eat.

Cicely looked at him, they all looked at him--this gaunt, fierce man
who, after many other sorrows and strivings, had spent three days in a
black dungeon with the rats, fed upon water and a few fingers of black
bread. Yes; with the crawling rats and another man so dear to one of
them, who still sat in that horrid hole, waiting to be hung like a felon
at the dawn. The silence, with only Jeffrey's munching to break it, grew
painful, so that all were glad when the door opened and the messenger
whom they had sent to the Abbey appeared. He was breathless, having run
fast, and somewhat disturbed, perhaps because two arrows were sticking
in his back, or rather in his jerkin, for the mail beneath had stopped
them.

"Speak," said old Jacob Smith; "what is your answer?"

"Look behind me, master, and you will find it," replied the man. "They
set a ladder across the moat and a board on that, over which a priest
tripped to take my writing. I waited a while, till presently I heard a
voice hail me from the gateway tower, and, looking up, saw Abbot Maldon
standing there, with a face like that of a black devil.

"'Hark you, knave,' he said to me, 'get you gone to the witch,
Cicely Foterell, and to the recreant monk, Bolle, whom I curse and
excommunicate from the fellowship of Holy Church, and tell them to watch
for the first light of dawn, for by it, somewhat high up, they'll see
Christopher Harflete hanging black against the morning sky!'

"On hearing this I lost my caution, and hallooed back--

"'If so, ere to-morrow's nightfall you shall keep him company, every
one of you, black against the evening sky, except those who go to be
quartered at Tower Hill and Tyburn.' Then I ran and they shot at me,
hitting once or twice, but, though old, the mail was good, and here am
I, unhurt except for bruises."

A while later Cicely, Jacob Smith, Thomas Bolle, Jeffrey Stokes, and
Emlyn Stower sat together taking counsel--very earnest counsel, for the
case was desperate. Plan after plan was brought forward and set aside
for this reason or for that, till at length they stared at each other
emptily.

"Emlyn," exclaimed Cicely at last, "in past days you were wont to be
full of comfortable words; have you never a one in this extreme?" for
all the while Emlyn had sat silent.

"Thomas," said Emlyn, looking up, "do you remember when we were children
where we used to catch the big carp in the Abbey moat?"

"Aye, woman," he answered; "b