The Laughing Cavalier, Baroness Orczy [the beginning after the end read novel TXT] 📗

shouted their rough jests to one another across the width of the room. Homeless, shiftless, thriftless, they knew no other names save those which chance or the coarse buffoonery of their friends had endowed them with. There was a man here tonight who was called Wry-face and another who went by the name of Gutter-rat. Not one amongst them mayhap could have told you who his father was or who his mother, nor where he himself had first seen the light of day; but they all knew of one another’s career, of one another’s prowess in the field at Prague or Ghent or Magdeburg, and they formed a band of brothers⁠—offensive and defensive⁠—which was the despair of the town-guard whenever the law had to be enforced against anyone of them.

It was at the hour when Mynheer Beek was beginning to hope that his guests would soon bethink themselves of returning home and leaving him to his own supper and bed, that a party of these worthies made noisy interruption into the room. They brought with them an atmosphere of boisterous gaiety with their clanking spurs and swords, their loud verbiage and burly personality.

“Hech da!” yelled one of these in a stentorian voice, “whom have we there, snug and cosy in the warmest corner of this hole but our three well-beloved philosophers. Diogenes, old compeer,” he shouted still louder than before, “is there room in your tub for your friends?”

“Plenty round this table, O noble Gutter-rat,” shouted Diogenes in joyful response, “but let me give you warning that space as well as common funds are running short, and that every newcomer who wants to sit must stand the others a draught of ale apiece; that is the price of a corner of this bench on which ye may sit if ye have a mind.”

“Done with you,” agreed all the newcomers lustily, and with scant ceremony they pushed their way through the closely packed throng.

They took no notice of the mutterings of more sober customers, angered at seeing their mantles crushed or feeling their toes trodden on. It suddenly seemed as if the whole place belonged to these men and that the peaceful burghers of the city were only here on suffrance.

The three philosophers had already called for some old Rhenish wine on draught. Käthi and Luise brought pewter jugs and more goblets along. Soon Gutter-rat and his friends were installed at the table, squeezed against one another on the narrow wooden benches. Pythagoras had already rolled off his corner seat and was sitting on the floor; Diogenes was perched on the corner of the table.

Socrates roused by the noise, opened a pair of heavy eyes and blinked round him in astonishment. Gutter-rat deposited his bulky form close beside him and brought his large and grimy hand down on the shoulder of the sleepy philosopher.

“Hello, wise Socrates,” he cried in his rough, husky voice, “I hope you have been having pleasant dreams.”

“No, I have not,” growled Socrates laconically.

“Take no heed of him,” laughed Diogenes, “he has a hole in his head through which his good temper has been oozing out bit by bit. And yet if you’ll all believe me he has been reposing there so peacefully and snoring so lustily that I thought he must be dreaming of Heaven and the last trumpet call.”

“I was dreaming of all the chances which Pythagoras and I have missed tonight owing to your d⁠⸺⁠d nonsense,” said Socrates, who was more sulky now than he had been before he went to sleep.

Pythagoras uttered a prolonged sigh and gazed meditatively down into the depths of his mug of ale. Gutter-rat and the others looked inquiringly from one philosopher to the other.

“Diogenes been at his tricks again?” asked Gutter-rat.

Socrates and Pythagoras nodded in their gloomy response.

“Gallantry, eh? some beauteous damsel, to succour whom we throw our life, our best chances away?” continued the other with ironical sympathy, the while Diogenes’ entire face was wreathed in one huge, all-embracing smile. Gutter-rat admonished him with solemn voice and uplifted finger.

“Conduct unworthy a philosopher,” he said.

“If he had only injured himself,” growled Socrates.

“And let us enjoy the gifts which a beneficent goddess was ready to pour into our lap,” added Pythagoras dulcetly from the floor.

“Let’s hear the story,” concluded Gutter-rat.

The others clapped their mugs against the tabletop and shouted: “The story! the story!” to the accompaniment of din that drowned all other noises in the room.

Pythagoras from his lowly position began his narrative in a faint, injured tone of voice. He related the incidents of this night from the moment when the chance of possessing oneself with but little trouble of a tulip bulb worth fifteen thousand florins was so airily flouted, down to the awful moment when a young and beauteous lady made offers of influence and of money which were equally airily refused.

Gutter-rat and the others listened attentively. They specially relished the exciting incidents connected with the affray in Dam Straat, the breaking of Jan Tiele’s nose and the dispersal of the mob with the aid of a lighted torch.

“Bravo! splendid!” they shouted at intervals and loudly expressed their regret at having missed such furious fun.

Socrates threw in a word or two now and then, when Pythagoras did not fully explain his own valorous position in the fight, but Diogenes said nothing at all; he allowed his comrade to tell the tale his own way; the recollection of it seemed to afford him vast amusement for he hummed a lively tune to himself all the while.

Pythagoras now was mimicking his friend, throwing into this performance all the disgust which he felt.

“Raise thy hand to my lips, mejuffrouw,” he said mincing his words, “momentarily I have not the use of mine own.”

His round, beady eyes appealed to his listeners for sympathy, and there is no doubt that he got that in plenty. Gutter-rat more especially highly disapproved of the dénouement of what might have proved a lucrative adventure.

“The rich jongejuffrouw might even have fallen in