Buch lesen: «Sir Christopher: A Romance of a Maryland Manor in 1644», Seite 10

They were out in the river now. The Potomac spread far to the southward as far as eye could reach, with vague hints of low hills so near the hue of the water that one could scarce tell where water ended and land began, or where the land again slipped into the misty blueness of the western sky.

Neville strained his eyes to catch sight of a particular point as they passed it, – a point rising a little from the water and crowned with a thick growth of primeval forest. There lay Robin Hood's Barn, and the wide acres of Cecil's Manor stretched peacefully along the river just where it widened into the bay.

There is a peculiar irony in watching in our unhappiness the scenes associated with hours of hope and joy. Neville smiled bitterly as he contrasted what might have been with what was. Then he reproached himself for a coward and a faint heart that was ready to yield to the first buffet of Fate. He resolved to turn his mind from gloomy thoughts and find comfort in the cheerfulness around him.

The ketch was running free with all sails spread and looked like a big white bird skimming the surface. It was a sight to cheer the heart of the most downcast, but more cheering still was the smell of breakfast a-cooking in the cabin, and right willingly did Neville respond to the call and seat himself at the rude board in the tiny cabin, which, rude as it was, proved a welcome shelter from the fresh wind blowing outside.

"I reckon," he said, looking with a smile at his captors, "that I am to be allowed the freedom of my arms while eating unless ye do intend to feed me with a pap spoon like an infant."

"All in good time, Sir Christopher." It seemed to be always the tall man who spoke.

"Curse his ready tongue! Why will he never give the other fellow a chance?" thought Neville, but held his peace while the spokesman continued, —

"Before we remove the rope we want your oath to two things. First, that you will make no effort to escape. Second, that you will cheerfully obey our orders and those, whatever they may be, in this sealed paper."

"A largish contract; but for the first I can well afford to promise, since having put aside the chance of escape when 'twas easy, I am not like to undertake it now 'tis become well-nigh impossible. I'm neither whale nor Jonah that I should set out to swim a matter of a dozen miles to land; and as for running away, I am bound to see this trial to a finish and try what Maryland law for Protestants is."

Here Philpotts was guilty of the indiscretion of sighing. Neville, fearing he would show himself too much the prisoner's friend for his own good, turned upon him with simulated fierceness.

"Sirrah, I will have none of your officious sighing as if I were already as good as a dead man. Keep your breath to cool your porridge. When I want it I'll ask for it.

"Now," turning again to his interlocutor, "as for the second clause, you ask a trifle too much. As much of your will as I must obey I shall, and with three against one to enforce it that share seems likely to be well-nigh the whole; but as to the cheerfulness with which I meet it, that must needs depend on God and my own mind. But make haste ere those cakes be cold to unbind me and let me have at them!"

"Are you satisfied with the prisoner's promise?"

The other two men nodded, and Philpotts went on deck again. The stripling began in a trice to undo the ropes which bound Neville, whereupon he fell to and made as hearty a breakfast as ever he laid in on firm land with high hopes and bright prospects.

When they were come out of the cabin again, he noticed that the boat had changed her course and was running with a beam wind.

"Why, how's this?" he asked of Philpotts as he took his seat once more by the stern. "Surely this ketch is not laying her course for St. Mary's."

"Do not ask me, sir! I'm not the captain of this infernal ketch. In truth, I'm no sailor at all, and would be right glad if I could be set ashore this minute."

Neville could have laughed as he saw the green and yellow melancholy that too surely tells the story of coming sea-sickness, but pity ruled and he said sympathetically, "Go you below, and I'll keep the helm till you have braced your insides with some hot meat and drink."

"How's this?" cried the tall man, coming on deck just as Neville reached for the tiller. "Mutiny already! Troth, I have a pair of irons below, and you shall be clapped in them if I see you move toward the tiller again. Philpotts, give me the helm and go below!"

Neville shrugged his shoulders, but refrained from speech. He withdrew his outstretched hand, pulled his hat over his eyes, and sat gazing over the sail at the blue distance which seemed of a sudden peopled with all the friends of a lifetime. He could see his father and mother seated by the great stone fireplace at Frome Hall, the Irish setter with his head on his master's knee. Yes, and there in her own little chair, the tiny Peggy, with rebellious curls shaken back every now and again from the bright eyes beneath them, and then the quick lighting up of the face, the leaning forward of the little figure as Christopher himself entered the room with his game-bag over his shoulder, the eager peep into the bag, and the jumping up and down with delight as she counted the tale of the day's success.

