“I know nothing, Mr. Alban.  They even shut me up here when they took her to Tixall; and even now none but myself and her two women have access to her.  I do not know even if her Grace will be left here.  There has been talk among the men of going to Fotheringay.  I know nothing, from day to day.  It is a ... a cauchemar.  But they will certainly do what they can to shake her.  It grows more rigorous every day.  And I thought, that if you would tell me whether a message could reach you, and if her chaplain is not allowed to see her again, you might be able to come again.  I would tell Sir Amyas how much good you had done to her last time, with your herbs; and, it might be, you could see her again in a month or two perhaps—­or later.”

Robin was silent.

The greatness of the affair terrified him; yet its melancholy drew him.  He had seen her on whom all England bent its thoughts at this time, who was a crowned Queen, with broad lands and wealth, who called Elizabeth “sister”; yet who was more of a prisoner than any in the Fleet or Westminster Gatehouse, since those at least could have their friends to come to them.  Her hidden fires, too, had warmed him—­that passion for God that had burst from her when her gaoler left her, and she had flung herself on her knees before her hidden Saviour.  It may be he had doubted her before (he did not know); but there was no more doubt in him after her protestation of her innocence.  He began to see now that she stood for more than her kingdom or her son or the plots attributed to her, that she was more than a mere great woman, for whose sake men could both live and die; he began to see in her that which poor Anthony had seen—­a champion for the Faith of them all, an incarnate suffering symbol, in flesh and blood, of that Religion for which he, too, was in peril—­that Religion, which, in spite of all clamour to the contrary, was the real storm-centre of England’s life.

He turned then to the old man with a suddenly flushed face.

“A message will always reach me at Mistress Manners’ house, at Booth’s Edge, near Hathersage, in Derbyshire.  And I will come from there, or from the world’s end, to serve her Grace.”

CHAPTER V

I

“First give me your blessing, Mr. Alban,” said Marjorie, kneeling down before him in the hall in front of them all.  She was as pale as a ghost, but her eyes shone like stars.

* * * * *

It was a couple of months after his leaving Chartley before he came at last to Booth’s Edge.  First he had had to bestow Mr. Arnold in Lancashire, for suspicion was abroad; and it was a letter from Marjorie herself, reaching him in Derby, at Mr. Biddell’s house, that had told him of it, and bidden him go on with his friend.  The town had never been the same since Topcliffe’s visit; and now that Babington