“An it please your Grace,” said Bowyer, “it is the same against whom I this instant closed the door of the presence-room.”

“An it please me?” repeated Elizabeth sharply, not at that moment in the humour of being pleased with anything.—­“It does not please me that he should pass saucily into my presence, or that you should exclude from it one who came to justify himself from an accusation.”

“May it please you,” answered the perplexed usher, “if I knew, in such case, how to bear myself, I would take heed—­”

“You should have reported the fellow’s desire to us, Master Usher, and taken our directions.  You think yourself a great man, because but now we chid a nobleman on your account; yet, after all, we hold you but as the lead-weight that keeps the door fast.  Call this Varney hither instantly.  There is one Tressilian also mentioned in this petition.  Let them both come before us.”

She was obeyed, and Tressilian and Varney appeared accordingly.  Varney’s first glance was at Leicester, his second at the Queen.  In the looks of the latter there appeared an approaching storm, and in the downcast countenance of his patron he could read no directions in what way he was to trim his vessel for the encounter.  He then saw Tressilian, and at once perceived the peril of the situation in which he was placed.  But Varney was as bold-faced and ready-witted as he was cunning and unscrupulous—­a skilful pilot in extremity, and fully conscious of the advantages which he would obtain could he extricate Leicester from his present peril, and of the ruin that yawned for himself should he fail in doing so.

“Is it true, sirrah,” said the Queen, with one of those searching looks which few had the audacity to resist, “that you have seduced to infamy a young lady of birth and breeding, the daughter of Sir Hugh Robsart of Lidcote Hall?”

Varney kneeled down, and replied, with a look of the most profound contrition, “There had been some love passages betwixt him and Mistress Amy Robsart.”

Leicester’s flesh quivered with indignation as he heard his dependant make this avowal, and for one moment he manned himself to step forward, and, bidding farewell to the court and the royal favour, confess the whole mystery of the secret marriage.  But he looked at Sussex, and the idea of the triumphant smile which would clothe his cheek upon hearing the avowal sealed his lips.  “Not now, at least,” he thought, “or in this presence, will I afford him so rich a triumph.”  And pressing his lips close together, he stood firm and collected, attentive to each word which Varney uttered, and determined to hide to the last the secret on which his court-favour seemed to depend.  Meanwhile, the Queen proceeded in her examination of Varney.

“Love passages!” said she, echoing his last words; “what passages, thou knave? and why not ask the wench’s hand from her father, if thou hadst any honesty in thy love for her?”