“Of course I’m anxious to know,” he asserted, “but I was so glad to have you come back again that for the moment I neglected to ask you.”
Quivven the Golden Flame pouted.
“Now you’re teasing me again,” she said, “and I won’t stand for it.”
“But I really want to know,” he continued with mock eagerness. “Please do tell me about your sister.”
“I gave her the note—”
Just then there came a loud pounding on the gate outside; so loud, in fact, that the sound penetrated within the house. Quivven stopped talking. She and Myles listened intently. The pounding continued.
“Evidently we are to have company this evening,” he remarked, glad to change the subject.
Quivven replied, “Such a racket at this time of night can mean naught but ill. Let us approach the gate with care, and question the intruders.”
So saying, she took down one of the hanging stone lamps and opened the outside door. It was a typical dark, silent, fragrant Porovian evening, except for the fact that the darkness was broken by the glare of the torches beyond the wall, and that the silence was broken by the pounding on the gate, and that the fragrance was marred by the smoke of Quivven’s lamp.
“Who is there?” Quivven called.