That evening he came to a small straggling town where was one inn. It had no sign; but being now better versed in the customs of the country he detected it at once by the coats of arms on its walls. These belonged to the distinguished visitors who had slept in it at different epochs since its foundation, and left these customary tokens of their patronage. At present it looked more like a mausoleum than a hotel. Nothing moved nor sounded either in it, or about it. Gerard hammered on the great oak door: no answer. He hallooed: no reply. After a while he hallooed louder, and at last a little round window or rather hole in the wall, opened, a man's head protruded cautiously, like a tortoise's from its shell, and eyed Gerard stolidly, but never uttered a syllable. "Is this an inn?" asked Gerard with a covert sneer. The head seemed to fall into a brown study; eventually it nodded, but lazily. "Can I have entertainment here?" Again the head pondered and ended by nodding, but sullenly, and seemed a skull overburdened with catch-penny interrogatories. "How am I to get within, an't please you?" At this the head popped in, as if the last question had shot it; and a hand popped out, pointed round the corner of the building, and slammed the window. Gerard followed the indication, and after some research discovered that the fortification had one vulnerable part, a small, low door on its flank. As for the main entrance, that was used to keep out thieves and customers, except once or twice in a year, when they entered together, _i. e._ when some duke or count arrived in pomp with his train of gaudy ruffians. Gerard, having penetrated the outer fort, soon found his way to the stove (as the public room was called from the principal article in it), and sat down near the oven, in which were only a few live embers that diffused a mild and grateful heat. After waiting patiently a long time, he asked a grim old fellow with a long white beard, who stalked solemnly in, and turned the hour-glass and then was stalking out--when supper would be. The grisly Ganymede counted the guests on his fingers--"When I see thrice as many here as now." Gerard groaned. The grisly tyrant resented the rebellious sound. "Inns are not built for one," said he; "if you can't wait for the rest, look out for another lodging." Gerard sighed. At this the greybeard frowned.