"Are you going to wait for them?" demanded Stephen, with several notes of astonishment in his voice. "I am going to wait for the Lord." "You'll be a fool if you do!" The tone was compassionate, though the words were rough. "Never. `They shall not be ashamed that wait for Him.'" "Do you expect Him to come down from Heaven to save you from the Bishops?" "As He pleases," said Gerhardt quietly. "But, man!--if you are a man, and not a stone--don't you know that the Church has authority from God to bind and loose--that her sentence is His also?" "Your Church has no jurisdiction over mine." "My Church, forsooth! I am speaking of the Catholic Church, which has authority over every Christian on earth." "Where is it?" "Every where." "The Church that is every where consists of faithful souls, elect of God. That Church will not condemn me for being faithful to the Word of God." "Oh, I can't split straws like you, nor preach like a doctor of the schools either. But one thing I can do, and that is to say, Gerard, you are in danger--much more danger than the rest. Get away while you can, and leave them to meet it. They won't do half so much to them as to you." "`He that is an hireling, when he seeth the wolf coming, leaveth the sheep and fleeth; and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep.' Is that conduct you recommend, Stephen?" "I recommend you to get outside of Oxford as fast as you can, and take your womankind with you; and if you don't, you'll be sorry, that's all. Now be off, and don't forget that you've been warned. Good night!" "I have been warned thrice, friend. But where God has need of me, there is my post, and there am I. There are penalties for desertion in the army of the Lord. I thank you for your kindly meaning. Good night!" "Poor fool!" said Stephen to himself as he fastened the postern behind Gerhardt. "Yet--`penalties for desertion'--I don't know. Which is the fool, I wonder? If I could have saved _her_!" Gerhardt went back to the Walnut Tree, where they were sitting down to the last meal. It consisted of "fat fish," apple turnovers, and spiced ale. "Eh dear!" said Isel, with a sigh. "To think that this is pretty nigh the last supper you'll ever eat in this house, Derette! I could cry with the best when I think of it." "You can come to see me whenever you wish, Mother--much better than if I were at Godstowe." "So I can, child; but you can't come to me." "I can send Leuesa to say that I want to see you." "Well, and if so be that I've broken my leg that very morning, and am lying groaning up atop of that ladder, with never a daughter to serve me--how then? Thou gone, and Flemild gone, and not a creature near!" "You'll have Ermine. But you are not going to break your leg, Mother, I hope." "You hope! Oh ay, hope's a fine trimming, but it's poor stuff for a gown. And how long shall I have Ermine? She'll go and wed somebody or other--you see if she doesn't."