The slave who
introduced him withdrew on a signal from her mistress, and it was
with humiliation, not of the posture only but of the very inmost
soul, that the unfortunate knight, thus strangely disguised,
threw himself on one knee, with looks bent on the ground and arms
folded on his bosom, like a criminal who expects his doom. Edith
was clad in the same manner as when she received King Richard,
her long, transparent dark veil hanging around her like the shade
of a summer night on a beautiful landscape, disguising and
rendering obscure the beauties which it could not hide. She held
in her hand a silver lamp, fed with some aromatic spirit, which
burned with unusual brightness.
When Edith came within a step of the kneeling and motionless
slave, she held the light towards his face, as if to peruse his
features more attentively, then turned from him, and placed her
lamp so as to throw the shadow of his face in profile upon the
curtain which hung beside. She at length spoke in a voice
composed, yet deeply sorrowful,
"Is it you? It is indeed you, brave Knight of the Leopard
--gallant Sir Kenneth of Scotland; is it indeed you?--thus
servilely disguised--thus surrounded by a hundred dangers.
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