CHAPTER XIVTHE TYRANTSIThe next morning, at the tenth hour, five reverend seigniors presented themselves before the Duke of Alva, Lieutenant-Governor of the Low Countries and Captain-General of the Forces, in the apartments which he occupied in Het Spanjaards Kasteel.They were Messire Pierre van Overbeque, Vice-Bailiff of Ghent; Messire Deynoot, Procurator-General, and Messire Jan van Migrode, Chief Sheriff of the Keure; then there was Messire Lievin van Deynse, the brewer at the sign of the "Star of the North," and Baron van Groobendock, chief financial adviser on the Town Council.They had waited on His Highness at a very early hour, but had been kept waiting in the guard-room for two hours, without a chair to sit on, and with a crowd of rough soldiers around them, some of whom were lounging about on the benches, others playing at cards or dice, whilst all of them improved the occasion and whiled away the time by indulging in insolent jests at the expense of the reverend burghers, who--humiliated beyond forbearance and vainly endeavouring to swallow their wrath--did not dare to complain to the officer in command, lest worse insults be heaped upon them.At one hour before noon the seigniors were at last told very peremptorily that they might present themselves before His Highness. They were marched between a detachment of soldiers through the castle yard to the magnificent apartments in the Meeste-Toren, which at one time were occupied by the Counts of Flanders. Now the Duke of Alva's soldiery and his attendants were in every corridor and every ante-room. They stared with undisguised insolence at the grave seigniors who belonged to the despised race.The Lieutenant-Governor was graciously pleased to receive the burghers in his council-chamber where, seated upon a velvet-covered chair upon an elevated platform and beneath a crimson dais, he looked down upon these free citizens of an independent State as if he were indeed possessed of divine rights over them all. The officer in command of the small detachment which had escorted the deputation into the dreaded presence, now ordered the five seigniors to kneel, and they, who had a petition to present and an act of mercy to entreat, obeyed with that proud humility wherewith their fathers had knelt thirty-two years ago in sackcloth and ashes before the throne of the Emperor Charles."Your desire, seigniors?" queried the Duke curtly.Some of the members of his abominable Grand Council sat around him, on benches placed well below the level of the platform. Alberic del Rio was there--bland and submissive; President Viglius, General de Noircarmes, and President Hessels--men who were as bitter against Orange and his followers as was Alva himself--and, sitting a little apart from the others, don Juan de Vargas, but recently arrived from Brussels."Your desire, seigniors?" the Duke had questioned peremptorily, and after a few moments Messire Deynoot, the Procurator-General, who was spokesman of the deputation, began timidly at first--then gradually more resolutely."It is with profound grief," he said, "that we became aware last night that your Highness' visit to our city was not one of goodwill and amity. Your Highness' severe restrictions upon our citizens and stern measures taken against them hath filled our hearts with sorrow.""Your abominable treachery hath filled our heart with wrath," retorted the Duke roughly, "and nothing but the clemency enjoined upon us by our suzerain Lord and King prevented us from reducing this accursed city to ashes and putting every one of her citizens to the sword, without giving them a single chance of retrieving their hellish conduct by surrendering themselves unconditionally to our will.""It is with the utmost confidence," rejoined the Procurator-General humbly, "that we rely upon the well-known clemency of our suzerain Lord the King, and place the future of our beautiful city unconditionally in your Highness' hands.""The future of the city is in my hands, Messire," said the Duke dryly, "by the power of our suzerain Lord and with the help of the troops at my command. I told you last night under what condition I will spare your town from total destruction. I am not in the habit of changing my mind during the course of one night.""Alas, your Highness! but the city is quite unable to fulfil the one condition which would appease the wrath of our suzerain Lord and your own.""Then," retorted Alva haughtily, "why waste my time and your own in bandying words which must remain purposeless? Either William of Orange is delivered into my hands, or my soldiers burn your city down at sunset to-morrow. By our Lady! is that not clear enough?""Clear enough, alas!" rejoined the Procurator-General, and suddenly in his mind there rose a picture of the tall man last night beneath the dais, of his inspiring words, his whole-hearted sacrifice: his ringing voice seemed to echo through this narrow room, and some of the words which he spoke knocked at the gates of the grave seignior's memory."Yours will be the harder task," he had said gaily; "you will have to fawn and to cringe, to swallow your wrath and to bend your pride!" Well! God knew that they had done all that: they had swallowed their wrath and bent their pride before an insolent soldiery, and now they were fawning and cringing to a tyrant whom they abhorred.Ghent! beloved city! once the home of the free! what must thy citizens endure for thy sake?And the Procurator-General--the descendant of an hundred free men--had to lick the dust before Alva's throne. He forced his voice to tones of humility, he looked up at the tyrant with eyes full of unspoken devotion."What can we do?" he said timidly, "to prove our loyalty? I entreat your Magnificence to look down on our helplessness. Orange is no longer in Ghent, and we do not know where to find him.""A pretty tale, indeed," interposed de Vargas suddenly, with a strident laugh which was echoed obsequiously by the other members round the council board, "a pretty, likely tale, which I trust your Highness will not think to believe.""I neither believe nor disbelieve any tale which these grave seigniors choose to tell me," rejoined the Duke. "I want Orange--or we burn this city down till not a stone in it be left upon stone."And Messire Deynoot, whose entire soul rose in revolt against that rough dictate of a hellish tyrant, had perforce to subdue his passionate wrath and to speak with affected humility and unconcern."We had hoped," he said quietly, "that we might offer to your Highness such a proof of our loyalty that you would no longer wish to cast aside a city that hath always hitherto proved staunch and true.""What mean you, sirrah? What proofs can you give me now of this accursed city's loyalty, when you harbour a veritable army of traitors within your walls?""We would wish to prove to your Magnificence that the city itself takes no part in the vagaries and plottings of a few hot-headed malcontents.""Hot-headed malcontents, forsooth!" exclaimed the Duke fiercely. "Two thousand men prepared to take up arms against our Suzerain Lord the King! ... arms