e any chance of safety for these two
monks. Yet I had no thought of aught but dying with them, if need
were, though as for myself I had but to walk across the courtyard
and go away. The Danes would but think I lingered yet for the sake
of plunder.

"If we may not stand this smoke, neither can the Danes," I said. "I
am going to see."

So I set down my axe and sword and leapt sailor-wise at the
rope--which the men had dropped again when they had taken the helm
from the bucket--catching it easily and swarming up to the
trapdoor. I only raised myself to the height of my eyes and looked
out.

I could see nothing. The dense smoke eddied and circled round the
court, and the Danes were gone, leaving us in a ring of fire on
three sides. The wooden buildings were blazing higher every moment,
and the heat seemed to scorch my head and hands till I could
scarcely bear it. But as the wind drove aside the smoke I could see
that the way to the rear gate, the last we had barred, was clear.
So I slid down and hung opposite the chamber. The monks looked out
at me with white faces.

"It may be done," I said. "Come quickly! it is the only chance."

The prior gave me the rope-ladder end without a word, not needing
to be asked for it; nor did I wait to say more, for at that moment
a roof fell in with a great crash, and a red glare filled the well
as the flames shot up, and the sparks and bits of burning timber
came down the shaft and hissed into the water below me.

I clomb up, fixed the ladder, and called down to the prior to bring
my arms with him. There was a burning beam not three feet from the
well mouth, part of the fallen roof that had slipped sideways from
it. The flames that shot up from the building were so hot that I
could barely abide them, and I shaded my face with both my hands,
crying again to the monks to come quickly.

In a few seconds came the sacristan, white and trembling--I had to
help him out of the well mouth. The prior was close to him; he was
calm, and even smiled at me as he saw me clutch my arms eagerly.

"To the rear gate," I said, turning and kicking the ladder into the
well, and thinking how cool the splash was compared with this
furnace of heat. "Kilt up your frocks and go swiftly, but run not,"
for in that smoke, save their long garments betrayed them, a man
might be armed or unarmed for all that one could see.

So, walking quickly, we came to the court entrance, and even as we
stood under its arch