Elizabethan, the one monument as well preserved as the other. They
passed the stately de Vere, his armour all laid out in fragments upon
a marble slab, as a proof that he died at peace with all men; and
they saw the terrible statue of the onslaught of Death, which, viewed
in the moonlight, made a midnight robber drop his booty and fly
panic-stricken out of the Abbey. So awful and yet so fascinating is
it, that the shuffling feet of the party of sightseers had passed out
of hearing before Maude and Frank could force themselves away from
it.

In the base of the statue is an iron door, which has been thrown
open, and the sculptor's art has succeeded wonderfully in convincing
you that it has been thrown open violently. The two leaves of it
seem still to quiver with the shock, and one could imagine that one
heard the harsh clang of the metal. Out of the black opening had
sprung a dreadful thing, something muffled in a winding-sheet, one
bony hand clutching the edge of the pedestal, the other upraised to
hurl a dart at the woman above him. She, a young bride of twenty-
seven, has fallen fainting, while her husband, with horror in his
face, is springing forward, his hand outstretched, to get between his
wife and her loathsome assailant.

'I shall dream of this,' said Maude. She had turned pale, as many a
woman has before this monument.

'It is awful!' Frank walked backwards, unable to take his eyes from
it. 'What pluck that sculptor had! It is an effect which must be
either ludicrous or great, and he has made it great.'

'Roubillac is his name,' said Maude, reading it from the pedestal.