concealed in churches and cemeteries! money poured into the lap of Orange and all his rebels!""There are more than two thousand men who are prepared to fight and die for their country and their King," said the Fleming suavely, "and who are equally ready to pour money into the coffers of their Liege Lord, as represented by His Highness Ferdinand Alvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alva, and by the reverend members of his Council."This he had said very slowly and with marked emphasis, and even while he spoke he had the satisfaction of seeing more than one pair of eyes round that Council board gloating with delight at the vision of treasure and wealth which his words had called forth. He and his colleagues had long after the assembly of last night discussed between them this one proposal, which might, they hoped, tempt the cupidity of the Spaniards, which they knew to be boundless. They were wealthy men all of them--the town was wealthy beyond the dreams of Alva's avarice, and the five men who had been deputed to offer up a brave man's life as the price of a city's safety, had resolved to sacrifice their last stiver, and keep the hero in their midst.But Alva, with a sneer, had already destroyed all the fond hopes which had been built upon that resolve."If you offered me every treasure--to the last gulden--contained in your city," he said, with emphasis no less strongly marked than had been the other man's offer, "I would not deny myself the pleasure of razing this abominable nest of rebels to the ground. Why should I," he added with a cynical shrug of the shoulders, "take from you as a bribe what my soldiers can get for me by the might of fire and sword? Orange alone would tempt me, for I would wish to have him alive--we might kill him by accident when we destroy the town.""We can collect two million gulden in gold," said Messire Deynoot insinuatingly, "and lay that sum at the feet of your Magnificence to-morrow.""Ah?" said the Duke blandly, "then I am greatly relieved that so much money can be got voluntarily out of this city. Your words, Messire, are honey to mine ears; they prove, beyond a doubt, that if you can raise two million gulden in forty-eight hours my soldiers can put up ten times that amount in a two days' sacking of this town.""The money voluntarily offered, Monseigneur," here interposed the Vice-Bailiff, "would shame neither the giver nor the receiver. The destruction of a free and loyal city would be an eternal disgrace upon the might of Spain.""Spare me thy heroics, sirrah!" quoth Alva fiercely, "or I'll have that impudent tongue of thine cut out before nightfall."And once more the burghers had to bend their pride before the appalling arrogance of their tyrant."Begone now!" added the Lieutenant-Governor peremptorily, seeing that the Flemings were silent for the moment. "The business of the State cannot be held up by such profitless talk. And if you have nothing better to offer to our Gracious King than money which is already his, why, then, you are wasting my time, and had best go back to those who sent you.""No one sent us, Monseigneur," resumed the Procurator-General, with as much dignity as he could command, even though his back ached and his knees were painfully cramped. "We are free burghers of the city of Ghent, which, alas! hath earned your Highness' displeasure. We have offered of our treasure so as to testify to our loyalty ... but this offer your Magnificence hath thought fit to refuse. At the same time we are not at the end of our resources or of our protestations of loyalty. We have yet another offer to place before your Highness which, perhaps, may be more agreeable in your sight.""And what is that offer, sirrah? Be quick about it, as my patience, of a truth, is at the end of its resources."The Procurator-General did not make immediate reply. Truly he was screwing up his determination for the terrible ordeal which was before him. He hung his head, and, despite his fortitude--probably because of weakness following on fatigue--he felt that tears gathered in his eyes, and he feared that his voice now as he spoke would become unsteady. The others, too, kept their eyes fixed to the ground. They could not bear to look on one another, at this moment when they were about to offer up so brave and gallant a life in sacrifice for their city and for all the townsfolk. Indeed, Messire Deynoot ere he spoke forced his mind to dwell upon all the horrors of Mons and Valenciennes and Mechlin, upon all the women and children, the feeble and the old, his own wife, his daughters and his mother, so as to gather courage for the task which had been imposed upon him.Thus there was silence for a minute or so in this narrow room, wherein the close velvet draperies made the air heavy, so that the number of men here assembled--Spaniards and Flemings and soldiers--felt as if an awful load was weighing their senses down. Councillor Hessels, as was his wont, had fallen asleep. He woke up in the oppressive silence in order to murmur drowsily: "To the gallows with them all!" Alva sat sullen and wrathful, looking down with contempt and scorn on the kneeling burghers before him. De Vargas, now and again, turned anxious, furtive eyes to where a rich portière of damask-velvet hid a door in the panelling of the wall. Even now it seemed as if that portiere stirred--as if an unseen hand was grasping it with a febrile nervous clutch--it seemed, in fact, as if some one lived and breathed there behind the curtain, and as if all that was said and would be said in the room would find its echo in a palpitating heart.IIAnon the Duke of Alva's impatience broke its bounds: "An you'll not speak, sirrah," he cried, "get you gone! Get you gone, I say, ere I order my lacqueys to throw you out of my house.""Your pardon, Monseigneur," said Messire Deynoot with sudden resolution, "I but paused in order to choose the words which might best please your ears. The offer which I am about to make to your Highness is in the name of all the citizens of Ghent, and I feel confident that your Highness will gladly acknowledge that no greater mark of loyalty could be offered by any town to our suzerain Lord the King.""Speak!" commanded Alva."Next to the Prince of Orange himself," said the Procurator-General timidly, "is there not a man who hath gravely incurred your Highness' displeasure, but who hath hitherto evaded the punishment which your Highness would no doubt mete out to him?""Yes; there is!" replied the Duke curtly. "A man who chooses to wrap himself up in a mantle of mystery; a spy of Orange--a rebel and traitor to the King. There is such a man, sirrah! He hath several times thwarted my projects with regard to Orange. If, as you say, Orange is not in Ghent then hath that man had a hand in helping him to get away. Well! what of that man, sirrah? I want him. He is called Leatherface by my soldiers. What of him, I say?""Leatherface is in Ghent, Monseigneur," murmured Deynoot, scarce above his breath."Come! that's good! Then will our booty be even richer than we thought.""Leatherface is in