and the houses about us rocked. It made in an instant a
pandemonium of the quiet night.

We turned and hurried instinctively from the place, crouching and
amazed, looking upwards with bent shoulders and scared faces.
"What is it? What is it?" I cried, half in resentment; half in
terror. It deafened me.

"The bell of St. Germain l'Auxerrois!" he shouted in answer.
"The Church of the Louvre. It is as I said. We are doomed!"

"Doomed? No!" I replied fiercely, for my courage seemed to rise
again on the wave of sound and excitement as if rebounding from
the momentary shock. "Never! We wear the devil's livery, and he
will look after his own. Draw, man, and let him that stops us
look to himself. You know the way. Lead on!" I cried savagely.

He caught the infection and drew his sword. So we started
boldly, and the result justified my confidence. We looked, no
doubt, as like murderers as any who were abroad that night.
Moving in this desperate guise we hastened up that street and
into another--still pursued by the din and clangour of the bell
--and then a short distance along a third. We were not stopped
or addressed by anyone, though numbers, increasing each moment as
door after door opened, and we drew nearer to the heart of the
commotion, were hurrying in the same direction, side by side with
us; and though in front, where now and again lights gleamed on a
mass of weapons, or on white eager faces, filling some alley from
wall to wall, we heard the roar of voices rising and falling like
the murmur of an angry sea.