Perhaps he had scarcely realized in those days how much that little sister's adoring love had meant to him. But now it all came back with a swift stab. Oh, to take her in his arms once more, to tell her how he felt to the heart's core her loyalty and devotion! Why do these impulses so often come too late to all of us?

As Neville withdrew his gaze from the water to the deck, the hallucination of familiar figures followed him. There close at his elbow was the dear round face with its roguish dimples and mischievous eyes, not cast down and swollen with crying as he had seen them last, but full of life and light, and her dear voice was murmuring in his ear, —

"Kit, my darling brother, I am here. Are you glad?"

Neville brushed his arm across his eyes: the figure was too real. It savored of madness, but it would not move. When he opened his eyes again, there it stood, more solid than ever, but now the tears were rising in the eyes, and the hands were stretched out softly toward him.

"Where am I? What does it mean?" Christopher murmured.

"It means," said the senior escort, removing his hat, and revealing the dark curls of Romney Huntoon, "that we have decided upon a change of venue for your case, and have arranged to remove the jurisdiction to Romney Hall, York County, Virginia."

"Bless my soul!" cried Philpotts, from the companionway; "he's told him, the mean devil, and me not there to see the fun – me, that's beaten any play actor in the old country at deceiving tricks. Sir Christopher, the Captain and crew of the ketch Lady Betty are at your service, and it's no more of prison bars we'll hear after we touch Protestant Virginia."

"Peggy, Peggy, what have you done?" exclaimed her brother, bending over her brown head as it lay on his breast, as she knelt close beside him.

"Done? We have saved you from prison, to be sure. He and I and good Master Philpotts, that we thought to outwit and found full ready to help us. And this is Master Huntoon's boat all ready loaded for Romney. He brought it round yesterday from St. Mary's. He's rather clever, that Master Huntoon, though he keeps his wits mostly for great occasions."

"Vastly clever of you all three, and vastly dull of me to be your dupe! I thank you all heartily; and now will you please put your helm about, and head the ketch for St. Mary's with what speed you may?"

"Christopher!" exclaimed Peggy, in such a heart-broken voice that her brother clasped her closer than ever as he said, —

"Indeed, indeed, I appreciate what you have all done, and risked for me, but I cannot run away."

"Then you care nothing for me compared with your flimsy honor."

"Nay, 'tis partly that I care so much for you that I must have a care of this flimsy honor, which is yours as well as mine. Philpotts, will you kindly put about that helm?"

Philpotts made a motion to obey; but Huntoon stopped him with a movement of his hand.

"Listen, Sir Christopher, I pray you," he said. "Of course I am a younger man, and you may resent my counselling you; but remember, I love your sister, and her honor and yours are no less dear to me than to you. I see the situation more clearly as a looker-on, and this is how it looks to me. There is no hope here and now of a fair trial. The Catholics are hot for the punishment of the murderer of a priest, and Calvert and Brent have already angered them by the leniency they have shown to Protestants. Give the matter but time to cool, and make sure of a fair hearing. That is all I ask."

Neville sat silent with his head bowed on his hands for an instant, then he spoke low but firmly, —

"Go! I must have time to think. Go you all below and give me the helm! When I have made up my mind, I will summon you, and my decision must stand. You, Huntoon, must give me back the oath I swore to obey you. This matter touches none so close as me, and in my hands it must be left. Go!"

Slowly and dejectedly the three conspirators crept into the cabin. There Romney and Peggy sat silent and expectant for what seemed an eternity. Ropes creaked, sails flapped on deck. Who could say what was passing? At length they heard a cheerful call of "All hands on deck!"

They rushed up the companionway and saw Christopher standing at the helm, his hair blown back and his hand grasping the helm, the tiller pushed far to port, and the ketch standing for St. Mary's.

CHAPTER XIV
IN WHICH FATE TAKES THE HELM

AS the three conspirators emerged from the companionway one after another, they made a forlorn picture of disappointment, so chapfallen were the faces of all. Philpotts stood still, his shaggy eyebrows drawn into a frown, and under them a pair of eyes that threatened resistance. 'Twas as if Sancho Panza had come to the end of his patience with Don Quixote, and thought it time that common-sense took control for the good of all concerned.

