“But Ugo is only half Italian, as I have just said,” rejoined Seymour, “and I have bound him to me by ties of deepest gratitude. I have every reason to believe him faithful; but your Highness may rely upon it, I will not trust him further than can be done with safety. And there are some secrets I shall keep sedulously guarded from him.”
“You have given him a key to one he ought never to have been intrusted withal,” remarked Elizabeth, half-reproachfully.
“Nay, if your Highness views the matter thus gravely, I shall indeed be angry with the knave,” rejoined Seymour. “But you may rest quite easy—whatever he may suspect, he knows nothing of a certainty.”
“I am not to be deceived on that score,” returned Elizabeth. “No man ever spoke as that galliard did, without authority for what he uttered.”
“Hum! the impudent varlet must have gone too far,” mentally ejaculated Seymour. “He shall never offend again in like sort,” he added, aloud.
“To chide him will not mend matters,” said the princess. “If anybody deserves reproof for presumption it is yourself, Sir Thomas. Signor Ugo is the mere tool of his lord.”
“Signor Ugo shall pay dearly for it, if he loses me only a feather’s weight of your Highness’s good opinion, which I value more than my life,” cried Seymour. “If I have been too bold, the force of my passion must plead my excuse. Since I last beheld your Highness at Enfield, your charms have had such an effect upon me that my judgment has scarce been under my own control. Every thought has been given to you—every emotion has been influenced by you. My existence hangs on your breath. It is for you to make me the proudest and the happiest of men, or to plunge me into the lowest depths of despair.”
“No more of this, I pray you, Sir Thomas,” replied the princess, her bosom palpitating quickly, for she was not in sensible to his ardor. “You will draw the eyes of the bystanders upon us, and some sharp and curious ear may catch your words.”
“Nay, condemn me not to silence till I have learnt my fate!” cried Seymour, in accents trembling with emotion, which was communicated to the princess as he approached her saddle. “Idolo del mio cuore! what response do you vouchsafe to my letter? Speak, I implore you, and put me out of my misery.”
“To-morrow I will decide,” said Elizabeth, “in tones almost as tremulous as his own.”
“No, now—now, adorata!” cried Seymour, pressing still closer towards her, and essaying to take her hand.
At this critical juncture the warning voice of his esquire reached him. They were now not far from the entrance of the palace.
“Zitto! zitto! monsignore,” cried Ugo. “Eccola li!—alla finestra del palazzo—la Regina Caterina!”
Roused by the caution, Seymour looked up, and, to his infinite annoyance and dismay, beheld Queen Catherine Parr, with the Countess of Hertford, the Marchioness of Dorset, Lady Jane Grey, and some other court dames, looking down upon them from the open casements of the palace. Though it did not seem possible that the queen-dowager could have heard what was passing between the pair, yet the enamored deportment of Seymour, his propinquity to the princess, and the blushes and downcast looks of the latter, seemed scarcely to leave a doubt as to the subject of their discourse. The scornful and indignant glance given by Catherine to Sir Thomas satisfied him that her jealousy was awakened. Elizabeth looked up at the same moment, and was covered with confusion on perceiving so many eyes directed towards her.
“Retire instantly, I entreat you, Sir Thomas,” she said, hastily—”you have placed me in a very embarrassing situation.”
“Heed them not, fair princess!” he rejoined, complying, however, with her injunctions, and removing from her side; “they will merely think some light and trivial discourse hath been passing between us.”
“The queen, my stepmother, looked as if she had a shrewd notion of the truth,” rejoined Elizabeth.
“It may be well to lull her suspicions,” said Seymour. “Treat the matter lightly, and laugh it off, if she questions your Highness, as peradventure she may. She can have overheard nothing, so you are quite safe on that head.”