Whether the captain had met with any disappointment in visiting the different posts under his charge, or whether he had reason to suppose that his midnight walk was to be more agreeable than usual, and felt aggrieved to find its dulness unrelieved by any variety, it is not our province to inquire; but he certainly showed more zeal for discipline than on his departure, and entering Chastelâr’s cell in person, after kicking poor Geddes away with a bitter curse, ordered the maid-of-honour imperatively to be gone, and summoned two of the soberest men-at-arms to mount sentry for the rest of the night at the head of the stair.
Mary Hamilton neither screamed, nor fainted, nor wept. She knew that all was over now, and accepted the inevitable catastrophe with that resignation which Providence seems to bestow in mercy on those who are destined to endure great suffering. She bent over Chastelâr’s hand as she bade him a silent farewell, and though her lips moved as if in prayer, not a sound escaped them. Then she raised her head proudly, and walked rigidly and slowly out of the cell, less like a living being than a figure set in motion by mechanical means. The boisterous men-at-arms, in the guard-room, stood aside, respectfully, to let her pass; and James Geddes, as he followed her, cowered and shook with a mysterious fear.
But Chastelâr, in the selfishness of his great love, so strong even at the threshold of the grave, scarcely noticed her; nay, he even called out to her as she departed with a message for the Queen. The ruling passion was, indeed, strong in death. As his short and brilliant life had been valued only for her sake, so she was his last thought now that he stood on the brink of eternity.
‘Tell her,’ he said, ‘that I commend me to her with my last breath. Thank her for all her kindness and the mercy she would have shown me even to-night, but say that I choose to die rather than be banished from her presence, and so Chastelâr bids her farewell,--the fairest, the proudest, and the best beloved princess under heaven!’
He seemed composed, even cheerful. To all appearance, the man was in possession of his faculties and in his right mind, yet these were the last words Chastelâr ever spoke on earth.