Romney twisted his cap and looked at Peggy, who bit her lips to keep back the tears which, in spite of her will, were gathering in her eyes, and standing large on the fringe of her lashes.

As Christopher watched her, he felt his courage ebbing so fast that he must either yield or smile. He chose the latter.

"Troth," cried he, "'tis as though you were condemned criminals and I the judge. For having connived at the escape of a prisoner, I do sentence you to a happy life forever after, but in the present case to be balked of your good intent. Wherefore I am bound for St. Mary's, there to surrender myself to Sheriff Ellyson; but 'tis no part of my plan to give you up too. So if you are minded to risk the trip across the bay without yonder shallop bobbing along behind us like an empty cork, I'll e'en borrow it, when we are within a mile of the town and then – " here he paused and swallowed hard for a minute, "then, tried friends and true, we'll say good-bye for a while and you must continue on your way."

"Let them go, then, since thou wilt have it so, and we will make our way safe to St. Mary's, thou and I."

It was Peggy who spoke, coming close to her brother and looking up at him with unwavering love in her eyes.

"Nay, nay, little sister," said Christopher, gathering her soft hand into his. "That will not content me neither. Thou art well-nigh a part of myself, and it will content me much, whate'er betides, to feel that one part at least is happy. I will not have thee go back where thou must be made wretched by hearing hard words of thy brother, and be looked down upon by all. Huntoon, thou hast in right manful fashion declared thy love for my sister Margaret here. I venture not to give her answer. That must thou win from her thyself, and perchance 'tis not yet ready for the giving; but I trust her in thy keeping. Take her back to thy mother! She will, I know, receive her tenderly, for I am familiar with the repute of Mistress Huntoon's hospitality."

Huntoon came swiftly forward and grasped Neville's other hand, which released its hold on the tiller as Philpotts took the helm. Tears stood in the lad's eyes.

"Be sure," he said, "that your sister shall be treated with that love and reverence which are her due, nor shall she be hurried to any decision she might after regret. To my mother she will be dear as a daughter of her own."

Men are prone to believe in a family welcome to their loves as warm as their own. It does not always fall out according to expectation, but Romney Huntoon knew his mother's heart, which was soft to a folly, especially to young and unhappy lovers; she herself having suffered much, 'twas said, in her youth.

"'Tis well," said Neville, clasping Huntoon's hand on his right almost as firmly as he held his sister's on the other side. "Thou art a man after my own heart; and if thou dost win this little sister of mine, be tender, be gentle to her whimsies, of which she hath a full assortment; but keep the whip hand, my friend, keep the whip hand! And now one more charge I pray thee accept for my sake. This good Master Philpotts, – he is not made for a roving life, as his sea-sickness but now did bear witness, yet hath he without a murmur left farm and implements and all means of earning a livelihood to help me out of this hard place."

"Yes, and if thou wert a wiser man, thou wouldst stay helped and not go throwing thyself back into the pit from which we ha' digged you."

"Have thy fling, good friend Philpotts! Having never laid claim to wisdom, I am not over-sensitive to the charge of lacking it; but what I would say to Master Huntoon was this, that if my lands at home in England be not confiscate, I do intend them as a dowry for my sister. I would counsel that they be sold and land taken up in Virginia, where Philpotts may have a farm and implements as many as he left and whatsoever more is needed."

Philpotts tried to speak, but could not. The tears choked him. He gulped and bent over the tiller. Peggy, too, was crying hard, and Huntoon sat with steady gaze fixed upon Christopher.

The silence that fell upon the little group continued long. So much must be said if that silence were once broken! So bowed down were their hearts that it seemed quite natural that the sunshine should fade out of the sky and a universal grayness slowly spread itself over the sea.

Philpotts was first to speak. "Look yonder, Captain!" he said, pointing Huntoon to the eastward; "is that yonder Watkins Point or a bank of fog?"

"That's the Point. No, it cannot be the Point either, – 'tis too far south for that; besides, it looms as we look. It is drawing nearer, and the fogs do drift in with marvellous quickness in these waters. Give me the helm!"

"'Tis unlucky," murmured Neville, "for 'tis not the easiest thing in the world in the brightest weather to make one's way past all these headlands, they are so much alike. What's that craft yonder by the wooded point?"

Huntoon made a glass of his two hands. "She hath the look of a packet sloop outward bound, somewhat heavy laden too, for she lies low in the water and goes slowly with a fair wind."

