h an ejaculation, and his sword rang
loudly on the stones. Two or three voices demanded who went there--some
in French, some in English; but Denis made no reply, and ran the faster
down the lane. Once upon the terrace, he paused to look back. They still
kept calling after him, and just then began to double the pace in
pursuit, with a considerable clank of armour, and great tossing of the
torchlight to and fro in the narrow jaws of the passage.

Denis cast a look around and darted into the porch. There he might
escape observation, or--if that were too much to expect--was in a
capital posture whether for parley or defence. So thinking, he drew his
sword and tried to set his back against the door. To his surprise, it
yielded behind his weight; and though he turned in a moment, continued
to swing back on oiled and noiseless hinges, until it stood wide open on
a black interior. When things fall out opportunely for the person
concerned, he is not apt to be critical about the how or why, his own
immediate personal convenience seeming a sufficient reason for the
strangest oddities and revolutions in our sublunary things; and so
Denis, without a moment's hesitation, stepped within and partly closed
the door behind him to conceal his place of refuge. Nothing was further
from his thoughts than to close it altogether; but for some inexplicable
reason--perhaps by a spring or a weight--the ponderous mass of oak
whipped itself out of his fingers and clanked to, with a formidable
rumble and noise like the falling of an automatic bar.

The round, at that very moment, debouched upon the terrace, and
proceeded to summon him with shouts and curses. He heard them ferreting
in the dark corners; the stock of a lance even rattled along the outer
surface of the door behind which he stood; but these gentlemen were in
too high a humour to be long delayed, and soon made off down a
corkscrew pathway which had escaped Denis's observation, and passed out
of sight and hearing along the battlements of the town.

Denis breathed again. He gave them a few minutes' grace for fear of
accidents, and then groped about for some means of opening the door and
slipping forth again. The inner surface was quite smooth, not a handle,
not a moulding, not a projection of any sort. He got his finger-nails
round the edges and pulled, but the mass was immovable. He shook it; it
was as firm as a rock. Denis de Beaulieu frowned and gave vent to a
little noiseless whistle