He tore out a bundle of papers from behind his cloak, detached one with shaking hands and thrust it before her.
She sat down and spread it on the table. But his voice broke in and interrupted her all the while.
"They were all three taken together, in the summer…. I … have been in France; my letters never reached me…. They were racked continually…. They died all together; praying for the Queen … at Tyburn…. Campion died the first…."
She pushed the paper from her; the close handwriting was no more to her than black marks on the paper. She passed her hands over her forehead and eyes.
"Mistress Marjorie, you look like death. See, I will leave the paper with you. It is from one of my friends who was there…."
The door was pushed open, and the servant came in, bearing a tray.
"Set it down," said Marjorie, as coolly as if death and horror were as far from her as an hour ago.
She nodded sharply to the maid, who went out again; then she rose and spread the food within the man's reach. He began to eat and drink, talking all the time.
* * * * *
As she sat and watched him and listened, remembering afterwards, as if mechanically, all that he said, she was contemplating something else. She seemed to see Campion, not as he had been three days ago, not as he was now … but as she had seen him in London—alert, brisk, quick. Even the tones of his voice were with her, and the swift merry look in his eyes…. Somewhere on the outskirts of her thought there hung other presences: the darkness, the blood, the smoking cauldron…. Oh! she would have to face these presently; she would go through this night, she knew, looking at all their terror. But just now let her remember him as he had been; let her keep off all other thoughts so long as she could….