A faint light flared up in one of the aisles, and then another and another. Each increased in volume of flame until several torches were blazing here and there in the body of the church. They were borne aloft over moving heads, and the two men in the chantry saw villainous faces and ragged forms. It was a score of the most desperate thieves of the Straits, who, having found the loosely closed door of the church opened wide by a furious blast of the storm, had entered like water into the broken hold of a vessel. The fierce desire for plunder had robbed them of caution, and they had become emboldened by their numbers. Possibly they had not thought that the exterior appearance of the lighted church would cause alarm, and it is questionable whether such thought would have stayed them. Then began a scene of spoliation which, in splendor of setting and fierceness of its moving figures, beggars description.
Seldom, if ever, had a house of worship blazed with like illumination. Black smoke arose from the wavering torches, but it was lost in the great space intervening between the spots where it took flight and the groined ceiling, so that nothing obscured the painted windows, the flamboyant tracery above them, and the great arch over the chancel and the altar, except the shadows thrown by intercepting columns. The brilliant colored faces of the saints upon the lancet windows appeared to look down in wonder upon the vandals, whose glances in turn directed upward to these rows of costly panes were the extreme of covetousness. It was only the insurmountable space that kept these pictured saints inviolate. But there were other treasures which held no positions of safety against unholy and unlawful onslaught, and it was toward them that the robbers now directed attention. They began stripping the gilt trappings from the altar and the pulpit, tearing down the purple tapestry before the sacristry, gathering up the chalices, books and vestments, and even wrenching the brass balusters from the winding rood stair to the choir. It may have been their intense action or the awfulness of the surroundings, that closed all lips from the moment that, with eyes feasting on the splendors of the church, they began its desecration. However that may have been, no sound of human voice accompanied the furious workings of the robbers. Still, silence did not prevail. There were blows of solid substances together, rasping of metals, tearings of cloth, and their echoes prolonged by a construction of dome, walls and galleries calculated to keep every sound alive.
Toward the closed chantry, two robbers at length turned. One thrust his torch through a circular window of the door, and the two men within sunk on the marble floor close by the tomb of the founder. The eyes of the thief should have followed the torch, but at that moment a cry attracted his attention, and he saw the tapestry hanging against the wall behind the pulpit wrapped in fierce flames.
It had been kindled by the careless handling of one of the torches, and bid fair to supplement the night’s work with total destruction. While that sight first drew attention, another sight and the sound of shrill voices immediately caused diversion. New figures had suddenly appeared at the wide entrances to the body of the church, and a new fear ran like wildfire through the scattered mob of thieves. There was no outlet except where the alarmed and hastily gathered watchmen were standing. The blazing tapestry forced the robbers forward. None of their spoils were dropped. Having grouped together for an instant, they rushed recklessly toward the entrances held by the watchmen, who could not repel the onslaught. Excepting three who stumbled and fell, the thieves poured forth into the street.
Marlowe was first upon his feet after the withdrawal of the searching torch. He saw the blazing tapestry and the mad rush of the cornered robbers. He unbolted the door, flung it open and without a glance behind him, ran down the aisle and entered the chancel. The light aided him in his rapid survey. He recognized the tomb by which he had ascended, and, lifting the slab, he crawled under into the passage made for the king. In the oratory, a few moments later, he searched his clothes nervously for the still unread message from Anne. It was not to be found, and the meeting of the night had resulted in nought but perplexity and misfortune.
It was not until Marlowe had mysteriously disappeared, that Bame gathered himself for action. He thought of no chance for escape except through the way he had entered. He attempted it, and, having traversed with expedition the aisles and narthex of the church now brilliantly lighted by the flames of the burning tapestry and its supports, he ran into the arms of the watchman in the portico to which the latter had withdrawn. His protestations were of no avail. In vain he pleaded that he had just come up from the sidewalk. Three officers had seen him issue from the church entrance. As one of the thieves he was taken into custody.
GUILTY ON GENERAL PRINCIPLES.
These looks of thine can harbor nought but death!
I see my tragedy written in thy brow.
Yet stay, awhile forbear thy bloody hand.
—Edward II, v, 5.
No doubt the murderous knife was dull and blunt,
Till it was whetted on thy stone-hard heart,
To revel in the entrails of my lambs.
—King Richard III, iv, 4.