“So, this is the end of my private audience, from which I hoped so much!” he muttered to himself, as he went through the long gallery, and down the back staircase.  “Cogs bones!  I thought the Earl had wanted a cast of mine office in some secret intrigue, and it all ends in carrying a letter!  Well, his pleasure shall be done, however; and as his lordship well says, it may do me good another time.  The child must creep ere he walk, and so must your infant courtier.  I will have a look into this letter, however, which he hath sealed so sloven-like.”  Having accomplished this, he clapped his hands together in ecstasy, exclaiming, “The Countess the Countess!  I have the secret that shall make or mar me.—­But come forth, Bayard,” he added, leading his horse into the courtyard, “for your flanks and my spurs must be presently acquainted.”

Lambourne mounted, accordingly, and left the Castle by the postern gate, where his free passage was permitted, in consequence of a message to that effect left by Sir Richard Varney.

As soon as Lambourne and the valet had left the apartment, Leicester proceeded to change his dress for a very plain one, threw his mantle around him, and taking a lamp in his hand, went by the private passage of communication to a small secret postern door which opened into the courtyard, near to the entrance of the Pleasance.  His reflections were of a more calm and determined character than they had been at any late period, and he endeavoured to claim, even in his own eyes, the character of a man more sinned against than sinning.

“I have suffered the deepest injury,” such was the tenor of his meditations, “yet I have restricted the instant revenge which was in my power, and have limited it to that which is manly and noble.  But shall the union which this false woman has this day disgraced remain an abiding fetter on me, to check me in the noble career to which my destinies invite me?  No; there are other means of disengaging such ties, without unloosing the cords of life.  In the sight of God, I am no longer bound by the union she has broken.  Kingdoms shall divide us, oceans roll betwixt us, and their waves, whose abysses have swallowed whole navies, shall be the sole depositories of the deadly mystery.”

By such a train of argument did Leicester labour to reconcile his conscience to the prosecution of plans of vengeance, so hastily adopted, and of schemes of ambition, which had become so woven in with every purpose and action of his life that he was incapable of the effort of relinquishing them, until his revenge appeared to him to wear a face of justice, and even of generous moderation.