"How far away is she?"

"A matter of a mile, I should say."

"Ay," put in Philpotts, "and she hath seen the fog too, and is setting all sail to make what way she can before it strikes her."

The air grew colder as the sky clouded, and Huntoon brought Peggy's red cape from below and wrapped it close about her. She thanked him with a smile that he thought the sweetest and the saddest thing he had ever seen.

The fog was closing in on them now, and the wind dropped before it. The rail dripped with the chill dampness, and the sails flapped heavily as they swung over the deck whenever the vessel changed her course.

"Peggy dear, wilt thou not go below and keep warm?" said Christopher's voice.

"Nay, let me stay by thee whilst I can; and, Kit, if I obey thee in this, mind, 'tis only that I may help thee more. Romney – Master Huntoon – hath friends in the colony who are sure to sift this matter to the last. And it will go hard but we find some way to bring thee aid and comfort yet."

"Philpotts, can you see how we are heading?"

"No, faith, Master Huntoon, no more than if I were blindfold. The wind is dead ahead now; but whether it hath shifted or the boat hath run off its course, I know not."

"Hearken!" cried Peggy, putting her hand to her ear. "Did ye hear no noise? Methought I caught a sound as of a horn or a distant bell. Perchance 'twas the church bell ringing for noonday prayers. I heard them telling of some saint's day celebrated to-day."

All the men stood listening. Neville rose and running along the deck climbed to the bowsprit to listen again. Suddenly he cried out at the top of his voice, "Boat ahoy! Ahoy there!"

Too late! The three huddled together in the stern were aware of a large vessel looming up and up above them, rising with the rising wave, and then lunging forward full upon The Lady Betty. Huntoon clasped Peggy in his arms as though he could shield her thus from the inevitable crash. Philpotts dropped the helm and rushed forward to drag back Neville. Again too late. The two boats met with a shock.

By good luck when Philpotts dropped the helm, The Lady Betty had veered away from the larger vessel, so that the packet's bowsprit, having crashed against her, bumped along against the side, knocking away rail and stanchion, and staving a hole in her, deep and dangerous but not instantly fatal. For one instant all drew a breath of relief at the deadly peril passed. Then, to their dismay, they heard Philpotts crying out, "He's overboard! The bowsprit hit him!"

"Overboard!" cried Peggy; "but he is a famous swimmer, surely he can reach the boat."

Even as she spoke, something white rose to the surface and sank again, and Peggy knew it for Christopher's face with death in it, and but for Romney's strong arm around her, she, too, would have thrown herself into that cold grave.

"Let me go to him!" she shrieked aloud in her anguish of soul. "O Kit! Dead! Dead!"

The words seemed to fall dully on the surrounding wall of fog. No sound; not even an echo answered. Away to the right a single sail flitted ghostlike, showing no hull to support it. On the left close at hand loomed the packet which had wrought so much harm.

Save for these the waters were bare of life, and the girl in the ketch sat looking with frozen gaze, as if she had seen the Gorgon's head, at that spot unmoved now by so much as a ripple, that silent grave which had opened and closed again over a life precious to her beyond aught else that earth held.

As she gazed, she was seized by a sudden madness, following hard upon the stony stillness.

"I will go! I will!" she screamed, struggling with Romney's grasp, which held like steel. She was as powerless in that clasp as a bird in a gauntleted hand.

Of her sense of powerlessness a new emotion was born, a nameless quivering thing that nestled in the heart of her desolation and in that moment of deepest despair struck a peace.

CHAPTER XV
DIGITUS DEI

Much ado there was at St. Gabriel's when it was found that the door of the tobacco-house stood open, and the prisoner was gone. All the more exasperating was it when it proved that there was no one to be blamed or held responsible, because the jailor was gone too.

Each member of the household took the news of the escape differently.

Cecil jumped for joy. Father White betook himself to solitude and prayer in his oratory. Mary Brent made few comments, but went about with her mouth pursed up as though she feared to relax the muscles lest they betray her into rash words. Her light lashes too were cast down and her eyes carefully discharged of all expression.

Such silence has more power to irritate than reproaches or curses.

Elinor felt this irritation so keenly that she could not stay in the house with her cousin, but took refuge in the woods beneath the calm sky, in that silence of Nature which holds only balm for wounded hearts.