Ghent, Monseigneur," continued Deynoot, more steadily. "But he is an elusive creature. Mysterious agencies are at work, so they say, to enable him to escape the many traps that are set for him. He swims like a fish, and climbs like an ape. He entered the city last night, an hour after all the gates had been closed. In the terrible confusion which will attend the destruction of our city, he would escape again.... But just now he is in Ghent, and...""And you will deliver him over to me," broke in Alva with a harsh laugh, "if I will spare your city?"The Procurator-General nodded his head in reply. His lips refused him service for that awful, that irreparable "Yes!" The five men now no longer hung their heads. White as the linen ruffles round their throats, they were gazing straight into the face of the tyrant, trying to read the innermost thoughts of that inhuman devil, who held the destiny of their city--or of a brave man--in the hollow of his claw-like hands.Alva pondered; and while he did so his prominent, heavy-lidded eyes sought those of his colleagues no less inhuman, more devilish mayhap, than himself. And from behind the heavy portière there seemed to come a long drawn-out sigh, like some poor creature in pain. De Vargas frowned, and a muttered curse escaped his lips."How long has she been there?" asked Alva quickly, in a whisper."All the time," replied de Vargas, also under his breath."But this is not for women's ears.""Nay! your Highness does not know my daughter. It was the man Leatherface who killed her first lover. She would be happy to see him hang.""And she shall, too. She hath deserved well of us. We owe our present triumph to her."Then he turned once more to the burghers."I like your offer," he said coldly, "and, in a measure, I accept it.... Nay!" he added with that cruel and strident laugh of his, seeing that at his words a certain look of relief overspread the five pale faces before him, "do not rejoice too soon. I would not give up the delight of punishing an entire city for the mere pleasure of seeing one man hang. True! I would like to hold him. Next to Orange himself, I would sooner see that mysterious Leatherface dangling on a gibbet than any other heretic or rebel in this abominable country. But to give up my purpose over Ghent, that is another matter! Once and for all, seigniors," he added with fierce and irrevocable determination, "Ghent shall burn, since Orange has escaped again. But I have said that I accept your offer, and I do. I take it as an expression of tardy loyalty, and will reward you in accordance with its value. We will burn your city, seigniors; but if when your flaming walls begin to crumble about your ears; when my soldiery have taken their fill of your money and your treasures, and human lives begin to pay the toll of your rebellion and treachery, then, if you deliver to me the person of Leatherface alive, I will, in return, stay my soldiers' hands, and order that in every homestead one son and one daughter, aye, and the head of the house, too, be spared. Otherwise--and remember that this is my last word--not one stone shall remain upon stone within the city--not one inhabitant, man, woman, or child, shall be left to perpetuate rebellion inside these walls. I have spoken, and now go--go and tell Leatherface that I await him. He hath not aided Orange's escape in vain."He rose, and with a peremptory gesture pointed to the door. The five burghers were silent. What could they say? To beg, to implore, to remonstrate would, indeed, have been in vain. As well implore the fierce torrent not to uproot the tree that impedes its course, or beg the wolf not to devour its prey. Painfully they struggled to their feet, roughly urged along by the soldiers. They were indeed cramped and stiff, as well mentally as physically; they had done their heart-breaking errand--they had swallowed their wrath and humbled their pride--they had cringed, and they had fawned and licked the dust beneath the feet of the tyrant who was in sheer, lustful wantonness sending them and their kith and kin--guilty and innocent alike--to an abominable death.... And they had failed--miserably failed either to bribe, to cajole, or to shame that human fiend into some semblance of mercy. Now a deathlike sorrow weighed upon their souls. They were like five very old men sent tottering to their own graves.Some could hardly see because of the veil of tears before their eyes.But, even as one by one they filed out of the presence of the tyrant, they still prayed ... prayed to God to help them and their fellow-citizens in this the darkest hour of their lives. Truly, if these valiant people of Flanders had lost their faith and trust in God then they would have gone absolutely and irretrievably under into the awful vortex of oppression which threatened to crush the very existence of their nation, and would have hurled them into the bottomless abyss of self-destruction.CHAPTER XVTWO PICTURESIThese stand out clearly among the mass of documents, details, dissertations and chronicles of the time--so clearly indeed that only a brief mention of them will suffice here.First: Lenora in the small room which adjoined the council chamber within Het Spanjaard's Kasteel in Ghent. She had stood for close upon an hour under the lintel of the open door, her hand clinging to the heavy velvet portière; not one sound which came from the council chamber failed to strike her ear: every phase of that awesome interview between the supplicants and their vengeful tyrant struck at her heart, until at last unable to keep still, she uttered a moan of pain.All this was his work! Not hers! Before God and her own conscience she felt that she could not have acted differently; that if it had all to be done again, she would again obey the still, insistent voice which had prompted her to keep her oath and to serve her King and country in the only way that lay in her power.It was his work! not hers! His, whose whole life seemed to be given over to murder, to rebellion and to secret plottings, and who had tried to throw dust in her eyes and to cajole her into becoming a traitor too to all that she held dear.It was his work, and the terrible reprisals which the Duke of Alva's retributive justice would mete out to this rebellious city lay at the door of those who had conspired against the State, and not at hers who had only been an humble tool in Almighty hands.But in spite of her inner conviction that she had done right, in spite of her father's praise and approval which he had lavished on her all the way from Dendermonde to Ghent, she could not rid herself of a terrible sense of utter desolation and utter misery, and of a feeling of pity for all these poor people which caused her unendurable--almost physically unendurable--agony.When anon the Lieutenant-Governor dismissed the burghers and after a few words with her father and señor del Rio left the council chamber, Lenora had a feeling as if the ground was opening before her, as if an awful chasm yawned at her feet into which she must inevitably fall if she dared look into it. And yet she looked and looked, as