A short distance down the street a chain was stretched across it, and here a musketeer was pacing up and down on guard.

Two others could be seen at the farther end of the street, where there was a gateway in the wall, now closed up with sandbags piled thickly against it.
"We will see if the other streets are similarly guarded." This was found to be so, sentries being placed in every street running down to the wall in this quarter.
"So far so good, Paolo.

I do not think that matters could have been better for us.

The next thing is to buy a tool with which we can wrench open a door or the shutter of a window; but a door will be best, because we could not work at a shutter without running the risk of being seen by a sentinel, while in a doorway we should be screened from observation.
These houses in the Strada Vecchia are old, and the doors ought not to give us much trouble." "Some of these old locks are very strong, master.

I should think that it would be easier to cut out one of the panels than to force the door open." "Possibly it would, but it is not an easy thing to get the saw to work.
We should have to bore a hole large enough for the saw to go through before we could use it.