Peter's. At Queen Mary's accession, he had stood, with
mild but genuine enthusiasm, in his lawyer's gown, in the train of the
sheriff who proclaimed her in Derby market-place; and stood in the
crowd, with corresponding dismay, six years later to shout for Queen
Elizabeth. Since that date, for the first eleven years he had gone, as
did other Catholics, to his parish church secretly, thankful that there
was no doubt as to the priesthood of his parson, to hear the English
prayers; and then, to do him justice, though he heard with something
resembling consternation the decision from Rome that compromise must
cease and that, henceforth, all true Catholics must withdraw themselves
from the national worship, he had obeyed without even a serious moment
of consideration. He had always feared that it might be so,
understanding that delay in the decision was only caused by the hope
that even now the breach might not be final or complete; and so was
better prepared for the blow when it came. Since that time he had heard
mass when he could, and occasionally even harboured priests, urged
thereto by his wife and daughter; and, for the rest, still went into
Derby for three or four days a week to carry on his lawyer's business,
with Mr. Biddell his partner, and had the reputation of a sound and
careful man without bigotry or passion.

It was, then, a shock to his love of peace and serenity, to hear that
yet another Catholic house had fallen, and that Mr. Audrey, one of his
clients, could no longer be reckoned as one of his co-religionists.

The next point for his reflection was that Robin was refusing to follow
his father's example; the third, that somebody must harbour the boy over
Easter, and that, in his daughter's violently expressed opinion, and
with his wife's consent, he, Thomas Manners, was the proper person to do
it. Last, that it was plain that there was something between his
daughter and this boy, though what that was he had been unable to
understand. Marjorie had flown suddenly from the room just as he was
beginning to put his questions.

It is no wonder, then, that his peace of mind was gone. Not only were
large principles once more threatened--considerations of religion and
loyalty, but also those small and intimate principles which, so far more
than great ones, agitate the mind of the individual. He did not wish to
lose a client; yet neither did he wish to be unfriendly to a young
confessor for the faith. Still less di