Brent too thought it well to give his sister a wide berth. His own irritation found vent in an honest volley of oaths directed impartially at himself and each member of the household except perhaps Ralph Ingle, to whom he turned for that comfort which a strong and autocratic nature finds in a pliant one. With such a man as Brent, to concur is to conquer.

Ingle in return gave him sympathy and silence. Silences differ as widely as speech, and Ingle's silence was no more like that of Mary Brent than the calm of a sunny day is like the electric stillness preceding storm. Ingle's silence was full of delicate suggestions of assent, of a sympathy too subtle to be put into words, of comradeship and support to that self-esteem which just now felt itself sadly shaken.

No wonder his company was desired! We succeed with others as we comprehend them. We value others as they comprehend us.

Giles Brent was a man of action, and lost no time in locking and double barring the stable door after the horse was stolen.

Two messengers he despatched to St. Mary's to learn, if they could, whether any news had reached the town of Neville's escape. The other available men he divided into parties of four, and sent them to scour the woods in all directions. Then, taking Ralph Ingle with him, he buckled on his sword, lifted two guns from the rack in the hall, and marched grimly down the little path to the wharf.

"You have a keen eye, Ingle, and are a mariner born and bred. Therefore have I brought you with me, for it seems far likelier that Neville has made his escape by sea than by land. I will take the helm, and do you go before the mast and keep a sharp lookout for any small boat, especially one that may seem to hug the wooded points at the mouth of the river."

Ingle ventured a few words by way of conversation, but found his companion in a taciturn mood and not to be drawn into conversation. Both men scanned every headland and inlet till their eyes ached, but with no success, till at length Ingle called out, —

"There's a ship yonder, – a packet, I should say, from the size and build of her."

"Ay, for a guess 'tis Prescott's. I ordered him from St. Mary's yesterday for being too much hand in glove with that scapegrace brother of thine."

A pained look crossed Ralph Ingle's face.

"Forgive me!" said Brent, who had a soft heart under a quick temper. "Whatever may be said of your brother, I put trust in you, and here's my hand on 't."

Ingle did not note the outstretched hand, for his eyes were fixed on something beyond the ship, a smaller boat making for St. Mary's.

"Look!" he said, "to the right there, to the southward of Pine Point! Damnation, how the fog is shutting down!"

Even as he spoke a film gathered between him and the two boats, – a film deepening into a thick veil and that into an impenetrable, impalpable wall of fog.

Brent held his boat straight on her course. On, on, till once again he caught the outline of the packet looming close at hand. Then from the other side he heard a voice which he recognized as Neville's shouting "Boat ahoy!" Then a crash as if a sea monster had both boats and were grinding them between his teeth. A rebound, and then another crash, and above the noise the voice of Philpotts crying, "My God! He's gone!" and a woman's voice sobbing, "O Kit! Dead! Dead!"

"Hard alee!" shouted Ingle to Brent. "Hard alee! or we shall be in the coil with the rest;" and running aft he threw his whole weight on the tiller just in time to shave the packet. They swept into open water, and the wind bore them away till once more the two boats looked like gray phantoms against the grayer sky.

"Well done, Ingle! But for your quickness we should have been snarled up with the other boats. Next time we must come to them with more caution."

"Why take the risk again? Death has been before us in claiming our prisoner."

"Ay, but his jailor and the accomplices are yet to be reckoned with if Maryland justice is not to become a byword and a hissing."

"Governor Brent," Ingle spoke in slow, reluctant tones, "did you chance to read the name of the larger packet as we passed?"

"Nay, I was too much occupied with saving the skin of my own boat. Did you?"

"I did."

"And the name – "

"Was The Reformation."

"Ah!"

"Yes, and I saw Dick aboard her striding up and down the deck in a fury, swearing like the cutthroat he is."

"Yet shall he not hinder me from the performance of my duty. No man shall say that Giles Brent is a coward."

"No fear that any man will ever say that. Let none have cause to say that the Lieutenant-General, Admiral, Chancellor, Keeper of the Great Seal, Chief Captain, Magistrate, and Commander of the Province forgot the sacredness of trust involved in all these offices and ran risks. Do not drive me to say what risks; but believe me when I say that I know my brother well, and I know he would stop at nothing, – even to the carrying off of an officer of the King. He is mad, fairly mad, over his treatment at St. Mary's yonder."

Brent frowned, shook his head, and hesitated as if uncertain what course to pursue, then he gave the helm to Ingle entirely, saying, —

"You are right. It is hard to draw the line betwixt cowardice and caution; but in Calvert's absence I have no right to run risks."

