Just then the street door was forced.
Suddenly the Abbot's arms whirled like windmills, and his huge body
wrenched wildly and carried them to the doorway, twisting their wrists
and nearly throwing them off their legs.
"He'll win clear yet," cried Denys: "out steel! and in again!"
They tore out their smoking swords, but ere they could stab again,
the Abbot leaped full five feet high, and fell with a tremendous crash
against the door below, carrying it away with him like a sheet of paper,
and through the aperture the glare of torches burst on the awe-struck
faces above, half blinding them.
The thieves at the first alarm had made for the back door, but driven
thence by a strong guard ran back to the kitchen, just in time to see
the lock forced out of the socket, and half-a-dozen mailed archers burst
in upon them. On these in pure despair they drew their swords.
But ere a blow was struck on either side, the staircase door behind them
was battered into their midst with one ponderous blow, and with it the
Abbot's body came flying, hurled as they thought by no mortal hand, and
rolled on the floor spouting blood from back and bosom in two furious
jets, and quivered, but breathed no more.
The thieves smitten with dismay fell on their knees directly, and the
archers bound them, while, above, the rescued ones still stood like
statues rooted to the spot, their dripping swords extended in the red
torchlight, expecting their indomitable enemy to leap back on them as
wonderfully as he had gone.
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