Stephen made no answer and they walked back in silence to his house. It may be that they were wondering whether Prince Henry and the Countess would escape. Yet it may be that they thought of something else. When they reached the house, Stephen bade the Princess go into the inner room and resume her own dress that she might return to the palace, and that it might not be known where she had been nor how she had aided her brother to evade the King's prohibition; and when she, still strangely silent, went in as he bade her, he took his great staff in his hand, and stood on the threshold of the house, his head nearly touching the lintel and his shoulders filling almost all the space between door-post and door-post. [Illustration: "STEPHEN STOOD ON THE THRESHOLD WITH HIS STAFF IN HIS HAND."--_Page 37._] When he had stood there a little while, the same Sergeant of the Guard, recollecting (now that the fire at the fruit-seller's was out) that he had never searched the house of the smith, came again with his four men, and told Stephen to stand aside and allow him to enter the house. "For I must search it," he said, "or my orders will not be performed." "Those whom you seek are not here," said Stephen. "That I must see for myself," answered the Sergeant. "Come, smith, stand aside." When the Princess heard the voices outside, she put her head round the door of the inner room, and cried in great alarm to Stephen: "They must not come in, Stephen. At any cost they must not come in!" "Do not be afraid, madame, they shall not come in," said he. "I heard a voice in the house," exclaimed the Sergeant. "It is nothing uncommon to hear in a house," said Stephen, and he grasped more firmly his great staff. "Will you make way for us?" demanded the Sergeant. "For the last time, will you make way?" Stephen's eyes kindled; for though he was a man of peace, yet his strength was great and he loved sometimes to use it; and above all, he loved to use it now at the bidding and in protection of his dear Princess. So he answered the Sergeant from between set teeth: "Over my dead body you can come in." Then the Sergeant drew his sword and his men set their halberds in rest, and the Sergeant, crying, "In the King's name!" came at Stephen with drawn sword and struck fiercely at him. But Stephen let the great staff drop on the Sergeant's shoulder, and the Sergeant's arm fell powerless by his side. Thereupon the Guards cried aloud, and people began to come out of their houses, seeing that there was a fight at Stephen's door. And Stephen's eyes gleamed, and when the Guards thrust at him, he struck at them, and two of them he stretched senseless on the ground; for his height and reach were such that he struck them before they could come near enough to touch him, and having no firearms they could not bring him down.