o craven," the man answered hoarsely, his face flushing under the
whip of Francesco's scorn. "Out in the open I will take my chances, and
fight in any cause that pays me. But this is not my trade--this waiting
for the death of a trapped rat."

Francesco met his eyes steadily for a moment, then glanced at the other
men, to the number of a half-score or so--all, in fact, whom the duties
he had apportioned them did not hold elsewhere. They hung in the rear
of Cappoccio, all ears for what was being said, and their countenances
plainly showing how their feelings were in sympathy with their
spokesman.

"And you a soldier, Cappoccio?" sneered Francesco. "Shall I tell you
in what Fortemani was wrong when he enlisted you? He was wrong in not
hiring you for scullion duty in the castle kitchen."

"Sir Knight!"

"Bah! Do you raise your voice to me? Do you think I am of your kind,
animal, to be affrighted by sounds--however hideous?"

"I am not affrighted by sounds."

"Are you not? Why, then, all this ado about a bunch of empty threats
cast at us by the Duke of Babbiano? If you were indeed the soldier you
would have us think you, would you come here and say, 'I will not die
this way, or that'? Confess yourself a boaster when you tell us that you
are ready to die in the open."

"Nay! That am I not."

"Then, if you are ready to die out there, why not in here? Shall
it signify aught to him that dies where he gets his dying done? But
reassure yourself, you woman," he added, with a laugh, and in a
voice loud enough to be heard by the others, "you are not going to
die--neither here, nor there."

"When Roccaleone capitulates----"

"It will not capitulate," thundered Francesco.

"Well, then--when it is taken."

"Nor will it be taken," the Provost insisted, with an assurance that
carried conviction. "If Gian Maria had time unlimited at his command,
he might starve us into submission. But he has not. An enemy is menacing
his own frontiers, and in a few days--a week, at most--he will be forced
to get him hence to defend his crown."

"The greater reason for him to use stern measures and bombard us as he
threatens," answered Cappoccio shrewdly but rather in the tone of a man
who expects to have his argument disproved. And Francesco, if he could
not disprove it, could at least contradict it.

"Believe it not," he cried, with a scornful laugh. "I tell you that Gian
Maria will never dare so much. And if he did, are these walls tha