CHAPTER XXVIII
ON THE CASTLE ROOF
Maud Lindesay parted from Sholto upon the roof of the keep. She hadgone up thither to watch the cavalcade ride off where none could spyupon her, and Sholto, noting the flutter of white by the battlements,ran up thither also, pretending that he had forgotten something,though he was indeed fully armed and ready to mount and ride.
Maud Lindesay was leaning over the battlements of the castle, and,hearing a step behind her, she looked about with a start of apparentsurprise.
The after dew of recent tears still glorified her eyes.
"Oh, Sholto," she cried, "I thought you were gone; I was watching foryou to ride away. I thought--"
But Sholto, seeing her disorder, and having little time to waste, camequickly forward and took her in his arms without apology or prelude,as is (they say) wisest in such cases.
"Maud," he said, his utterance quick and hoarse, "we go into the houseof our enemies. Thirty knights and no more accompany my lord, whomight have ridden out with three thousand in his train."
"'Tis all that witch woman," cried the girl; "can you not advise him?"
"The Earl of Douglas did not ask my advice," said Sholto, a littledryly, being eager to turn the conversation upon his own matters andto his own advantage. "And, moreover, if he rides into danger for thesake of love--why, I for one think the more of him for it."
"But for such a creature," objected Maud Lindesay. "For any true maidit were most right and proper! Where is there a noble lady in Scotlandwho would not have been proud to listen to him? But he must needs runafter this mongrel French woman!"
"Even Mistress Maud Lindesay would accept him, would she?" saidSholto, somewhat bitterly, releasing her a little.
"Maud Lindesay is no great lady, only the daughter of a poor baron ofthe North, and much bound to my Lord Douglas by gratitude for thatwhich he hath done for her family. As you right well know, MaudLindesay is little better than a tiremaiden in the house of my lord."
"Nay," said Sholto, "I crave your pardon. I meant it not. I am hastyof words, and the time is short. Will you pardon me and bid mefarewell, for the horses are being led from stall, and I cannot keepmy lord waiting?"
"You are glad to go," she said reproachfully; "you will forget us whomyou leave behind you here. Indeed, you care not even now, so that youare free to wander over the world and taste new pleasures. That is tobe a man, indeed. Would that I had been born one!"
"Nay, Maud," said Sholto, trying to draw the girl again near him,because she kept him at arm's length by the unyielding strength of herwrist, "none shall ever come near my heart save Maud Lindesay alone! Iwould that I could ride away as sure of you as you are of SholtoMacKim!"
"Indeed," cried the girl, with some show of returning spirit, "to thatyou have no claim. Never have I said that I loved you, nor indeed thatI thought about you at all."
"It is true," answered Sholto, "and yet--I think you will remember mewhen the lamps are blown out. God speed, belovedst, I hear the trumpetblow, and the horses trampling."
For out on the green before the castle the Earl's guard was mustering,and Fergus MacCulloch, the Earl's trumpeter, blew an impatient blast.It seemed to speak to this effect:
_"Hasten ye, hasten ye, come to the riding, Hasten ye, hasten ye, lads of the Dee-- Douglasdale come, come Galloway, Annandale, Galloway blades are the best of the three!"_
Sholto held out his arms at the first burst of the stirring sound, andthe girl, all her wayward pride falling from her in a moment, camestraight into them.
"Good-by, my sweetheart," he said, stooping to kiss the lips that nowsaid him not nay, but which quivered pitifully as he touched them,"God knows whether these eyes shall rest again on the desire of myheart."
Maud looked into his face steadily and searchingly.
"You are sure you will not forget me, Sholto?" she said; "you willlove me as much to-morrow when you are far away, and think me as fairas you do when you hold me thus in your arms upon the battlements ofThrieve?"
Before Sholto had time to answer, the trumpet rang out again, with acall more instant and imperious than before.
"BUT THERE COMETH A NIGHT WHEN EVERY ONE OF US WATCHESTHE GREY SHALLOWS TO THE EAST FOR THOSE THAT SHALL RETURN NO MORE!"]
Sholto clasped her close to him as the second summons shrilled up intothe air.
"God keep my little lass!" he said; "fear not, Maud, I have neverloved any but you!"
He was gone. And through her tears Maud Lindesay watched him from thetop of the great square keep, as he rode off gallantly behind the Earland his brother.
"In time past I have dreamed," she thought to herself, "that I lovedthis one and that; but it was not at all like this. I cannot put himout of my mind for a moment, even when I would!"
As the brothers William and David Douglas crossed the rough bridge ofpine thrown over the narrows of the Dee, they looked backsimultaneously. Their mother stood on the green moat platform ofThrieve, with their little sister Margaret holding up her train with apretty modesty. She waved not a hand, fluttered no kerchief offarewell, only stood sadly watching the sons with whom she hadtravailed, like one who watches the dear dead borne to their lastresting-place.
"So," she communed, "even thus do the women of the Douglas House watchtheir beloveds ride out of sight. And so for many times they returnthrough the ford at dawn or dusk. But there cometh a night when everyone of us watches the grey shallows to the east for those that shallreturn no more!"
"See, see!" cried the little Margaret, "look, dear mother, they havetaken off their caps, and even Sholto hath his steel bonnet in hishand. They are bidding us farewell. I wish Maudie had been here tosee. I wonder where she has hidden herself. How surprised she will beto find that they are gone!"
It was a true word that the little Maid of Galloway spoke, for,according to the pretty custom of the young Earl, the cavalcade hadhalted ere they plunged into the woods of Kelton. The Douglas ladstook their bonnets in their hands. Their dark hair was stirred by thebreeze. Sholto also bared his head and looked towards the speck ofwhite which he could just discern on the summit of the frowning keep.
"Shall ever her eyelashes rise and fall again for me, and shall I seethe smile waver alternately petulant and tender upon her lips?"
This was his meditation. For, being a young man in love, these thingswere more to him than matins and evensong, king or chancellor, heavenor hell--as indeed it was right and wholesome that they should be.