Tropile faltered. He hadn't even _seen_ the damned woman, but there she
was, rising up from behind the counter, screaming her head off: "Wolf!
Wolf!"
He said sharply: "Citizeness, I beg you--" But that was no good. The
evidence was on him and her screams would fetch others.
Tropile panicked. He started toward her to silence her, but that was no
good, either. He whirled. She was screaming, screaming, and there were
people to hear. Tropile darted into the street, but they were popping
out of every doorway now, appearing from each rat's hole in which they
had hid to escape Boyne.
"Please!" he cried, sobbing. "Wait a minute!"
But they weren't waiting. They had heard the woman and maybe some of
them had seen him with the bread. They were all around him--no, they
were all over him; they were clutching at him, tearing at his soft,
warm furs.
They pulled at his pockets and the stolen twists of salt spilled
accusingly out. They yanked at his sleeves and even the stout,
unweakened seams ripped open. He was fairly captured.
"Wolf!" they were shouting. "Wolf!" It drowned out the distant noise
from where Boyne had finally been run to earth, a block and more away.
It drowned out everything.
It was the other circumstance when _they_ forgot to be gracious: when
they had trapped a Son of the Wolf.