he clash of arms, so that they had run with all speed. When Athol, who
came first, without knowing whose it was, struck against the dead
body of Rizzio, which was stretched at the top of the staircase, they
believed, seeing someone assassinated, that the lives of the king and
queen were threatened, and they had drawn their swords to force the door
that Morton was guarding. But directly Darnley understood what was going
on, he darted from the cabinet, followed by Ruthven, and showing himself
to the newcomers--

"My lords," he said, "the persons of the queen and myself are safe, and
nothing has occurred here but by our orders. Withdraw, then; you will
know more about it in time. As to him," he added, holding up Rizzio's
head by the hair, whilst the bastard of Douglas lit up the face with a
torch so that it could be recognised, "you see who it is, and whether it
is worth your while to get into trouble for him".

And in fact, as soon as Huntly, Athol, and Bothwell had recognised the
musician-minister, they sheathed their swords, and, having saluted the
king, went away.

Mary had gone away with a single thought in her heart, vengeance. But
she understood that she could not revenge herself at one and the same
time on her husband and his companions: she set to work, then, with
all the charms of her wit and beauty to detach the kind from his
accomplices. It was not a difficult task: when that brutal rage which
often carried Darnley beyond all bounds was spent, he was frightened
himself at the crime he had committed, and while the assassins,
assembled by Murray, were resolving that he should have that greatly
desired crown matrimonial, Darnley, as fickle as he was violent, and as
cowardly as he was cruel, in Mary's very room, before the scarcely
dried blood, made another compact, in which he engaged to deliver up
his accomplices. Indeed, three days after the event that we have just
related, the murderers learned a strange piece of news--that Darnley
and Mary, accompanied by Lord Seyton, had escaped together from Holyrood
Palace. Three days later still, a proclamation appeared, signed by Mary
and dated from Dunbar, which summoned round the queen, in her own name
and the king's, all the Scottish lords and barons, including those who
had been compromised in the affair of the "run in every sense," to whom
she not only granted full and complete pardon, but also restored her
entire confidence. In this way she separated Murray's caus