"I crave your pardon, my Lady Jean," said Claverhouse, recovering himself after an instant's discomposure, "for this intrusion upon your chosen place and your meditation. My excuse is the peace of the garden after the wildness of the moors, but I did not hope to find so good company. My success in Paisley Castle has been greater than among the moss-hags."
"It is a brave work, Colonel Graham, to hunt unarmed peasants"--and for the first time Claverhouse caught the ironical note in Jean's speech, and knew that for some reason she was nettled with him--"and it seems to bring little glory. Though, the story did come to our ears, it sometimes brought risk, and--perhaps it was a lie of the Covenanters--once ended in the defeat of his Majesty's Horse. I seem to forget the name of the place."
"Yes," replied Claverhouse with great good humor, "the rascals had the better of us at Drumclog. They might have the same to-morrow again, for the bogs are not good ground for cavalry, and fanatics are dour fighters."
"It was Henry Pollock ye were after this time, we hear, and ye followed him hard, but ye have not got him. It was a sair pity that you did not come a day sooner to the castle, and then you could have captured him without danger." And Lady Jean mocked him openly. "Ye would have tied his hands behind his back and his feet below the horse's belly, and taken him to Edinburgh with a hundred of his Majesty's Horse before him and a hundred behind to keep him safe; ye would have been a proud man, Colonel Graham, when ye came and presented the prisoner to your masters. May I crave of you the right word, for I am only a woman of the country? Would Mr. Henry Pollock have been a prisoner of war--of war?" she repeated with an accent and look of vast contempt.
Never had Claverhouse admired her more than at that moment, for the scorn on her face became her well, and he concluded that it must spring from one of two causes. Most likely, after all, Pollock was her lover.
"'Tis not possible, my Lady Jean," softening his accent till it was as smooth as velvet, and looking at the girl through half-closed eyes, "to please everyone to whom he owes duty in this poor world. If I had been successful for my master his Majesty the King--I cannot remember the name of any other master--then I would have arrested a rebel and a maker of strife in the land, and doubtless he would have suffered his just punishment. That would have been my part towards the king and towards Mr. Henry Pollock, too, and therein have I for the time failed. To-morrow, Lady Jean, I may succeed."