How quickly the days flew past! Beryl had a letter from Sir John
Maxton one Saturday:
"I have seen our friend for the third time since the sentence; you
know that on Tuesday he 'goes the way'--those are his own words.
What can I tell you of him. Beryl, that you do not know? He has
become one of my dearest friends. How strange that seems, written!
Yet it is true and when he asked me if I would come and see him on
the morning, I agreed. In France it is the custom of the defending
advocate to be present--I am glad it is not necessary in England.
Yet I shall go and I pray that I may be as fearless as he.
"He spoke of you yesterday and of 'Christina'--that is Miss
Colebrook, isn't it? But so cheerfully!
"The officers of the prison are fond of him and even the chief
warder, a hard-bitten Guardsman, who was the principal flogger at
Pentonville for many years, speaks of him affectionately. Completely
untroubled--that is how I should describe Ambrose. He has been
allowed the privilege of a reader, one of the warders, an educated
man who acts as librarian to the prison. He has chosen Gibbon's
'Roman Empire' and on my suggestion, he is concentrating on the
chapters dealing with the creation of the Byzantine Empire. The
story of Belesarius fascinates him; Belesarius is a character after
his own heart, as I knew would be the case. The chaplain sees him
frequently and Ambrose is politely attentive. It is rather like a
village schoolmaster instructing Newton in astronomy. Ambrose is so
far advanced that the good man's efforts to bring him to an
understanding are just a little pathetic. 'I can't understand Mr.
Pinley's God,' he said to me when I called immediately after the
clergyman's visit. 'He is a slave's conception of a
super-master--the superstition of a fighting tribe.' Ambrose holds
to his own faith, which is comprehended in Henley's poem 'Out of the
dark which covers me.' He recites this continuously.
"I said that he spoke of you and Christina. I asked him if he would
like to see you both, knowing that if he did you would face the
ordeal. But he said that it was unnecessary."
On the Monday evening Christina came to the house. They did not
sleep that night.
"I suppose we're neurotic, but I never felt saner," said Beryl, "or
more peacefully minded. And yet if it were somebody I did not know,
some servant with whom I was just on nodding terms, I should be a
bundle of nerves. And it is Ambrose! Christina, are we just keyed
up, over-strained--shall we collapse? I have wondered."
"I shall not break," said Christina, "I have been worrying about
you--"
Yet it was Christina on whom the chimes of the little French clock on
the mantelpiece fell like the knell of doom.
"--six--seven--eight--nine!" counted Beryl, tense, exalted.
It was over. Ambrose Sault had gone the way.
"Goodbye, Ambrose!"
Christina's voice was a wail. Before Beryl could reach her, she had
slipped to the floor in a dead faint.