As the first noise broke out his mind rearranged itself and seemed to
have two consciousnesses. In the foreground he followed, intently and
eagerly, every movement below; in the background, there still moved
before him the pageant of deeper thoughts and more remote--of prayer and
wonder and fear and expectation; and from that onwards it continued so
with him. Even while he followed the sounds, he understood why my lord
Shrewsbury had made this assault so suddenly, after months of peace....
He perceived the hand of Thomas FitzHerbert, too, in the precision with
which the attack had been made, and the certain information he must have
given that priests would be in Padley that morning.
There were noises that he could not interpret--vague tramplings from a
direction which he could not tell; voices that shouted; the sound of
metal on stone.
He did interpret rightly, however, the sudden tumult as the gate was
unbarred at last, and the shrill screaming of a woman as the company
poured through into the house; the clamour of voices from beneath as the
hall below was filled with men; the battering that began almost
immediately; and, finally, the rush of shod feet up the outside
staircases, one of which led straight into the chapel itself. Then,
indeed, his heart seemed to spring upwards into his throat, and to beat
there, as loud as knocking, so loud that it appeared to him that all the
house must hear it.
* * * * *
Yet it was still some minutes before the climax came to him.
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