III

It was a heavy-hearted priest that presently, downstairs, stood with Anthony in one of the guest-rooms, and was made known to half a dozen strangers.  Every word that he had heard upstairs must be as if it had never been spoken, from the instant at which Anthony had first sat down to the instant in which he had kneeled down to receive his blessing.  So much he knew from his studies at Rheims.  He must be to each man that he met, that which he would have been to him an hour ago.  Yet, though as a man he must know nothing, his priest’s heart was heavy in his breast.  It was a strange home-coming—­to pass from the ordered piety of the college:  to the whirl of politics and plots in which good and evil span round together—­honest and fiery zeal for God’s cause, mingled with what he was persuaded was crime and abomination.  He had thought that a priest’s life would be a simple thing, but it seemed otherwise now.

He spoke with those half-dozen men—­those who knew him well enough for a priest; and presently, when some of his own party came, drew aside again with Anthony, who began to tell him in a low voice of the personages there.

“These are all my private friends,” he said, “and some of them be men of substance in their own place.  There is Mr. Charnoc, of Lancashire, he with the gilt sword.  He is of the Court of her Grace, and comes and goes as he pleases.  He is lodged in Whitehall, and comes here but to see his friends.  And there is Mr. Savage, in the new clothes, with his beard cut short.  He is a very honest fellow, but of a small substance, though of good family enough.”

“Her Grace has some of her ladies, too, that are Catholics, has she not?” asked Robin.

“There are two or three at least, and no trouble made.  They hear mass when they can at the Embassies.  Mendoza is a very good friend of ours.”

Mr. Charnoc came up presently to the two.  He was a cheerful-looking man, of northern descent, very particular in his clothes, with large gold ear-rings; he wore a short, pointed beard above his stiff ruff, and his eyes were bright and fanatical.

“You are from Rheims, I understand, Mr. Alban.”

He sat down with something of an air next to Robin.

“And your county—?” he asked.

“I am from Derbyshire, sir,” said Robin.

“From Derbyshire.  Then you will have heard of Mistress Marjorie Manners, no doubt.”

“She is an old friend of mine,” said Robin, smiling. (The man had a great personal charm about him.)

“You are very happy in your friends, then,” said the other.  “I have never spoken with her myself; but I hear of her continually as assisting our people—­sending them now up into the Peak country, now into the towns, as the case may be—­and never a mistake.”

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