Before I could close and bolt the door I heard a crash and a cry of pain, and caught a glimpse of Cludde, who, in leaping from the coach, had fallen awry and lay sprawling in the dust.  Then I shut him from sight and ran to the other door, by which Mistress Peabody had gone into the garden.  This I slammed and barred, dashing afterwards to the window to do the like with it.  Luckily it was already fastened, and I was hastily drawing the shutters over it, when Vetch, his face livid with passion, came up to it, drove his pistol through the glass, and threatened to shoot me if I did not instantly unbolt the door.

I have always had reason to thank Heaven that my brain is quickest and my resolution most cool at the moments of greatest stress.  Vetch had fired his pistol through the lock of the turnpike gate; being busy with the horse he had certainly not had time to recharge it, nor to get another; so I thought that I might safely defy him.  Whispering to Mistress Lucy to find some hiding place in the cottage out of view from the window, I stood with my hand on the shutter, and said: 

“What will you do if I yield?”

The answer was the heavy pistol, hurled straight at my head.  It struck my temple and fell with a crash to the floor.  I gave back a little, half stunned by the blow, and Vetch seized that moment to smash another pane of the window, preparing to leap on the sill and into the room, But I had sufficient strength to anticipate him.  Throwing my whole weight on the shutter I drove it into its place, taking a certain pleasure in the knowledge that I had at least bruised the fellow’s knuckles.  Then I dropped the bar into its socket, and in the half darkness called to Mistress Lucy that all was well.

Immediately there began a heavy battering on the door, but not so heavy but that through it I heard Cludde order his men to splice the broken trace.  ’Twas lucky it was so, for had all four of them come with one mind to force my frail defences, the brief siege would, I fear, have had but a sorry end.  The door was a stout one, and finding it resisted their blows, Vetch and Cludde soon desisted, and I supposed that they had withdrawn altogether.  But after a short interval, a violent crash on the back door, which was of much slighter timber, warned me that I must still be prepared to fight against heavy odds.

I looked round for Mistress Lucy:  she was standing beside an oaken clothes press, the largest article of furniture in the room.

“Help will come, I hope,” I said to her; “if not, I can keep them at bay, and I will.”

A moment after I had spoken, I heard a shout from the road.  The blows upon the door ceased; I caught the sound of scurrying feet, and running to the window, I unbarred the shutter and opened it so that I might glance out.  The coach was moving:  the postilion was in the saddle, the other man was on the box.  It passed through the gate:  the horses were lashed to a gallop, and the equipage disappeared down the road in a cloud of dust.  Flinging the shutter wide, I craned my neck out of the broken panes and looked in the other direction.  Not half a mile away three horsemen were pressing a gallop towards us.