* * * * *

More than once, as they talked, Marjorie found herself looking at Mr. Ballard, or, as he was called here, Captain Fortescue.  It was he who seemed the leader of the troop; and, indeed, as Robin told her in a whisper, that was what he was.  He came and went frequently, he said; his manner and his carriage were reassuring to the suspicious; he appeared, perhaps, the last man in the world to be a priest.  He was a big man, as has been said; and he had a frank assured way with him; he was leaning forward, even now, as she looked at him, and seemed laying down the law, though in what was almost a whisper.  Father Campion was watching him, too, she noticed; and, what she had learned of Father Campion in the last few hours led her to wonder whether there was not something of doubtfulness in his opinion of him.

Father Campion suddenly shook his head sharply.

“I am not of that view at all,” he said.  “I—­”

And once more his voice sank so low as to be inaudible; as the rest leaned closer about him.

II

Mr. Anthony Babington seemed silent and even a little displeased when, half an hour later, the visitors were all gone downstairs to supper.  Three or four of them were to sleep in the house; the rest, of whom Robin was one, had Captain Fortescue’s instructions as to where lodgings were prepared.  But the whole company was tired out with the long ride from the coast, and would be seen no more that night.

* * * * *

Marjorie knew enough of the divisions of opinion among Catholics, and of Mr. Babington in particular, to have a general view as to why her companion was displeased; but more than that she did not know, nor what point in particular it was on which the argument had run.  The one party—­of Mr. Babington’s kind—­held that Catholics were, morally, in a state of war.  War had been declared upon them, without justification, by the secular authorities, and physical instruments, including pursuivants and the rack, were employed against them.  Then why should not they, too, employ the same kind of instruments, if they could, in return?  The second party held that a religious persecution could not be held to constitute a state of war; the Apostles Peter and Paul, for example, not only did not employ the arm of flesh against the Roman Empire, but actually repudiated it.  And this party further held that even the Pope’s bull, relieving Elizabeth’s subjects from their allegiance, did so only in an interior sense—­in such a manner that while they must still regard her personal and individual rights—­such rights as any human being possessed—­they were not bound to render interior loyalty to her as their Queen, and need not, for example (though they were not forbidden to do so), regard it as a duty to fight for her, in the event, let us say, of an armed invasion from Spain.