He threw
her hand from him, and gazed at her with looks of such flaming
wrath, that she involuntarily trembled.
"Traitoress yourself!" yelled he, wildly. "Speak not of innocence--
you who are yourself guilty; and before you dare defend the earl,
defend yourself!"
Catharine rose from her seat and looked with flashing eyes into the
king's face blazing with wrath. "King Henry of England," said she,
solemnly, "you have openly, before your whole court, accused your
queen of a crime. I now demand that you name it!"
She was of wondrous beauty in her proud, hold bearing--in her
imposing, majestic tranquillity.
The decisive moment had come, and she was conscious that her life
and her future were struggling with death for the victory.
She looked over to Thomas Seymour, and their eyes met. She saw how
he laid his hand on his sword, and nodded to her a smiling greeting.
"He will defend me; and before he will suffer me to be dragged to
the Tower, he himself will plunge his sword into my breast," thought
she, and a joyous, triumphant assurance filled her whole heart.
She saw nothing but him, who had sworn to die with her when the
decisive moment came. She looked with a smile on the blade which he
had already half drawn from its scabbard; and she hailed it as a
dear, long-yearned-for friend.
She saw not that Henry Howard also had lain his hand on his sword;
that he, too, was ready for her defence, firmly resolved to slay the
king himself, before his mouth uttered the sentence of death over
the queen.
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