The First Sir Percy, Baroness Orczy [most important books to read TXT] 📗

“Stay,” my lord commanded. “Where is the burgomaster?”

“In his private apartments, so please you,” one of the men replied.

“And his daughter?”

“The jongejuffrouw is with Mynheer the Burgomaster.”

“Tell them both I want them to sup here with me and Mynheer Nicolaes.”

Again the men bowed with the same silent dignity. It was impossible to gather from their stolid, mask-like faces what their thoughts might be at this hour. When they had gone, Stoutenburg peremptorily dismissed his equerries.

“If you have anything to complain of in this house,” he said curtly, “come and report to me at once. Tomorrow we leave at dawn.”

Both the equerries gave a gasp of astonishment.

“Tomorrow?” one of them murmured, apparently quite taken aback by this order.

“At dawn,” Stoutenburg reiterated briefly.

This was enough. Neither did the equerries venture on further remarks. They had served for some time now under his Magnificence, knew his obstinacy and the irrevocableness of his decisions when once he had spoken.

“No further commands until then, my lord?” was all that the spokesman said.

“None for you,” Stoutenburg replied curtly. “But tell Jan that the moment⁠—the moment, you understand⁠—that the burgomaster enters this room, he is to be prevented from doing any mischief. If he carries a weapon, he must at once be disarmed; if he resists, there should be a length of rope handy wherewith to tie his hands behind his back. But otherwise I’ll not have him hurt. Understand?”

“Perfectly, my lord,” the equerry gave answer. “ ’Tis simple enough.”

Now the two friends⁠—brothers in crime⁠—were alone in the vast, panelled hall.

Nicolaes had said nothing, made no movement of indignation or protest, when the other delivered his monstrous and treacherous commands against the personal liberty of the burgomaster. He had sat sullen and glowering, his head resting against his hand.

Stoutenburg looked down on him for a moment or two, his deep-set eyes full of that contempt which he felt for this weak-kneed and conscience-plagued waverer. Then he curtly advised him to leave the room.

“You might not think it seemly,” he remarked with a sneer, “to be present when I take certain preventive measures against your father. These measures are necessary, else I would not take them. You would not have him spitting some of our men, or mayhap do himself or Gilda some injury, would you?”

“I was not complaining,” Nicolaes retorted dryly.

Indeed, he obeyed readily enough. Now that the time had come to meet his father, he shrank from the ordeal with horror. It would have come, of course; but, like all weak natures, Nicolaes was always on the side of procrastination. He rose without another word, and, avoiding the main door of the banqueting-hall, he went out by the back one, which gave on a narrow antechamber and thence on the service staircase.

“I’ll remain in the antechamber,” he said. “Call me when you wish.”

Stoutenburg shrugged his shoulders. He was glad to remain alone for awhile⁠—alone with that wealth of memories which would not be chased away. Memories of childhood, of adolescence, of youth untainted with crime; of love, before greed and ambition had caused him to betray so basely the girl who had believed in him.

“If Gilda had remained true to me,” he sighed, with almost cynical inconsequence, exacting fidelity where he had given none. “If she had stuck to me that night in Haarlem everything would have been different.”

He went up to the open window, and, leaning his arm against the mullion, he gazed upon the busy scene below. The current of cold, humid air appeared to do him good. His arquebusiers and pikemen, bivouacking round the spluttering fires, striving to keep the damp air out of their stiffening limbs; the shouts, the songs, the peremptory calls; the shrieks of frightened women and children; the loud Spanish oaths; the medley of curses in every tongue⁠—all this confused din pertaining to strife seemed to work like a tonic upon his brooding spirit. A blind beggar soliciting alms among the soldiery chased all softer thoughts away.

“Hey, there!” he shouted fiercely, to one of the soldiers who happened just then to have caught his eye, “Have I not given orders that every blind beggar lurking around the city be hung to the nearest tree?”

The men laughed. A monstrously tyrannical order such as that suited their present mood.

“But this one was inside the city, so please your Magnificence,” one of them protested with a cynical laugh, “when we arrived.”

“All the more reason why he should be hung forthwith!” Stoutenburg riposted savagely in reply.

A loud guffaw greeted this inhuman order. His Magnificence was loudly cheered, his health drunk in deep goblets of stolen wine. Then a search was made for the blind beggar. But he, luckily for himself, had in the meanwhile taken to his heels.

The next moment a slight noise behind him caused the Lord of Stoutenburg to turn on his heel. The door had been thrown open, and the burgomaster, having his daughter on his arm, stood upon the threshold. He was dressed in his robes of office, with black cloak and velvet bonnet; but he wore a steel gorget round his neck and rapier by his side.

At the sight of his arch enemy, he had paused under the lintel, and the ashen pallor of his cheeks became more marked. But he had no time to move, for in an instant Jan and three or four men were all around him.

At this treacherous onslaught a fierce oath escaped Beresteyn’s lips. In an instant his sword was out of its scabbard, he himself at bay, covering Gilda with his body, and facing the men who had thus scurrilously rushed on him out of the gloom.

But obviously resistance was futile. Already he was surrounded and disarmed, Gilda torn forcibly away from him, thrust into a corner, whilst he himself was rendered helpless, even though he fought and struggled magnificently. The whole unequal combat had only lasted a few seconds; and now the grand old man stood like a fettered lion,