cudgel behind his back, looking
sharply this way and that, so as not to be taken unawares by a flank
movement of his enemies. Midway in the court he stopped and hesitated
for a moment; then he turned as though to enter the armory. The next
moment he saw the bachelors come pouring out from the archway.

Instantly he turned and rushed back towards where his friends lay
hidden, shouting: "To the rescue! To the rescue!"

"Stone him!" roared Blunt. "The villain escapes!"

He stopped and picked up a cobble-stone as he spoke, flinging it after
his escaping prey. It narrowly missed Myles's head; had it struck him,
there might have been no more of this story to tell.

"To the rescue! To the rescue!" shouted Myles's friends in answer, and
the next moment he was surrounded by them. Then he turned, and swinging
his cudgel, rushed back upon his foes.

The bachelors stopped short at the unexpected sight of the lads with
their cudgels. For a moment they rallied and drew their knives; then
they turned and fled towards their former place of hiding.

One of them turned for a moment, and flung his knife at Myles with a
deadly aim; but Myles, quick as a cat, ducked his body, and the weapon
flew clattering across the stony court. Then he who had flung it turned
again to fly, but in his attempt he had delayed one instant too long.
Myles reached him with a long-arm stroke of his cudgel just as he
entered the passage-way, knocking him over like a bottle, stunned and
senseless.

The next moment the picket-gate was banged in their faces and the bolt
shot in the staples, and the Knights of the Rose were left shouting and
battering with their cudgels against the palings.

By this time the uproar of fight had aroused those in the rooms and
offices fronting upon the Armory Court; heads were thrust from many of
the windows with the eager interest that a fight always evokes.

"Beware!" shouted Myles. "Here they come again!" He bore back towards
the entrance of the alley-way as he spoke, those behind him scattering
to right and left, for the bachelors had rallied, and were coming again
to the attack, shouting.

They were not a moment too soon in this retreat, either, for the next
instant the pickets flew open, and a volley of stones flew after the
retreating Knights of the Rose. One smote Wilkes upon the head,
knocking him down headlong. Another struck Myles upon his left shoulder,
benumbing his arm from the finger-tips to the armpit, so tha