, and not unlike him in character, he was yet far inferior in foresight and acuteness, above all in that mysterious force of will which bends and warps more pliant natures to its own ends. Maxwell, watching him intently from the tree, could not but mark how scruple after scruple disappeared, how gradually and completely conviction seemed to steal over his countenance, as he followed, step by step, and argument by argument, the bent of that master-mind which formed the third and dominant element in the conclave. And who was this third conspirator, this evil spirit so much mightier and so much more daring than the two it controlled? Who, but Moray, the Queen’s half-brother? Staid, quiet, composed as usual; less splendidly dressed, less energetic in gesture, less striking in appearance than either of his companions, yet obviously the leader whom they trusted implicitly and obeyed without remorse. One more faithful adherent to the House of Leslie completed the party. His honest face and loyal courage seemed strangely out of place where treason was brewing; a large handsome bloodhound kept close at the heel of Rothes, poking his wet nose at intervals into his master’s hand.