The knight behind whom the banner royal of Scotland fluttered was a
man of different mould. His spare frame seemed buried in the suit of
armour that he wore somewhat awkwardly. His pale ascetic countenance
looked more in place in a monkish cloister than on a knightly tilting
ground, and he glanced this way and that with the swift and furtive
suspicion of one who, while setting one trap, fears to be taken in
another.

But the lady who rode on a white palfrey between these two took all
men's regard, even in the presence of a marshal of France and a herald
extraordinary of the King of Scots.

The Earl Douglas, having let his eyes once rest upon her, could not
again remove them, being, as it were, fixed by the very greatness of
the wonder which he saw.

It was the lady of the pavilion underneath the pines, the lady of the
evening light and of the midnight storm.

She was no longer clothed in simple white, but arrayed like a king's
daughter. On her head was a high-peaked coiffure, from which there
flowed down a graceful cloud of finest lace. This, even as the Earl
looked at her, she caught at with a bewitching gesture, and brought
down over her shoulder with her gloved hand. A close-fitting robe of
palest blue outlined the perfections of her body. A single
fleur-de-lys in gold was embroidered on the breast of her white
bodice, and the same device appeared again and again on the white
housing of her palfrey.