Torfrida stormed down to the monks, in honest indignation, to demand that they should send to William, and purge her of the calumny. She found the Chapter-door barred and bolted. They were all gabbling inside, like starlings on a foggy morning, and would not let her in. She hurried back to Ranald, fearing treason, and foreseeing the effect of the message upon the monks. But what could Ranald do? To find out their counsels was impossible for him, or any man in Ely. For the monks could talk Latin, and the men could not. Torfrida alone knew the sacred tongue. If Torfrida could but listen at the keyhole. Well,--all was fair in war. And to the Chapter-house door she went, guarded by Ranald and some of his housecarles, and listened, with a beating heart. She heard words now incomprehensible. That men who most of them lived no better than their own serfs; who could have no amount of wealth, not even the hope of leaving that wealth to their children,--should cling to wealth,--struggle, forge, lie, do anything for wealth, to be used almost entirely not for themselves, but for the honor and glory of the convent,--indicates an intensity of corporate feeling, unknown in the outer world then, or now. The monastery would be ruined! Without this manor, without that wood, without that stone quarry, that fishery,--what would become of them? But mingled with those words were other words, unfortunately more intelligible to this day,--those of superstition. What would St. Etheldreda say? How dare they provoke her wrath? Would she submit to lose her lands? She might do,--what might she not do? Her bones would refuse ever to work a miracle again. They had been but too slack in miracle-working for many years. She might strike the isle with barrenness, the minster with lightning. She might send a flood up the fens. She might-- William the Norman, to do them justice, those valiant monks feared not; for he was man, and could but kill the body. But St. Etheldreda, a virgin goddess, with all the host of heaven to back her,--might she not, by intercession with powers still higher than her own, destroy both body and soul in hell? “We are betrayed. They are going to send for the Abbot from Angerhale,” said Torfrida at last, reeling from the door, “All is lost.” “Shall we burst open the door and kill them all?” asked Ranald, simply. “No, King,--no. They are God’s men; and we have blood enough on our souls.” “We can keep the gates, lest any go out to the King.” “Impossible. They know the isle better than we, and have a thousand arts.” So all they could do was to wait in fear and trembling for Hereward’s return, and send Martin Lightfoot off to warn him, wherever he might be. The monks remained perfectly quiet. The organ droned, the chants wailed, as usual; nothing interrupted the stated order of the services; and in the hall, each day, they met the knights as cheerfully as ever. Greed and superstition had made cowards of them,--and now traitors.