Sophie, with the colour gone from her face, went boldly back to the
door, where the hammering on the panels continued and would have
split anything of a less tough fibre than the English oak of which
they were constructed.

"Who is there? What do you want?" she gave out in a shrill falsetto;
but no one heard her till the questions were repeated about an
octave and a half higher.

"Hold hard, Stango; there's a woman calling to us. Stop your row,
will you?"

A sudden cessation of the battering ensued, and some one was heard
going rapidly backward over cobblestones amid the laughter of the
rest, who had dismounted and were standing outside in the cold,
with their hands upon their horses' bridles.

"Who is there?" asked Sophie Tarne again.

"Travellers in need of assistance, and who--" began a polite and
even musical voice, which was interrupted by a hoarse voice:

"Open in the king's name, will you?"

"Open in the fiend's name, won't you?" called out a third and hoarser
voice; "or we'll fire through the windows and burn the place down.'

"What do you want?"