Marpasse hung over her, and smoothed her hair.
“You were a little slip of a thing when we first were friends,” she said, “and you often slept in my bosom. We had rough days and rough weather together. All the roads were rough for us, and so is the last track.”
Isoult lay very still, though her cold hands crept up, and rested in the warmth between Marpasse’s breasts. She grew very grey and feeble, and blood came into her mouth. Isoult spat it out, and looked up at Marpasse.
“What a fool of a world,” she said hoarsely; “but if I could work a miracle, I would just mend you, and set you on your feet. And if God and His saints are harder hearted, let them keep their pride, I would rather sup with the devil.”
Isoult gave a great sigh.
“How could I help it all,” she said; “I was branded when I was born, and I was no man’s child. No one ever taught me prayers, or fed me on white bread. And when I was kicked, I learnt to scratch back.”
Marpasse lay down beside her, and in a little while the end came. Nor did Isoult die easily, but with pain and revolt, and blood choking her throat. Marpasse put her arms about her, and held her till she died. And with the passing of Isoult’s spirit, something seemed to break in the heart of Marpasse.
The dusk deepened, and the living woman was sitting there with her head between her hands, and staring at the dead woman’s face, when a gaunt man in the dress of a priest came by, and seeing them, turned aside. He had a wooden cross in his hand, an axe thrust into his girdle, and a buckler at his back. If Grimbald had served the White Cross with his axe that day down amid the windings of the Ouse, he had put the iron aside now, and taken to compassion.
He spoke to Marpasse, but she did not hear him. Grimbald touched her on the shoulder.
“Peace, sister,” he said.