if fascinated by the hideousness of what she saw--pictures of cruelty and of evil far more horrible than any which had ever been limned of hell. And in the overwhelming horror which faced her now, she felt herself screaming aloud, with appealing defiance: "It is his work! not mine! Let the blood of his kinsfolk fall upon him--not me!" ere she tottered and fell back.When full consciousness returned to her, her father was by her side. He looked pale and sullen and instinctively she drew away from him, whereat he smiled, showing his large teeth which looked like the fangs of a wolf."I ought never to have allowed you to come here, Lenora," he said roughly. "As His Highness said, it was not at all fit for women's ears.""His Highness," she retorted coldly, "also said that to be here was my right ... your triumph to-day being all due to me.""Well!" he added lightly, "'tis you wanted to come, remember.""Yes," she said, "I wanted to come.""I would have sent you to Brussels with Inez and a good escort. It is not too late. You can still go. Ghent will not be a fitting place for women during the next few days," he added, whilst a glow of evil satisfaction suddenly lit up his sallow face. "Would you prefer to go?""No, father, I thank you," she replied. "I would wish to stay.""Ah! that's a brave daughter, and a true Spaniard," he cried, "and I promise you that you shall be satisfied with what you see. Ramon, your cousin, will be avenged more completely than even you could have dared to hope, and that assassin Leatherface will suffer: you shall see him dangling on a gibbet, never fear."A slight shudder went right through her. Her face was as white as her gown; and as she made no reply, her father continued blandly:"You little thought that your marriage would bring such a magnificent harvest of reprisals quite so soon! The city of Ghent and the man Leatherface! The destruction of the one and the death of the other are your work, my daughter."She closed her eyes; for she saw that awful chasm once more yawning at her feet, and once more she felt herself falling ... falling ... with no one to cling to but her father who kept asking her whether she was satisfied with what she had done.... His voice came to her as through a shroud ... he talked and talked incessantly ... of Ghent ... of rebels ... of murder and pillage and gibbets and torture-chambers ... of women and children and fathers of families ... of sons and of daughters ... and of one--Leatherface ... of the High-Bailiff of Ghent ... of Laurence and of Mark ... her husband."I wonder where that fool is now," she could hear her father saying through a muffler which seemed to envelop his mouth. "On the high road to Brussels mayhap with a message from you to me ... did you say you had sent him on from Dendermonde or straight away from Ghent? I am half sorry I gave in to your whim and brought you here with me ... but 'tis you wanted to come ... eh, my girl? ... you were so obstinate ... I was weak enough to give in ... but I ought not to have let you listen to those mealy-mouthed Flemings! ... ah! you are my true daughter ... you wanted to see these traitors punished, what? and Ramon's murder avenged! Well! you shall see it all, my dear, I promise you.... But I wish you could tell me what has become of that fool of a husband of yours ... we shall have to know presently if you are still wife or widow...."He said this quite gaily and laughed at his own jest, and Lenora, pale and wild-eyed, echoed his laugh. She laughed as she had done two nights ago at Dendermonde when a face made up of lighted windows grinned at and mocked her across the Grand' Place. She laughed until the whole room began to dance a wild galliarde around her, until her father's face appeared like one huge, mocking grin.Then she just glided from the couch down on to the floor. And there she lay, white and inert, whilst señor de Vargas, cursing the megrims of women, went calmly in search of help.IIThe second picture has for background the refectory in the convent of St. Agneten at the same hour as when last night the newly chosen, mysterious leader had roused boundless enthusiasm in the hearts of all his hearers. There is no lack of enthusiasm now either, but tempers are more subdued--gloom hangs over the assembly, for Messire the Procurator-General has just given a graphic account of his mission to the Lieutenant-Governor.When he has finished speaking, the man with the mask who sits at the head of the table at the top of the long, low room, asks quietly:"Then he refused?"All the five men who this morning had knelt humbly before the tyrant, exchange silent glances, after which Messire Deynoot says firmly:"He refused.""Nothing will save our city," insisted Leatherface solemnly, "except if we track the Prince of Orange and bring him bound and a prisoner to the feet of Alva?""Nothing! save Orange's person will move Alva from his resolve."Leatherface sits for a moment quite still, with his head buried in his hands: and the vast crowd now assembled in the room waits in breathless silence for his next word. There are far more than two thousand men here this night; the number has indeed been more than doubled. The deadly danger which threatens the city has already brought over three thousand new recruits to the standard.Suddenly with a resolute gesture Leatherface draws his mask away and rises to his feet in full view of all the crowd."Mark van Rycke!" comes as one cry from several hundred throats."Aye!" he says with a light laugh, "your ne'er-do-well and frequenter of taverns was just the watch-dog of our noble Prince. Unknown I was able to render him some small service. Now that you are no longer called upon to throw me as a bait to the snarling lion, I'll resume mine own identity, and hereby ask you, if--knowing me for what I am--you still trust me to lead you to victory or to death?""To victory!" shout the younger men enthusiastically."To die like men," murmur the older ones."To-morrow we fight, seigniors!" says Mark earnestly, "to-morrow we defend our homes, our wives, our daughters, with scarce a hope of success. To-morrow we show to the rulers of the world how those of the down-trodden race can die whilst fighting for God and liberty.""To-morrow!" they all assent with unbounded enthusiasm.The ardour of a noble cause is in their veins. Not one of them here hesitates for one second in order to count the cost. And yet every one of them know that theirs is a forlorn cause. How can a handful of burghers and apprentices stand up before the might of Spain? But they are men at bay! they--the sober burghers of a fog-ridden land, steady, wise of counsel, without an ounce of impetuosity or hot-headedness in their blood; and yet they are ready to go into this desperate adventure without another thought save that of selling their lives and the honour of their women folk as dearly as they can.For leader they have a man! for help they have only God! For incentive they have their own dignity, their pride, their valour ... for weapon they have the justice of their cause, and the right to die like men.CHAPTER