With
an ugly look, under which my men shrank as if her eye had power
to scorch them, the hag said that she would confess, and, with
impotent rage, admitted the truth of Boisrueil's surmises. The
rearward gate had been barricaded that afternoon by the Great
Band, who had had notice of our coming, and intended to attack us
at midnight. I asked her how many they mustered.
"A hundred," she answered sullenly.
"Very well," I said. "And, supposing that we do not wait for
them, how shall we escape? By the road to Gueret?"
"Fifty lie in ambush on it."
"By the road by which we came?"
"The other fifty lie there."
"Across the river?"
"There is no ford."
"Then in the village? If we seize some other building?"
"The village is watched, and this house," she answered, with a
sparkle of joy in her eye.
At that the position began to assume so serious an aspect that I
turned to Parabere to take his advice. We numbered twenty in
all, and were well armed; but five to one are large odds, and we
had little ammunition, while, for all we knew, the house might be
fired with ease from the outside.
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