his moment she thinks she hears something and says, "Hark! Peace! / It was the owl that shriek'd, the fatal bellman, / Which gives the stern'st good-night. He is about it" (2.2.2-4). A lot happens in these few words. When she says "Hark!" she's telling herself to listen, and then when she says "Peace!" she's telling herself to be quiet, so that she can hear what she's listening for. After she listens, she decides that she heard a screech owl, and she takes that as a good omen, because the screech owl is nature's own "fatal bellman." A "fatal bellman" is a night watchman who rings a bell at the door of a prisoner scheduled for execution in the morning, and an owl does the same job in nature, because--according to folklore--the screech of a screech owl foretells the death of a person. Therefore, Lady Macbeth believes that because she has just heard the owl's screech, her husband must be "about it," that is, doing it (the murder) at this very moment. Not only did Lady Macbeth drug the grooms, she made sure that they were fast asleep and that the doors to the King's bedchamber were open. Then she rang the bell to summon Macbeth. Because of all that she has done, she can practically see each step Macbeth takes. But suddenly she hears her husband say--probably in a hoarse whisper--"Who's there? what, ho!" (2.2.8). Just as Lady Macbeth thinks she heard something, so now Macbeth thinks he hears someone, and he's trying to check it out. Immediately, Lady Macbeth assumes the worst, that the grooms have awakened before the murder has been done, and that all will be lost. She also assumes the worst about her husband. She says to herself, "I laid their daggers ready; / He [Macbeth] could not miss 'em. Had he [King Duncan] not resembled / My father as he slept, I had done't" (2.2.11-13). She's thinking that maybe her husband is so stupid that he can't find the grooms' daggers, even though she put them in plain sight. And she's thinking that she shoul...