XVITHE RIGHT TO DIEIAnd after the lapse of three hundred and more years the imagination projects itself into that past so full of heroic deeds, so full of valour and of glory, and stands still wondering before the glowing pictures which the insurrection of Ghent reveals.Memory--the stern handmaiden of unruly imagination--goes back to that 21st day in October 1572 and recalls the sounds and sights which from early dawn filled the beautiful city with a presage of desolation to come; the church bells' melancholy appeal, the deserted streets, the barred and shuttered houses, the crowds of women and children and old men sitting at prayer in their own halls, the peaceful folk of a prosperous city quietly preparing for death.At four o'clock in the afternoon the Duke of Alva rides out of the Kasteel with his staff and his bodyguard, which consists of three squadrons of cavalry, one bandera of Spanish infantry--halberdiers and pikemen--and five companies of harquebusiers, The Bandes d'Ordonnance--the local mounted gendarmerie--are on duty in the Vridachmart, and thither the Duke repairs in slow and stately majesty through silent streets, in which every window is shuttered, and where not one idler or gaffer stands to see him pass by. A cruel, ironical smile curls his thin lips beneath the drooping moustache as he notes the deserted aspect of the place."Terror," he mutters to himself, "or sulkiness. But they cannot eat their money or their treasures: and there must be a vast deal of it behind those walls!"On the Vridachmart he halts with his armed escort grouped around him, the Bandes d'Ordonnance lining the market place, his standard unfurled behind him, his drummers in the front. Not a soul out upon the mart--not a head at any of the windows in the houses round! It seems as if Don Frederic Alvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alva, Lieutenant-Governor of the Netherlands and Captain-General of the Forces, was about to read a proclamation to a city of the dead.A prolonged roll of drums commands silence for His Highness--silence which already is absolute--and then the Duke, in his usual loud and peremptory voice, demands the immediate surrender of the Prince of Orange now an outlaw in the town. And suddenly from every house around the huge market comes the answering cry: "Come and take him!" And from every doorway, from every adjoining street men come rushing along--with pikes and halberds and muskets, and from end to end of the town the defiant cry arises: "Come and take him!"The Bandes d'Ordonnance, hastily summoned by the Duke to keep back the rabble, turn their arms against the Spanish halberdiers. Taking up the cry of "Come and take him!" they go over in a body to the side of the insurgents.At once the Walloon arquebusiers are ordered to fire. The rebels respond this time with their own battle cry of "Orange and Liberty!" and a death-dealing volley of musketry. Whereupon the mêlée becomes general; the cavalry charges into the now serried ranks of the Orangists who are forced momentarily to retreat. They are pushed back across the mart as far as the cemetery of St. Jakab. Here they unfurl their standard, and their musketeers hold their ground with unshakable valour, firing from behind the low encircling wall with marvellous precision and quickness whilst two bodies of halbertmen and pikemen pour out in numbers from inside the church, and their artillerymen with five culverins and three falconets emerge out of the Guild House of the Tanners which is close by, and take up a position in front of the cemetery.Alva's troops soon begin to lose their nerve. They were wholly unprepared for attack, and suddenly they feel themselves both outnumbered and hard-pressed. The Duke himself had been unprepared and had appeared upon the Vridachmart with less than two thousand men, whilst the other companies stationed in different portions of the city had not even been warned to hold themselves in readiness.And just when the Spanish cavalry upon the Market Square is beginning to give ground the cry of "Sauve qui peut" is raised somewhere in the distance.The Spanish and Walloon soldiery quartered in the various guild-houses, the open markets or private homesteads were just as unprepared for attack as was the garrison of the Kasteel. They had been promised that as soon as the evening Angelus had ceased to ring they could run wild throughout the city, loot and pillage as much as they desired, and that until that hour they could do no better than fill their heads with ale so as to be ready for the glorious sacking and destruction of the richest town in the Netherlands. Therefore, a goodly number of them--fresh from Mechlin--have spent the afternoon in recalling some of the pleasurable adventures there--the trophies gained, the treasure, the money, the jewels all lying ready to their hand. Others have listened open-mouthed and agape, longing to get to work on the rich city and its wealthy burghers, and all have imbibed a great quantity of very heady ale which has fuddled their brain and made them more and more drowsy as the afternoon wears on. Their captains too have spent most of the day in the taverns, drinking and playing hazard in anticipation of loot, and thus the men are not at the moment in touch with their commanders or with their comrades, and all have laid aside their arms.And simultaneously with the mêlée in the Vridachmart, the insurgents have made a general attack upon every guild-house, every market, every tavern where soldiers are quartered and congregated. With much shouting and to-do so as to give an exaggerated idea of their numbers they fall upon the unsuspecting soldiers--Walloons for the most part--and overpower and capture them before these have fully roused themselves from their afternoon torpor; their provosts and captains oft surrender without striking a blow. In almost every instance--so the chroniclers of the time aver--fifty and sixty men were captured by a dozen or twenty, and within half an hour all the guild-houses are in the hands of the Orangists, and close on fifteen hundred Walloons are prisoners in the cellars below; whilst all the arms stowed in the open markets go to swell the stores of the brave Orange men.But some of the Walloons and Spaniards contrive to escape this general rounding up and it was they who first raised the cry of "Sauve qui peut!"Now it is repeated and repeated again and again: it echoes from street to street; it gains in volume and in power until from end to end of the city it seems to converge toward the Vridachmart in one huge, all dominating wave of sound: "Sauve qui peut!" and the tramp of running feet, the calls and cries drown the clash of lance and pike.Suddenly the bowmen of the Orangists scale the low cemetery wall as one man and their defence is turned into a vigorous onslaught: the cavalry is forced back upon the market square, they catch up the cry: "Sauve qui peut! They are on us!Sauve qui peut!" They break their ranks--a panic hath seized them--their retreat becomes a rout. The Orangists are all over the cemetery wall now: they