H. C. Bailey

“ God have mercy on a mad world." She gazed at him not knowing him and ran where Becket had gone and he too followed.
The last of the winter twilight glimmered in the cloisters. The great bell was ringing vespers and the cathedral windows shone from the candles on the altars. Down the cloisters the four knights came, phantoms in arms, swords drawn, with axes in their left hands and after them clanging, glittering, yet dimly seen, a company of men-at-arms. "Where is the traitor? Where is Thomas Becket?" ”

“ So the Lord wills. This is not the place, nor this the hour, nor thus you win to grace. Come, brother, come."
Then Fitzstephen the chaplain and Grim the clerk from Cambridge tore him off and he fell down and sobbed: "Save not yourself, na, na. Save men. Be gone and save us all."
Then Fitzstephen said, "He hath a devil."
But Becket said, "Nay, brother. He has loved much, alas poor Bran"; and the hard face smiled. Now a noise sounded far off and grew and a woman came running and after her a monk, and she cried out: "My lord, my lord, the King's knights, the King's knights come in arms." ”

“ Tracey struck and Grim took the blow on his arm and fell, but Becket's brow was wounded and the blood ran down his face. "For Christ and His Church I am ready to die," he cried, and Tracey struck again and he fell down on hands and knees. Then Richard the Breton gave a blow at his head which seared the very skull and broke the sword upon the stones and he was dead. One of their company, the deed is certain but proved against none of them, set his foot upon the dead man's neck and thrust at the brain. ”