The party of Elvira, in the mean time, was quite unable to stem the torrent opposed to it. The Queen and her father were both too ill to leave their beds, and Lord Edmund was in prison.
"What will become of us?" whispered Emma to Dr. Coleman, one day in the chamber of Elvira, when she fancied the Queen to be asleep. "To-morrow Prince Ferdinand and Lord Edmund are to be tried, and, they say, not even the Queen has power to pardon them if they are convicted."
"It is but too true," returned Dr. Coleman; "they must die, and the punishment is horrid. The criminal is doomed to be burned by a slow fire."
"Horrible!" cried Emma; "and this only for drawing a sword in the vicinity of a royal palace."
"Alas! that is not all! Ferdinand is accused of wishing to marry the Queen; and the laws that devote to a horrid death the man who shall presume to address her in the language of love, yet hold good against foreigners."
