with a crash.
Oh, Anthony! how I prayed!

"Then I saw Mr. Lackington"--Isabel stopped a moment at the name, and
then went on again--"and he was on horseback too in the court; but he was
shouting to two or three more who were just mounting. 'Across the
field--across the field---cut them off!' I could hear it so plainly; and
I saw the stable-gate was open, and they went through, and I could hear
them galloping on the grass. And then I knew what was happening; and I
went back to my room and shut the door."

Isabel stopped again; and Anthony took her hand softly in his own and
stroked it. Then she went on.

"Well, I saw them bring you back, from the gallery window--and ran to the
top of the stairs and saw you go through into the hall where the
magistrates were waiting, and the door was shut; and then I went back to
my place at the window--and then presently they brought in Mary. I
reached the bottom of the stairs just as they set her down. And I told
them to bring her upstairs; and they did, and laid her on the bed where
we had sat together all the afternoon.... And I would let no one in: I
did it all myself; and then I set the tapers round her, and put the
crucifix that was round my neck into her fingers, which I had laid on her
breast ... and there she lay on the great bed ... and her face was like a
child's, fast asleep--smiling: and then I kissed her again, and
whispered, 'Thank you, Mary'; for, though I did not know all, I knew
enough, and that it was for you."

Anthony had thrown his arms on the table and his face was buried in them.
Isabel put out her hand and stroked his curly head gently as she went on,
and told him in the same quiet voice of how Mary had tried to save him by
lashing his horse, as she caught sight of the man waiting at the entrance
of the field-path, and riding in between him and Anthony. The man had
declared in his panic of fear before the magistrates that he had never
dreamt of doing Mistress Corbet an injury, but that she had ridden across
just as he drew the trigger to shoot the priest's horse and stop him that
way.

When Isabel had finished Anthony still lay with his head on his arms.

"Why, Anthony, my darling," she said, "what could be more perfect? How
proud I am of you both!"

She told him, too, how they had been tracked to Stanfield--Lackington had
let it out in his exultation.

The sailor at Greenhithe was one of his agents--an apostate, like his
master. He had recognised that