charge with halberd and pike and force the Spaniards and Walloons back and back into the narrow streets which debouch upon the Schelde. Some are able to escape over the Ketel Brüghe, but two entire companies of Spanish infantry and a whole squadron of cavalry are--so Messire Vaernewyck avers--pushed into the river where they perish to the last man.IIAt this hour all is confusion. The picture which the mind conjures up of the stricken city is a blurred mass of pikes and lances, of muskets and crossbows, of Spaniards and Walloons and Flemings, of ragged doublets and plumed hats--a medley of sounds: of arrows whizzing with a long whistling sound through the air, of the crash of muskets and clash of lance against lance, the appeal of those who are afraid and the groans of those who are dying--of falling timber and sizzling woodwork, and crumbling masonry, and through it all the awful cry of "Sauve qui peut!" and the sound of the tocsin weirdly calling through the fast gathering night.And amidst this helter-skelter and confusion, the Duke of Alva upon his black charger--untiring, grim, terrible--tries by commands, cajoleries, threats, to rally those who flee. But the voice which erstwhile had the power to make the stoutest heart quake had none over the poltroon. He shouts and admonishes and threatens in vain. They run and run--cavalry, infantry, halbertmen and lancers--the flower of the Spanish force sent to subdue the Netherlands--they run; and in the general vortex of fleeing cavalry the Duke is engulfed too, and he is carried along as far as the Ketel Brüghe, where he tries to make a stand.His doublet and hose are covered with mud and grime; his mantle is torn, his hat has fallen off his head and his white hair floats around his face which is as pale as death."Cowards!" he cries with fierce and maddened rage: "would you fly before such rabble?" But his voice has lost its magic; they do not heed him--they fly--past him and over the bridge to the safety of Het Spanjaard's Kasteel.Then prudence dictates the only possible course, or capture might become inevitable. Cursing savagely and vowing more bitter revenge than ever before, the Duke at last wheels his horse round and he too hastens back to the stronghold--there to work out a plan of campaign against the desperate resistance of that handful of Flemish louts whom His Highness and all Spanish grandees and officials so heartily despise.IIIHalf an hour later, and we see courier after courier sent flying from Het Spanjaard's Kasteel to every corner of the city.The city gates--thank the God of the Spaniards!--have been well garrisoned and well supplied with culverins and balls, it is from there that help must come, for--strange to tell--those louts have actually invested the Kasteel and have the pretension to lay a regular siege to the stronghold.Was there ever such a farce? A couple of thousand of an undisciplined rabble--they surely cannot be more--daring to pit themselves against a picked guard! Courier to the Waalpoort where Lodrono is in command! courier to the Braepoort!--Serbelloni is there with two culverins of the newest pattern and two hundred musketeers, the like of whom are not known outside the Spanish army!The only pity is that the bulk of the forces inside the city are Walloons! such poltroons as they have already proved themselves, surrendering in their hundreds to those confounded rebels! they have been scattered like flies out of a honey-pot, and the entire centre of the city is in the hands of the Orangists. But, anyway, the whole affair is only a question of time; for the moment the evening is closing in fast and the position cannot therefore be improved before nightfall; but in the morning a general closing-in movement, from the gates toward the centre would hold the rebels as in a claw and break their resistance within an hour. In the meanwhile the morale of the troops must be restored. Attend to that, ye captains at the city gates!Courier follows courier out of the gate-house of the Kasteel: naked men, ready to crawl, to swim, or to dive, to escape the vigilance of the Orangist lines. Impossible! Not one is able to cross the open ground beyond the castle moat; the houses on the further bank of the Schelde are filled with Orangists; bows and muskets are levelled from every window. The culverins are down below, covered by the angles of the cross-streets; the messengers either fall ere they reach the Schelde or are sent back the way they came.Attend to the morale of your men, ye captains at the city gates! The Duke of Alva, with some three or four thousand men, is inside the Kasteel, and no orders or communication can be got from him now before morning. And just like the flies when driven out of the honey, fly, scared, to the edges of the pot, so the Walloon soldiers, those who have escaped from the guild-houses, go and seek refuge in the shadow of the guard-houses at the gates. But the tactics of the Orangists have worked upon their nerves. At first there had appeared but a rabble upon the Vridachmart, but since then the numbers are swelling visibly; insurgents seem to be issuing out of every doorway, from under every arch in the city ... they rush out with muskets and crossbows, with pikes and halberds; and to the Walloons--already unnerved and fatigued--their numbers appear to be endless and their arms of a wonderful precision. Their muskets are of the newest pattern such as are made in Germany, and these they use with marvellous skill, discharging as many as ten shots in one quarter of an hour, and none but the picked French musketeers have ever been known to do that.And they are led by a man who seems to know neither fatigue nor fear. Here, there and everywhere he appears to the Walloon and Spanish soldiers like a mysterious being from another world. He wears no armour, but just a suit of leather which envelopes him from head to foot, and his face is hidden by a leather mask. His voice rings from end to end of the market place one moment; the next he appears inside the enclosure of the cemetery. Now he is at St. Pharaïlde and anon back at St. Jakab. Three of Alva's couriers hastily despatched to the commandants at the various gate-houses fall to his pistol, which is the only weapon he carries, and it is he who leads the last attack on the Ketel Brüghe which results in the flight of Alva and all his cavalry to the safe precincts of the Kasteel.Before the evening Angelus has ceased to ring, the whole of the centre of the city is swept clear of Alva's troops, and the insurgents have completely surrounded the Kasteel. Darkness finds the Orangists bivouacking in the open markets and along the banks of the Schelde and the Leye with their artillery still thundering against Alva's stronghold and the gate-houses of the city, like bursts of thunder-clouds in a storm. The mantle of night has fallen over a vast hecatomb of dead and dying, of Walloons and Flemings and Spaniards, of brothers who have died side by side, with muskets raised in fratricide one against the other, and of women and children who have died of terror and of grief.
