Within
the walled inclosure known as the Circle of Penance, standing midway
between these two stations, were two hundred other men under Kenric
himself. Thus the abbey and its grange with some forty cottages were
entirely surrounded.
The abbey with its chapel was a small building in the Norman style,
inclosed by a high wall, and standing in a grove of birch and ash trees.
In the crypt of the chapel and within the cottages the women of Bute,
some hundreds in number, had made their retreat, and the Lady Adela of
Rothesay had a most anxious four days attending to her numerous charges.
Food there was in plenty, of a simple sort, and the wells within the
abbey buildings provided abundance of pure water.
In the underground passage connecting the crypt with the walled
inclosure of the Circle of Penance the children had been collected.
Ailsa Redmain was with them, attending to their many wants, helped by
some of the women.
All this had been Kenric's doing, and to him would be due the praise and
the thanks of the people of Bute if his plan of defence should succeed.
But Kenric was not at his ease, for he knew that should the Norsemen set
aside thoughts of the sanctity of the place and make a successful
descent upon the abbey, then surely the women and children would be
discovered and an appalling massacre might follow.
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