Then Mary rolled her piteous blue eyes at her over Sir Humphrey’s shoulder from her gold tangle of hair.

“What mean you?” she cried.  “I tell you, Catherine, I will never leave him!”

“If we remain, we shall all be in custody,” replied Catherine in her clear voice, though her face was white as if she were dead, “and our estates may be forfeited, and we have no power to help him.  And he must be taken in the end in any case.  And if we be free, we can save him.”

“I will not go without him,” cried Mary.  “Set me down, Humphrey, and take up Harry, and I will help thee carry him.  Do as I tell thee, Humphrey.”

“Harry will be taken in any case,” replied Catherine, “and if you take him, you will be arrested with him, and then we can do nothing for him.  I tell thee, sweet, the only way to save him is to leave him.”

Then Mary gave one look at me.

“Harry, is this the truth they tell me?” she cried.

“As God is my witness, dear child,” I replied.  Then she twisted her white face around toward Sir Humphrey’s, who stood pinioning her arms with a look himself as if he were dying.

“Let me loose, Humphrey,” she said, “let me loose, then I swear I will go with you and Catherine.”

Then Sir Humphrey loosed her, and straight to me she came and bent over me and kissed me.  “Harry,” she said in a whisper which was of that strange quality that it seemed to be unable to be heard by any in the whole world save us two, though it was clear enough—­“I leave thee because thou tellest me that this is the only way to save thee, but I am thine for life and for death, and nothing shall ever come forever between thee and me, not even thine own self, nor the grave, nor all the wideness of life.”

Then she rose and turned to Sir Humphrey and Catherine.

“I am ready,” said she, and Sir Humphrey gave my hand one last wring, and said that he would stand by me.  Then they fled and, as I lay there alone, I heard their footsteps on the cellar stairs, and presently the dip of the boat as she was launched, and heard it above all the din outside, so keen were my ears for aught that concerned her.

Then that sound and all others grew dim, for I was near swooning, and when the door fell with a mighty crash near me, it might have been the fall of a rose leaf on velvet, and I had small heed of the fierce faces which bent over me, yet the hands extended toward my wounds were tender enough.  And I saw as in a dream, Capt.  Robert Waller, with his arm tied up, and wondered dimly if we were both dead, for I verily believed that I had killed him, and I heard him say, and his voice sounded as if a sea rolled between us, “’Tis the convict tutor, Wingfield, who held the door, and unless I be much mistaken, he hath his death-wound.  Make a litter and lift him gently, and five of you search the house for whatever other rebels be hid herein.”

And as I live, in the midst of my faintness, which made all sounds far away as from beyond the boundary of the flesh, and beyond the din of battle, which was still going on, though feebly, like a fire burning to its close, I heard the dip of oars on the creek, and knew that Mary Cavendish was safe.