Flavian told Malise to open the door and look out into the gallery. He did so. A man, more zealous than the rest, sprang out of the dark and stabbed at the lad’s throat. He fell with a whimper. Flavian plunged his sword home, dragged Malise within, barred the door again. Very tenderly he lifted the boy in his arms. Malise’s hands clung about his lord’s neck; he moaned a little, and was very white. "Save yourself, messire!" Flavian bore him towards a door that stood open in the panelling. He felt the lad’s blood soaking through his doublet; entreaties were poured into his ears. "I die, I die; oh, the smart, the burn of it! Leave me, messire; let me lie still!" "Nonsense----" "It is no use; I have it deep, the man’s knife went home." Flavian felt the lad’s hands relax, saw his head droop on his shoulder. He turned and put him down on the bed, and knelt there, while Malise panted and strove to speak. "Go--messire." Flavian was trying to staunch the flow from the boy’s neck with a corner of the sheeting. His own doublet was drenched with blood. In a minute he saw the futility of such unconscious heroism; the flickering taper by the bed told that Malise’s life would ebb before its own light would be gutted. Blows were being dealt upon the door. Flavian kissed the lad, took the taper, and passed out by the panel in the wainscotting. A stairway led him to a little gate that opened on the abbot’s garden. He more than thought to find the passage disputed, but the place stretched quiet before him as he came out with sword drawn. The scent of the flowers and fragrant shrubs was heavy on the night air, and the shouts of the mob sounded over the black roofs, and rang in his ears with an inspiriting fury. There was a gate at the far end of the garden, opening through a stone wall into a narrow alley, and Flavian, as he scoured the paths, could see pike points bobbing above the wall, and a flare of torches. Men were breaking in even here, and he was caught like a rat in a corner. In an angle of the wall he found a big marrow bed, and crawling under the leaves like a worm, he smeared dirt over his face and clothes and awaited developments. In another minute the garden gate fell away, and a tatterdemalion rout poured in, strenuous and frothy as any tavern pack. They spread over the garden towards the house, shouting and blaspheming like a herd of satyrs. Flavian saw his chance, plunged from his dark corner, and joined the mob of moving figures. Dirty face and dirtier clothes were in kindred keeping. He shouted as lustily as any, and by dint of gradual and discreet circumlocutions, edged to the gate and escaped into the now-deserted alley.