Lord Shrewsbury himself met them in front of the lodge, where, in spite of all his dignity, he had evidently been impatiently awaiting them.  He thanked Susan for coming, as if he had not had a right to order, gave her his ungloved hand when she had dismounted, then at the single doorway of the lodge caused his gentleman to go through the form of requesting admission for himself and Mistress Talbot, his dear kinswoman, to the presence of the Queen.  It was a ceremony daily observed as an acknowledgment of Mary’s royalty, and the Earl was far too courteous ever to omit it.

Queen Mary’s willingness to admit him was notified by Sir Andrew Melville, a tall, worn man, with the typical Scottish countenance and a keen steadfast gray eye.  He marshalled the trio up a circular staircase, made as easy as possible, but necessarily narrow, since it wound up through a brick turret at the corner, to the third and uppermost story of the lodge.

There, however, was a very handsome anteroom, with tapestry hangings, a richly moulded ceiling, and wide carved stone chimneypiece, where a bright fire was burning, around which sat several Scottish and French gentlemen, who rose at the Earl’s entrance.  Another wide doorway with a tapestry curtain over the folding leaves led to the presence chamber, and Sir Andrew announced in as full style as if he had been marshalling an English ambassador to the Court of Holyrood, the most high and mighty Earl of Shrewsbury.  The room was full of March sunshine, and a great wood fire blazed on the hearth.  Part of the floor was carpeted, and overhung with a canopy, proceeding from the tapestried wall, and here was a cross-legged velvet chair on which sat Queen Mary.  This was all that Cis saw at first, while the Earl advanced, knelt on one step of the dais, with bared head, exchanging greetings with the Queen.  He then added, that his wife, the Countess, and her daughter, having been called away from Sheffield, he would entreat her Grace to accept for a few days in their stead the attendance of his good kinswoman, Mrs. Talbot, and her daughter, Mistress Cicely.

Mary graciously intimated her consent, and extended her hand for each to kiss as they knelt in turn on the step; Susan either fancied, or really saw a wonderful likeness in that taper hand to the little one whose stitches she had so often guided.  Cis, on her part, felt the thrill of girlhood in the actual touch of the subject of her dreams.  She stood, scarcely hearing what passed, but taking in, from under her black brows, all the surroundings, and recognising the persons from her former glimpses, and from Antony Babington’s descriptions.  The presence chamber was ample for the suite of the Queen, which had been reduced on every fresh suspicion.  There was in it, besides the Queen’s four ladies, an elderly one, with a close black silk hood—­ Jean Kennedy, or Mrs. Kennett as the English called her; another, a thin slight figure, with a worn face,