CHAPTER XIV
THE TYRANTS
I
The next morning, at the tenth hour, five reverend seigniors presented themselves before the Duke of Alva, Lieutenant-Governor of the Low Countries and Captain-General of the Forces, in the apartments which he occupied in Het Spanjaards Kasteel.
They were Messire Pierre van Overbeque, Vice-Bailiff of Ghent; Messire Deynoot, Procurator-General, and Messire Jan van Migrode, Chief Sheriff of the Keure; then there was Messire Lievin van Deynse, the brewer at the sign of the "Star of the North," and Baron van Groobendock, chief financial adviser on the Town Council.
They had waited on His Highness at a very early hour, but had been kept waiting in the guard-room for two hours, without a chair to sit on, and with a crowd of rough soldiers around them, some of whom were lounging about on the benches, others playing at cards or dice, whilst all of them improved the occasion and whiled away the time by indulging in insolent jests at the expense of the reverend burghers, who--humiliated beyond forbearance and vainly endeavouring to swallow their wrath--did not dare to complain to the officer in command, lest worse insults be heaped upon them.
At one hour before noon the seigniors were at last told very peremptorily that they might present themselves before His Highness. They were marched between a detachment of soldiers through the castle yard to the magnificent apartments in the Meeste-Toren, which at one time were occupied by the Counts of Flanders. Now the Duke of Alva's soldiery and his attendants were in every corridor and every ante-room. They stared with undisguised insolence at the grave seigniors who belonged to the despised race.
The Lieutenant-Governor was graciously pleased to receive the burghers in his council-chamber where, seated upon a velvet-covered chair upon an elevated platform and beneath a crimson dais, he looked down upon these free citizens of an independent State as if he were indeed possessed of divine rights over them all. The officer in command of the small detachment which had escorted the deputation into the dreaded presence, now ordered the five seigniors to kneel, and they, who had a petition to present and an act of mercy to entreat, obeyed with that proud humility wherewith their fathers had knelt thirty-two years ago in sackcloth and ashes before the throne of the Emperor Charles.
"Your desire, seigniors?" queried the Duke curtly.
Some of the members of his abominable Grand Council sat around him, on benches placed well below the level of the platform. Alberic del Rio was there--bland and submissive; President Viglius, General de Noircarmes, and President Hessels--men who were as bitter against Orange and his followers as was Alva himself--and, sitting a little apart from the others, don Juan de Vargas, but recently arrived from Brussels.
"Your desire, seigniors?" the Duke had questioned peremptorily, and after a few moments Messire Deynoot, the Procurator-General, who was spokesman of the deputation, began timidly at first--then gradually more resolutely.
"It is with profound grief," he said, "that we became aware last night that your Highness' visit to our city was not one of goodwill and amity. Your Highness' severe restrictions upon our citizens and stern measures taken against them hath filled our hearts with sorrow."
"Your abominable treachery hath filled our heart with wrath," retorted the Duke roughly, "and nothing but the clemency enjoined upon us by our suzerain Lord and King prevented us from reducing this accursed city to ashes and putting every one of her citizens to the sword, without giving them a single chance of retrieving their hellish conduct by surrendering themselves unconditionally to our will."
"It is with the utmost confidence," rejoined the Procurator-General humbly, "that we rely upon the well-known clemency of our suzerain Lord the King, and place the future of our beautiful city unconditionally in your Highness' hands."
"The future of the city is in my hands, Messire," said the Duke dryly, "by the power of our suzerain Lord and with the help of the troops at my command. I told you last night under what condition I will spare your town from total destruction. I am not in the habit of changing my mind during the course of one night."
"Alas, your Highness! but the city is quite unable to fulfil the one condition which would appease the wrath of our suzerain Lord and your own."
"Then," retorted Alva haughtily, "why waste my time and your own in bandying words which must remain purposeless? Either William of Orange is delivered into my hands, or my soldiers burn your city down at sunset to-morrow. By our Lady! is that not clear enough?"
"Clear enough, alas!" rejoined the Procurator-General, and suddenly in his mind there rose a picture of the tall man last night beneath the dais, of his inspiring words, his whole-hearted sacrifice: his ringing voice seemed to echo through this narrow room, and some of the words which he spoke knocked at the gates of the grave seignior's memory.
"Yours will be the harder task," he had said gaily; "you will have to fawn and to cringe, to swallow your wrath and to bend your pride!" Well! God knew that they had done all that: they had swallowed their wrath and bent their pride before an insolent soldiery, and now they were fawning and cringing to a tyrant whom they abhorred.
Ghent! beloved city! once the home of the free! what must thy citizens endure for thy sake?
And the Procurator-General--the descendant of an hundred free men--had to lick the dust before Alva's throne. He forced his voice to tones of humility, he looked up at the tyrant with eyes full of unspoken devotion.
"What can we do?" he said timidly, "to prove our loyalty? I entreat your Magnificence to look down on our helplessness. Orange is no longer in Ghent, and we do not know where to find him."
"A pretty tale, indeed," interposed de Vargas suddenly, with a strident laugh which was echoed obsequiously by the other members round the council board, "a pretty, likely tale, which I trust your Highness will not think to believe."
