The Black Douglas | Page 6

permit what--out with it, old grumble-pate?"
"That I should saddle my Flanders mare and ride after you. Malise MacKim would not be in the way even if ye went a-trysting. He kens brawly, in such a case, when to turn his head and look upon the hills and the woods and the bonny sleeping waters."
The Earl laughed and shook his head.
"Na, na, Malise," he said, "were I indeed on such a quest the sight of your grey pow would fright a fair lady, and the mere trampling of that club-footed she-elephant of yours put to flight every sentiment of love. Remember the Douglas badge is a naked heart. Can I ride a-courting, therefore, with all my fighting tail behind me as though I besought an alliance with the King of England's daughter?"
Silently and sadly the strong man watched the young Earl ride away to the south along that fair lochside. He stood muttering to himself and looking long under his hand after his lord. The rider bowed his head as he passed under the rich blazonry of the white May-blossom, which, like creamy lace, covered the Three Thorns of Carlinwark, now deeply stained with rose colour from the clouds of sunset.
[Illustration: WILLIAM OF DOUGLAS REINED UP DARNAWAY UNDERNEATH THE WHISPERING FOLIAGE OF A GREAT BEECH.]
"Aye, aye," he said, "the Douglas badge is indeed a heart--but it is a bleeding heart. God avert the omen, and keep this young man safe--for though many love him, there be more that would rejoice at his fall."
The rider on Black Darnaway rode right into the saffron eye of the sunset. On his left hand Carlinwark and its many islets burned rich with spring-green foliage, all splashed with the golden sunset light. Darnaway's well-shod hoofs sent the diamond drops flying, as, with obvious pleasure, he trampled through the shallows. Ben Gairn and Screel, boldly ridged against the southern horizon, stood out in dark amethyst against the glowing sky of even, but the young rider never so much as turned his head to look at them.
Presently, however, he emerged from among the noble lakeside trees upon a more open space. Broom and whin blossom clustered yellow and orange beneath him, garrisoning with their green spears and golden banners every knoll and scaur. But there were broad spaces of turf here and there on which the conies fed, or fought terrible battles for the meek ear-twitching does, "spat-spatting" at each other with their fore paws and springing into the air in their mating fury.
William of Douglas reined up Darnaway underneath the whispering foliage of a great beech, for all at unawares he had come upon a sight that interested him more than the noble prospect of the May sunset.
In the centre of the golden glade, and with all their faces mistily glorified by the evening light, he saw a group of little girls, singing and dancing as they performed some quaint and graceful pageant of childhood.
Their young voices came up to him with a wistful, dying fall, and the slow, graceful movement of the rhythmic dance seemed to affect the young man strangely. Involuntarily he lifted his close-fitting feathered cap from his head, and allowed the cool airs to blow against his brow.
"See the robbers passing by, passing by, passing by, See the robbers passing by, My fair lady!"
The ancient words came up clearly and distinctly to him, and softened his heart with the indefinable and exquisite pathos of the refrain whenever it is sung by the sweet voices of children.
"These are surely but cottars' bairns," he said, smiling a little at his own intensity of feeling, "but they sing like little angels. I daresay my sweetheart Magdalen is amongst them."
And he sat still listening, patting Black Darnaway meanwhile on the neck.
"What did the robbers do to you, do to you, do to you, What did the robbers do to you, My fair lady?"
The first two lines rang out bold and clear. Then again the wistfulness of the refrain played upon his heart as if it had been an instrument of strings, till the tears came into his eyes at the wondrous sorrow and yearning with which one voice, the sweetest and purest of all, replied, singing quite alone:
"They broke my lock and stole my gold, stole my gold, stole my gold, Broke my lock and stole my gold, My fair lady!"
The tears brimmed over in the eyes of William Douglas, and a deep foreboding of the mysteries of fate fell upon his heart and abode there heavy as doom.
He turned his head as though he felt a presence near him, and lo! sudden and silent as the appearing of a phantom, another horse was alongside of Black Darnaway, and upon a white palfrey a maiden dressed also in white sat, smiling upon the young man, fair to