[Footnote 7: Let no one think the clergyman in charge aided or abetted our secular efforts to escape. On the contrary, on a later occasion, when Robin, as a poor and distressed prisoner hiding from the Turks, endeavoured to find sanctuary for a few hours in the church, he was expelled therefrom, so that our enemies should not complain that the House of God was used for anything but worship.] [Footnote 8: During the afternoon I lost over seven pounds in weight.] CHAPTER IX A CITY OF DISGUISES We knocked softly at the door of the house that was to be our home, and then waited, flattened in the shadow below it, quite prepared for the worst. It was then four o'clock in the morning. It seemed too much to hope that we would be welcome. But we were. The door opened cautiously about one inch, and two little faces were seen, low down the crack. Behind them, someone held a light. Then the door was flung wide, and we saw on the stairs a whole family of friendly people, male and female, old and young, all in night dress, and all with arms outstretched in rapturous greeting. We might have been Prodigal Sons returning, instead of two strangers whose presence would be a source of continual danger. Hyppolite and Athene, the twins, aged eight, who had first peeped at us, now took us each by the hand, and led us upstairs. "The last escaped prisoner we had here was a forger," said Hyppolite to us. "He was a friend of father's," added Athene over her shoulder, "and he escaped from prison about six weeks ago. He was afraid that the police would find his tools, so he threw them all into our cistern. They are there now." We reached the top floor, and were shown by the twins into an apartment containing a double bed with a stuffy canopy of damask. "This is the family bedroom," they said. "And where are we to sleep?" I asked. "Here," said Themistocle, the proud owner of the house. "My sister and I and the twins were using the bed until your arrival, but now we will sleep in the passage." "The passage?" I echoed. "Haven't you any other beds, and were you all four using this one?" "Yes, yes. The other rooms are full of lodgers. There are three officers of the Turkish army here at present. But they won't disturb you, because they are hiding too." "Mon Dieu!" said I, sitting on the bed--"but your sister can't sleep in the passage, can she?" "Certainly, she's quite used to that sort of thing. It's safer also, in case the police come." "I know all the police," said Athene, "even when they are not in uniform; I can recognise them by their boots." "And we are always on the look-out for them," added Hyppolite. "If the police come to search the house you will have to get into the cistern." "Where the forger threw his tools," explained Athene.