Still in the distance hovered the two phantom ships gray against the universal grayness, yet dimly discernible, the smaller boat settling lower and lower like some despairing animal feeling death near at hand yet struggling to the last.

"It is the end," said Ralph Ingle. "The man is drowned, and his boat is sunk. Whatever he has done, he has made the fullest atonement man can make."

"Yes," said Brent, uncovering his head. "I think that we have seen the end of this unhappy business. A life has been given for a life. The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

Ralph Ingle bowed his head as one too much moved for words.

Silently they drifted shoreward and still silently clewed up the sail and tied the boat to the dock. Once more Brent held out his hand. "You have proved yourself a tried and trusty comrade this day, and if you have aught to ask of me, be sure I stand ready to grant it."

"Nay, nay," said Ralph, with his frank smile, "'twere poor comradeship to begin with asking of favors; besides, there is naught in your gift that I crave unless – unless – "

"Out with it, man!"

"Well, then, your influence with your kinswoman, Mistress Elinor Calvert."

Brent started.

"I never dreamed of this," he said.

"Nor I, on my faith, till I was so deep there was no turning back. She is one of those women that to love once is to love always. I would do anything for her, – sacrifice my life, nay, my soul itself, – but she is cold as the ice floating in yonder river."

Giles Brent's face grew set and stern.

"I can well believe it, for I fear 'tis not alone that she loves you not; but that her heart has been given to another and clings but the closer, the unworthier she finds him."

"Then it was Neville. I suspected as much. But now, surely now that he is dead, there may be a chance for me."

"My friend, you little know Elinor Calvert. She has made this murderer into a saint, and she will burn candles to his memory and say masses for his soul while she lives."

"Hush! is this not she coming down the path?"

"Ay, go you round through the underbrush and leave me to tell her."

So advised, Ingle took a short cut through the woods, and Brent, walking on alone, met Elinor face to face.

"Good morrow, Cousin!"

"Would it were a good morrow, Giles! But that can scarce be till we are good ourselves and credulous of good in others."

"I have no time to play with words. I am come from stern scenes that wring men's souls."

Elinor turned pale.

"Hast thou seen him?"

"By him signifying Christopher Neville, I doubt not. Now I might put thee off by saying I have not seen him, as in a sense I have not; yet I have been near him and in a way to know his fate, which, not to delay ill news in the telling, is death by drowning."

Elinor answered not a word. She grew deadly white, bowed her head, and turning about began to walk toward the house.

Brent would not have been surprised to see her swoon at his feet, but this unnatural calmness terrified him.

"Whither art thou bound?" he asked, catching up with her.

"To the manor-house – there to say a prayer for the soul of him that's gone, then to pack my belongings and Cecil's."

"To pack?"

"Ay, and to make ready for our departure to St. Mary's. There we will make our home till we can betake ourselves to Cecil Manor. The house of the Brents can never again be shelter for me or mine."

"Elinor! Have I deserved this?"

"Thou hast been a kind kinsman to me, Giles, and for the past I thank thee; but thou art a hard man, and my heart is bitter against thee for the part thou hast played in driving an innocent man to his death."

"I drive the poltroon!" muttered Brent. "Was he not drowned in a cowardly attempt to escape from a trial he dared not face?"

"No!" flamed Elinor.

"Thou dost speak as one who knows. Perhaps thou hast information. How canst thou talk so bold?"

"I talk so bold because I do know – alas! none better. I – I tempted him – the other night – I promised him aid and begged him to escape, and he would not. He scorned the cowardice and vowed he would stand his trial and abide by the result."

"Some other must have had more influence with him, then, for there was a woman's voice in the boat when he sank."

"Bless her!" cried Elinor, "whoever she was, that did plan his safety – but hold. I know who it was, – his sister Peggy, – who, as we thought, went back to St. Mary's yesterday; whether he be taken with or against his will, she is with him. God has been kind to her, but she deserved it, for she was stanch and true. She has her deserts, and I had mine. 'Twas God's truth she spoke when she told me I had been false, and vowed she never wished to see my face again. I know how she felt, for I feel it now toward thee. Ay, stand back, Giles, and hear my vow: Never again after this day will I hold converse with thee or remember that there is a bond of kinship between us till thou shalt kneel as I have knelt in contrition and shame for the part thou hast played."