Even the queen leaned forward and awaited the answer eagerly, and the many eyes that had been riveted on Sir Norman since his entrance, left him now for the first time and settled on the prisoner.

A piteous spectacle that prisoner was--his face whiter than the snowy nymphs behind the throne, and so distorted with fear, fury, and guilt, that it looked scarcely human.

Twice he opened his eyes to reply, and twice all sounds died away in a choking gasp.
"Do you hear his highness ?" sharply inquired the lord high chancellor, reaching over the great seal, and giving the unhappy Earl of Gloucester a rap on the head with it, "Why do you not answer ?" "Pardon! Pardon!" exclaimed the earl, in a husky whisper.

"Do not believe the tales they tell you of me.

For Heaven's sake, spare my life!" "Confess!" thundered the dwarf, striking the table with his clinched fist, until all the papers thereon jumped spasmodically into the air-"confess at once, or I shall run you through where you stand!" The earl, with a perfect screech of terror, flung himself flat upon his face and hands before the queen, with such force, that Sir Norman expected to see his countenance make a hole in the floor.
"O madame! spare me! spare me! spare me! Have mercy on me as you hope for mercy yourself!" She recoiled, and drew back her very garments from his touch, as if that touch was pollution, eyeing him the while with a glance frigid and pitiless as death.
"There is no mercy for traitors!" she coldly said.