all the time, bustled here and there,
setting sweet cakes baked with honey, confitures and bairns' goodies,
figs, almonds, and cheese before her guests. But through all her
blandishments Sholto watched her and had his eyes warily upon what
should befall her husband, who could be seen lying apparently either
asleep or unconscious upon the bed in an inner room.

"You do not speak like the folk of the south," she said to the Lord
James. "Neither are you Northmen nor of the Midi. From what country
may you come?" The question dropped casually as to fill up the time.

"We are poor Scots who have lived under the protection of your good
King Charles, the seventh of that name, and having been restored to
our possessions after the turning out of the English, we are making a
pilgrimage in order to visit our friends and also to lay our thanks
upon the altar of the blessed Saint Andrew in his own town in
Scotland."

The old woman listened, approvingly nodding her head as the Lord James
reeled off this new and original narrative. But at the mention of the
land of the Scots La Meffraye pricked her ears.

"Scots," she said meditatively; "that will surely interest my lord,
who hath but recently returned from that country, whither they say he
hath been upon a very confidential embassy from the King."

It was the Lord James who asked the next question.

"Have you heard whether any of our nation returned with him from our
country? We would gladly meet with any such, that we might hear again
the tongue of our nativity, which is ever sweet in a strange land--and
also, if it might be, take back tidings of them to their folk in
Scotland."

"Nay," answered La Meffraye, standing before them with her eyes
shrewdly fixed upon the face of the speaker, "I have heard of none
such. Yet it may well be, for the marshal is very fond of the society
of the young, even as I am myself. He has many boy singers in his
choir, maidens also for his religious processions. Indeed, never do I
visit Machecoul without finding a pretty boy or a stripling girl
passing so innocently in and out of his study, that it is a pleasure
to behold."

"Is his lordship even now at Machecoul?" asked James Douglas, bluntly.
The Lord James prided himself upon his tact, but when he set out to
manifest it, Sholto groaned inwardly. He was never certain from one
moment to another what the reckless young Lord might do or say next.

"I do not even know whether the marshal is now