So they talked together gloomily, and at last announced that when he and their lady went they would go also and get off as best they could.  But there was a man among them, a small farmer named Jonathan Dicksey, who thought otherwise.  This Jonathan, who held his land under Christopher, had been forced to this business of the defence of Cranwell Towers somewhat against his will, namely, by the pressure of Christopher’s largest tenant, to whose daughter he was affianced.  He was a sly young man, and even during the siege, by means that need not be described, he had contrived to convey a message to the Abbot of Blossholme, telling him that had it been in his power he would gladly be in any other place.  Therefore, as he knew well, whatever had happened to others, his farm remained unharried.  Now he determined to be out of a bad business as soon as he might, for Jonathan was one of those who liked to stand upon the winning side.

Therefore, although he said “Aye, aye,” more loudly than his comrades, as soon as the dusk had fallen, while the others were making ready the horses and mounting guard, Jonathan thrust a ladder across the moat at the back of the stable, and clambered along its rungs into the shelter of a cattle-shed in the meadow, and so away.

Half-an-hour later he stood before the Abbot in the cottage where he had taken up his quarters, having contrived to blunder among his people and be captured.  To him at first Jonathan would say nothing, but when at length they threatened to take him out and hang him, to save his life, as he said, he found his tongue and told all.

“So, so,” said the Abbot when he had finished.  “Now God is good to us.  We have these birds in our net, and I shall keep St. Hilary’s at Blossholme after all.  For your services, Master Dicksey, you shall be my reeve at Cranwell Towers when they are in my hands.”

But here it may be said that in the end things went otherwise, since, so far from getting the stewardship of Cranwell, when the truth came to be known, Jonathan’s maiden would have no more to do with him, and the folk in those parts sacked his farm and hunted him out of the country, so that he was never heard of among them again.

Meanwhile, all being ready, Christopher at the Towers was closeted with Cicely, taking his farewell of her in the dark, for no light was left to them.

“This is a desperate venture,” he said to her, “nor can I tell how it will end, or if ever I shall see your sweet face again.  Yet, dearest, we have been happy together for some few hours, and if I fall and you live on I am sure that you will always remember me till, as we are taught, we meet again where no enemy has the power to torment us, and cold and hunger and darkness are not.  Cicely, if that should be so and any child should come to you, teach it to love the father whom it never saw.”

Now she threw her arms about him and wept, and wept, and wept.