Читать книгу Jane Seton; or, The King's Advocate. A Scottish Historical Romance онлайн

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As they drew near the royal group, Jane felt her heart almost failing her; she clung to Roland's arm, and watched the expression in the face of Magdalene. She seemed now very pale; her eyes were humid and downcast; gentleness and languor pervaded her beautiful features; she was overcome with lassitude and sinking with fatigue—the weakness incident to that hereditary disease which fast and surely was preying upon her fragile form. The proud nobles, to whom the king spoke occasionally as he bade them adieu, received his courtly attentions as a tribute due to their patriotic and lofty ancestry, and their proud bearing seemed to say, plainly, "I am George Earl of Errol, Constable of Scotland," or "I am William Earl of Montrose, and come of that Graeme whom King David knighted when the Stuarts were but thanes of Kyle and Strathgryfe;" for it was an age when the king was only a great baron, and every baron or laird was a king and a kaiser to boot.

As they approached, Roland could perceive that cold glances welcomed Jane Seton from the ladies of honour, who were all enemies of her house, and whose fathers and brothers enjoyed many fiefs of the Douglas lands and fortresses, defacing the crowned heart on their battlements and substituting the three cinque-foils of Hamilton; but, to crown all and increase the poor girl's perturbation, she perceived Redhall standing near the king, seeming, with his dark figure and pallid visage, like her evil genius, cold, impassible, and dignified as if the startling episode we have just related had never taken place.