hen, shedding to either side a surge of men, as the bow of a swift ship
casts a twin wave to right and left, a man with only scraps of rags
clinging to him rushed up the aisle of the nave. His hair was red-wet
and matted about his brow. There was a gash on one shoulder. His right
arm hung useless by his side. He was barefooted, but still in his left
hand he held a long knife, of which the steel was dimmed with blood.

"El Sarria! El Sarria!" cried the voices behind him. "There are a
hundred duros on his head! Take him! Take him!"

And in a moment more the whole church was filled with the clangour of
armed men. Bright uniforms filled the doorways. Sword bayonets glinted
from behind pillars, as eager pursuers rushed this way and that after
their prey, overturning the chairs and frightening the kneeling women.

Straight along the aisle, turning neither to right nor left, rushed the
hunted man. On the steps which lead up to the gilded railing he threw
down his knife, which with a clang rebounded on the marble floor of the
church.

A priest came forward as if to bar the little wicket door. But with a
bound El Sarria was within, and in another he had cast himself down on
the uppermost steps of the high altar itself and laid his hands upon the
cloth which bore _Su Majestad_, the high mystery of the Incarnation of
God.

At this uprose the Abbot, and stepping from his throne with a calm
dignity he reached the little golden gate through which the hunted man
had come one moment before the pursuers. These were the regular
Government troops, commanded by a Cristino officer, who with a naked
sword in his hand pointed them on.

Blind with anger and the loss of many comrades, they would have rushed
after the fugitive and slain him even on the holy place where he lay.

But the Abbot of the Order of the Virgin of Montblanch stood in the
breach. They must first pass over his body. He held aloft a cross of
gold with a gesture of stern defiance. The crozier-bearer had moved
automatically to his place behind him.

"Thus far, and no farther!" cried the Abbot; "bring not the strife of
man into the presence of the Prince of Peace. This man hath laid his
hands upon the horns of the altar, and by Our Lady and the Host of God,
he shall be safe!"

CHAPTER IX

THE SHADOW OF THE DESTROYER

The Abbot of Montblanch, Don Baltasar Varela, was supposed to be
occupied in prayer and meditation. But in common with many of his
abbatical