Great Britain -- History -- Elizabeth, 1558-1603 -- Fiction
It was a comely refined face, a little pale but perfectly serene: his
pointed dark brown beard and moustache were carefully trimmed; and his
large passionate eyes looked cheerfully about him. Anthony stared at him,
wholly fascinated; for above the romance that hung about the hunted
priest and the glamour of the dreaded Society which he represented, there
was a chivalrous fearless look in his face that drew the heart of the
young man almost irresistibly. At least he did not look like the skulking
knave at whom all the world was sneering, and of whom Anthony had dreamt
so vividly a few nights before.
The storm of execration from the faces below, and the faces crowding at
the windows, seemed to affect him not at all; and he looked from side to
side as if they were cheering him rather than crying against him. Once
his eyes met Anthony's and rested on them for a moment; and a strange
thrill ran through him and he shivered sharply.
* * * *
And yet he felt, too, a distinct and irresistible movement of attraction
towards this felon who was riding towards his agony and passion; and he
was conscious at the same time of that curious touch of wonder that he
had felt years before towards the man whipped at the cart's tail, as to
whether the solitary criminal were not in the right, and the clamorous
accusers in the wrong. Campion in a moment had passed on and turned his
head.
In that moment, too, Anthony caught a sudden clear instantaneous
impression of a group of faces in the window opposite. There were a
couple of men in front, stout city personages no doubt, with crimson
faces and open mouths cursing the traitorous Papist and the crafty
vagrant fox trapped at last; but between them, looking over their
shoulders, was a woman's face in which Anthony saw the most intense
struggle of emotions. The face was quite white, the lips parted, the eyes
straining, and sorrow and compassion were in every line, as she watched
the cheerful priest among his warders; and yet there rested on it, too, a
strange light as of triumph. It was the face of one who sees victory even
at the hour of supremest failure. In an instant more the face had
withdrawn itself into the darkness of the room.
When the crowds had surged down the street in the direction of the Tower,
yelling in derision as Campion saluted the lately defaced Cheapside
Cross, Anthony guided his horse out through the dispersing groups,
realising as he did so, with a touch of astonishment at the coincidence,
that he had been standing almost immediately under the window whence he
and Isabel had leaned out so many years before.
* * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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