hands, to let in the trembling wretches
who had been shut out among the wolves. They rushed past him, and
scattered in the hiding-places of the vast sanctuary, in the crypt, in
the galleries, or behind the tombs. All, or almost all, even of his
closest friends,--William of Canterbury, Benedict, John of Salisbury
himself,--forsook him to shift for themselves, admitting frankly that
they were unworthy of martyrdom. The archbishop was left alone with
his chaplain Fitzstephen, Robert of Merton his old master, and Edward
Grim, the stranger from Cambridge,--or perhaps with Grim only, who
says that he was the only one who stayed, and was the only one
certainly who showed any sign of courage. A cry had been raised in the
choir that armed men were breaking into the cathedral. The vespers
ceased; the few monks assembled left their seats and rushed to the
edge of the transept, looking wildly into the darkness.

The archbishop was on the fourth step beyond the central pillar
ascending into the choir, when the knights came in. The outline of his
figure may have been just visible to them, if light fell upon it from
candles in the Lady chapel. Fitzurse passed to the right of the
pillar, De Morville, Tracy, and Le Breton to the left. Robert de Broc,
and Hugh Mauclerc, another apostate priest, remained at the door by
which they entered. A voice cried, "Where is the traitor? Where is
Thomas Becket?" There was silence; such a name could not be
acknowledged. "Where is the archbishop?" Fitzurse shouted. "I am
here," the archbishop replied, descending the steps, and meeting the
knights full in the face. "What do you want with me? I am not afraid
of your swords. I will not do what is unjust." The knights closed
round him. "Absolve the persons whom you have excommunicated,"
they said, "and take off the suspensions." "They have made no
satisfaction," he answered; "I will not." "Then you shall die as
you have deserved," they said.

They had not meant to kill him--certainly not at that time and in that
place. One of them touched him on the shoulder with the flat of his
sword, and hissed in his ears, "Fly, or you are a dead man." There was
still time; with a few steps he would have been lost in the gloom of
the cathedral, and could have concealed him in any one of a hundred
hiding-places. But he was careless of life, and he felt that his time
was come. "I am ready to die," he said. "May the Church through my
blood obtain peace and liberty! I cha