midnight
`` But marked you not how astuciously the good father , '' said the Queen , `` eluded the questions of the woman Lochleven , telling her the very truth , which yet she received not as such ? '' Roland thought in his heart , that when the truth was spoken for the purpose of deceiving , it was little better than a lie in disguise . But it was no time to agitate such questions of conscience . `` And now for the signal from the shore , '' exclaimed Catherine ; `` my bosom tells me we shall see this night two lights instead of one gleam from that garden of Eden -- And then , Roland , do you play your part manfully , and we will dance on the greensward like midnight fairies ! '' Catherine 's conjecture misgave not , nor deceived her . In the evening two beams twinkled from the cottage , instead of one ; and the page heard , with beating heart , that the new retainer was ordered to stand sentinel on the outside of the castle . When he intimated this news to the Queen , she held her hand out to him -- he knelt , and when he raised it to his lips in all dutiful homage , he found it was damp and cold as marble .