Read "Bladys of the Stewponey" by Sabine Baring-Gould online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
A mob in ebullition, traversed by currents in various directions--such was the scene presented by the open space before the west front of the Abbey Church.
One stream set towards the stake, where hung the strangled woman in the midst of rising smoke and lambent flames. Another drove in pursuit of the flying executioner and his assistants. A third made for the bridge, to escape into the town from a tumult in which blood might, and probably would, be shed, and which would entail an unpleasant after-reckoning.