"Yours first," he said.
So Robin told him. He had been ordained priest a month ago, at Châlons-sur-Marne…. The college was as full as it could hold…. They had had an unadventurous journey.
Anthony put a question or two, and was answered.
"And now," said Robin, "what of Derbyshire; and of the country; and of my father? And is it true that Ballard is taken?"
Anthony threw an arm over the back of his chair, and tried to seem at his ease.
"Well," he said, "Derbyshire is as it ever was. You heard of Thomas
FitzHerbert's defection?"
"Mistress Manners wrote to me of it, more than two years ago."
"Well, he does what he can: he comes and goes with his wife or without her. But he comes no more to Padley. And he scarcely makes a feint even before strangers of being a Catholic, though he has not declared himself, nor gone to church, at any rate in his own county. Here in London I have seen him more than once in Topcliffe's company. But I think that every Catholic in the country knows of it by now. That is Mistress Manners' doing. My sister says there has never been a woman like her."
Robin's eyes twinkled.
"I always said so," he said. "But none would believe me. She has the wit and courage of twenty men. What has she been doing?"