“It’s nothing–– Let me go.”
Perry Waite looked sharply into her face. Then he took his hand from her arm.
Trembling and horror-stricken, Ruth slipped away and crowded herself in among the people who stood around the Bishop. Here no one would be likely to speak to her. And here, too, she felt a certain relief, a sense of security, in being surrounded by people who would understand. Even though they knew nothing of her secret, yet the mere feeling that she stood among those who could have understood gave her strength and a feeling of safety even against herself which she could not have had among her own kind.
But she was not long left with her feeling of security. A wan, grey-faced girl with burning eyes caught Ruth fiercely by the arm and drew her out of the crowd. It was Cynthe Cardinal, though Ruth found it difficult to recognise in her the red-cheeked, sprightly French girl she had met in the early summer.
“You saw Rafe Gadbeau die,” the girl said roughly, as she faced Ruth sharply at a little distance from the crowd. “You were there, close? No?”
“Yes, the fire was all around,” Ruth answered, quaking.
“How did he die? Tell me. How?”
“Why––why, he died quickly, in the Bishop’s arms.”
“I know. Yes. But how? He confessed?”