With the first hint of light the sentinel challenged; voices answered outside the gate. It was old Grangioia and his sons, calling up that they had come to visit their daughter. "Well arrived," Lapo grunted, his brain and body sluggish from the chill. He ordered the gate swung open. Too late, as they rode into the courtyard, he saw that there were nearly a score of them, all with their helmets on. Then in the fog he heard a noise like an avalanche of ice--the clatter of countless steel-clad men scrambling up the hillside. While running along the wall, Lapo Cercamorte noted that the horsemen were hanging back, content to hold the gate till reinforced. On each side of the courtyard his soldiers were tumbling out of their barracks and fleeing toward the keep, that inner stronghold which was now their only haven. Dropping at last from the ramparts, he joined this retreat. But on gaining the keep he found with him only some thirty of his men; the rest had been caught in their beds. Old Baldo gave him a coat of mail. Young Foresto brought him his sword and shield. Climbing the keep-wall, Cercamorte squinted down into the murky courtyard. That whole place now swarmed with his foes. Arrows began to fly. A round object sailed through the air and landed in the keep; it was the head of the Arabian. "Who are these people?" asked Baldo, while rapidly shooting at them with a bow. "There seem to be many knights; half the shields carry devices. Ai! they have fired the barracks. Now we shall make them out." The flames leaped up in great sheets, producing the effect of an infernal noon. The masses in the courtyard, inhuman-looking in their ponderous, barrel-shaped helmets, surged forward at the keep with a thunderous outcry: "Grangioia! Grangioia! Havoc on Cercamorte!" "Muti! Muti! Havoc on Cercamorte!" "God and the Monfalcone!" "Strike for Zaladino! Havoc on Cercamorte!" Lapo bared his teeth at them. "By the Five Wounds! half of Lombardy seems to be here. Well, my Baldo, before they make an end of us shall we show them some little tricks?" "You have said it, Cercamorte. One more good scuffle, with a parade of all our talent." The assailants tried beams against the keep gate; the defenders shot them down or hurled rocks upon their heads. But on the wall of the keep Cercamorte's half-clad men fell sprawling, abristle with feathered shafts. A beam reached the gate and shook it on its hinges. Lapo, one ear shot away, drew his surviving soldiers back into the hall. He ordered torches stuck into all the wall-rings, and ranged his men on the dais. Behind them, in the doorway leading to the upper chambers and the high tower, he saw his wife, wild-looking, and whiter than her robe. "Go back, Madonna. It is only your family calling with some of their friends. I entered Grangioia Castle abruptly; now it is tit for tat." The crone brought two helmets, which Lapo and Baldo put on. Then, drawing their long swords, they awaited the onset.