" Hector said as he lifted the latch.

The door, however, was fastened, and on his knocking a voice asked, "Who
is there at this time of night?"

"Travellers," Hector replied. "Come, open the door quickly or we shall
be wet to the skin!" and he emphasized his words by kicking at the door.
It was, however, a minute or two before it was opened, and Hector, who
was becoming furious at this delay, had just taken his axe from his
belt and was about to break the door in when it opened, and a man with a
torch in one hand and a sword in the other stood on the threshold.

CHAPTER XVII: A ROBBER'S DEN

"What mean you by knocking thus furiously?" the landlord of the little
inn asked angrily.

"What mean you by keeping your door shut in the face of travellers on
such a night as this?" Hector replied, even more loudly. "Are honest men
to be kept waiting in the rain while you are taking no steps to let them
in?"

"How could I tell that you are honest men?" the landlord retorted.

"Because if we had not been honest men we should long before this have
battered your door down, as indeed I was just going to do when you
opened it."

"Well, come in," the landlord said with an evil smile. "Maybe you would
have done better to have passed on."

He showed them into the taproom, where two or three rough men were
sitting.

"What did these fellows mean by knocking so loudly?" one of them asked
angrily.

"It means," Hector replied, "that travellers have a right to claim
shelter of an inn; and indeed, inn or no inn, no one would refuse
shelter to travellers on such a night as this is going to be." And his
words were emphasized by a crash of thunder overhead.

"You crow pretty loud, young fellow," the man growled.

"I speak loud because I have right on my side. I desire to quarrel with
no man; but one need indeed be a saint to keep one's temper when one is
kept standing outside a door with the rain coming down in great drops,
and threatening in another minute to come in bucketfuls. It is all the
worse when, as you see, one has a sick comrade with one."

The man spoke in a low voice to the three others seated at the table
with him. "May I ask whither you were journeying when thus caught in the
storm?" he asked in a more civil tone than he had hitherto used.

"Certainly you may. We were in haste to get on to Gunzenhausen by
morning, as a friend of ours has work ready for us there. We did not
expect this storm when we left Ei