Lord Dudley hurried down the aisle again, for there was something in the wild terror of her look that made him forgetful of everything but her. As his foot was lifted upon the first step of the altar, the tumult increased around the church till its foundation seemed tottering beneath the levers of a thousand fiends, all fierce and clamorous for a fragment of the sacred pile. There was a sound of heavy weapons battering against the entrance. Shout rang upon shout—a terrible crash—the great arched window was broken in. A fragment of the stone casement fell upon the baptismal font, forcing it in twain and dashing the consecrated water about till the censers and velvet footcloths were deluged with it. A storm of painted glass filled the church—whirled and flashed in the burst of sunshine, thus rudely let in, and fell upon the white altar-stone, and the scarcely less white beings that stood upon it, like a shower of gems shattered and ground to powder in their fall. Then the door gave way, and those who had kept guard rushed in with uplifted hands, and faces filled with terrible indignation, beseeching Lord Dudley to arouse himself and come to their aid against the tyrant who even then was planting his foot upon the ashes of their dead.
It was no time for deliberation or delay; the foundation of the church shook beneath their feet, a body of armed men hot with anger and chafed by opposition thundered at the scarcely bolted entrance. Perhaps the brave blood which burned in Dudley’s veins, urged him on to the step which now seemed unavoidable. Still he would have died, like a lion in his lair, rather than become in any way the leader of a mob, but he could not see that bright and gentle being, so good and so beloved, perish by the violence of her own father. He snatched her from the altar where she stood, and bearing her to a corner of the church most distant from the entrance, forced her clinging arms from his neck, pressed his lips hurriedly to her forehead, and rushed toward the door, followed by the men who had hitherto guarded it. The effort proved a useless one. The doors were blocked up by a phalanx of parishioners, and he could not make himself known or force a passage out. The brave band was almost crushed between the walls of the church and the Lord Protector, who, with his horsemen, had driven them back, step by step, till they were wedged together, resolute but almost helpless from want of room.
“To the window—stand beneath that I may mount by your shoulders,” exclaimed Dudley to the men who surrounded him.
Instantly the group gathered in a compact knot beneath the shattered window. Lord Dudley sprang upon the sort of platform made by their shoulders, and thence, with a vigorous leap to the stone sill where he stood, exposed and unarmed before the people—his cloak swaying loosely back from his shoulder—his cap off and his fine hair falling in damp heavy curls over his pale forehead.
A joyful shout and a fierce cry burst from the multitude and mingled together as he appeared before them. A world of flashing eyes and working faces was uplifted to the window, and for a moment the strife raging about the church was relaxed, for men were astonished by his appearance there, almost in open rebellion, face to face with the Lord Protector.
“Bring that man to the earth dead,” shouted Somerset, pointing toward the young nobleman, “and then set fire to the building, to-morrow shall not see a single stone in its place.”
A shower of deadly missiles flew around the young noble, but he sprang unhurt into the midst of the throng, which made way for him to pass till he stood front to front with the man who had just commanded his death. Somerset turned deadly pale, and, clenching his teeth with intense rage, lifted his sword with both hands, as if to cleave the youth through the head.
“My Lord Duke,” said Dudley, in a manner so calm that it arrested the proud nobleman’s hand, though his weapon was still kept uplifted, “I do beseech your grace draw the soldiers away; the parishioners are furious, and I am convinced will defend the church till you trample an entrance over their dead bodies.”
Dudley spoke respectfully and as a son to his parent, but with much agitation, for everything that he held dear seemed involved in the safety of the church. He knew that estrangement existed between the duke and his own noble father, but up to that moment had no idea that his personal favor with Somerset was in the least impaired. He had not believed that the command levelled against his life was indeed intended for him, and was therefore both astonished and perplexed when the duke bent his face bloodless and distorted with rage close down to his and exclaimed,
“Dastard and traitor! where is my child?”