The lovely sweetness of the late expression had gone from Katherine's
face, and its aspect showed that her high and ancestral spirit had
yielded but to one passion. She pursued,--

"While this strife lasts, it becomes my widowhood and kindred position
with the earl to retire to the convent my mother founded. To-morrow I
depart."

"Alas!" said Hastings, "thou speakest of the strife as if but a single
field. But Warwick returns not to these shores, nor bows himself to
league with Lancaster, for a chance hazardous and desperate, as Edward
too rashly deems it. It is in vain to deny that the earl is prepared
for a grave and lengthened war, and much I doubt whether Edward can
resist his power; for the idolatry of the very land will swell the
ranks of so dread a rebel. What if he succeed; what if we be driven
into exile, as Henry's friends before us; what if the king-maker be
the king-dethroner? Then, Katherine, then once more thou wilt be at
the best of thy hostile kindred, and once more, dowered as thou art,
and thy womanhood still in its richest bloom, thy hand will be lost to
Hastings."

"Nay, if that be all thy fear, take with thee this pledge,--that
Warwick's treason to the House for which my father fell dissolves his
power over one driven to disown him as a brother,--knowing Earl
Salisbury, had he foreseen such disgrace, had disowned him as a son.
And if there be defeat and flight and exile, wherever thou wanderest,
Hastings, shall Katherine be found beside thee. Fare thee well, and
Our Lady shield thee! may thy lance be victorious against all foes,--
save one. Thou wilt forbear my--that is, the earl!" And Katherine,