"I neither believe nor disbelieve any tale which these grave seigniors choose to tell me," rejoined the Duke. "I want Orange--or we burn this city down till not a stone in it be left upon stone."
And Messire Deynoot, whose entire soul rose in revolt against that rough dictate of a hellish tyrant, had perforce to subdue his passionate wrath and to speak with affected humility and unconcern.
"We had hoped," he said quietly, "that we might offer to your Highness such a proof of our loyalty that you would no longer wish to cast aside a city that hath always hitherto proved staunch and true."
"What mean you, sirrah? What proofs can you give me now of this accursed city's loyalty, when you harbour a veritable army of traitors within your walls?"
"We would wish to prove to your Magnificence that the city itself takes no part in the vagaries and plottings of a few hot-headed malcontents."
"Hot-headed malcontents, forsooth!" exclaimed the Duke fiercely. "Two thousand men prepared to take up arms against our Suzerain Lord the King! ... arms concealed in churches and cemeteries! money poured into the lap of Orange and all his rebels!"
"There are more than two thousand men who are prepared to fight and die for their country and their King," said the Fleming suavely, "and who are equally ready to pour money into the coffers of their Liege Lord, as represented by His Highness Ferdinand Alvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alva, and by the reverend members of his Council."
This he had said very slowly and with marked emphasis, and even while he spoke he had the satisfaction of seeing more than one pair of eyes round that Council board gloating with delight at the vision of treasure and wealth which his words had called forth. He and his colleagues had long after the assembly of last night discussed between them this one proposal, which might, they hoped, tempt the cupidity of the Spaniards, which they knew to be boundless. They were wealthy men all of them--the town was wealthy beyond the dreams of Alva's avarice, and the five men who had been deputed to offer up a brave man's life as the price of a city's safety, had resolved to sacrifice their last stiver, and keep the hero in their midst.
But Alva, with a sneer, had already destroyed all the fond hopes which had been built upon that resolve.
"If you offered me every treasure--to the last gulden--contained in your city," he said, with emphasis no less strongly marked than had been the other man's offer, "I would not deny myself the pleasure of razing this abominable nest of rebels to the ground. Why should I," he added with a cynical shrug of the shoulders, "take from you as a bribe what my soldiers can get for me by the might of fire and sword? Orange alone would tempt me, for I would wish to have him alive--we might kill him by accident when we destroy the town."
"We can collect two million gulden in gold," said Messire Deynoot insinuatingly, "and lay that sum at the feet of your Magnificence to-morrow."
"Ah?" said the Duke blandly, "then I am greatly relieved that so much money can be got voluntarily out of this city. Your words, Messire, are honey to mine ears; they prove, beyond a doubt, that if you can raise two million gulden in forty-eight hours my soldiers can put up ten times that amount in a two days' sacking of this town."
"The money voluntarily offered, Monseigneur," here interposed the Vice-Bailiff, "would shame neither the giver nor the receiver. The destruction of a free and loyal city would be an eternal disgrace upon the might of Spain."
"Spare me thy heroics, sirrah!" quoth Alva fiercely, "or I'll have that impudent tongue of thine cut out before nightfall."
And once more the burghers had to bend their pride before the appalling arrogance of their tyrant.
"Begone now!" added the Lieutenant-Governor peremptorily, seeing that the Flemings were silent for the moment. "The business of the State cannot be held up by such profitless talk. And if you have nothing better to offer to our Gracious King than money which is already his, why, then, you are wasting my time, and had best go back to those who sent you."
"No one sent us, Monseigneur," resumed the Procurator-General, with as much dignity as he could command, even though his back ached and his knees were painfully cramped. "We are free burghers of the city of Ghent, which, alas! hath earned your Highness' displeasure. We have offered of our treasure so as to testify to our loyalty ... but this offer your Magnificence hath thought fit to refuse. At the same time we are not at the end of our resources or of our protestations of loyalty. We have yet another offer to place before your Highness which, perhaps, may be more agreeable in your sight."
"And what is that offer, sirrah? Be quick about it, as my patience, of a truth, is at the end of its resources."
The Procurator-General did not make immediate reply. Truly he was screwing up his determination for the terrible ordeal which was before him. He hung his head, and, despite his fortitude--probably because of weakness following on fatigue--he felt that tears gathered in his eyes, and he feared that his voice now as he spoke would become unsteady. The others, too, kept their eyes fixed to the ground. They could not bear to look on one another, at this moment when they were about to offer up so brave and gallant a life in sacrifice for their city and for all the townsfolk. Indeed, Messire Deynoot ere he spoke forced his mind to dwell upon all the horrors of Mons and Valenciennes and Mechlin, upon all the women and children, the feeble and the old, his own wife, his daughters and his mother, so as to gather courage for the task which had been imposed upon him.
Thus there was silence for a minute or so in this narrow room, wherein the close velvet draperies made the air heavy, so that the number of men here assembled--Spaniards and Flemings and soldiers--felt as if an awful load was weighing their senses down. Councillor Hessels, as was his wont, had fallen asleep. He woke up in the oppressive silence in order to murmur drowsily: "To the gallows with them all!" Alva sat sullen and wrathful, looking down with contempt and scorn on the kneeling burghers before him. De Vargas, now and again, turned anxious, furtive eyes to where a rich portière of damask-velvet hid a door in the panelling of the wall. Even now it seemed as if that portiere stirred--as if an unseen hand was grasping it with a febrile nervous clutch--it seemed, in fact, as if some one lived and breathed there behind the curtain, and as if all that was said and would be said in the room would find its echo in a palpitating heart.
II
Anon the Duke of Alva's impatience broke its bounds: "An you'll not speak, sirrah," he cried, "get you gone! Get you gone, I say, ere I order my lacqueys to throw you out of my house."
"Your pardon, Monseigneur," said Messire Deynoot with sudden resolution, "I but paused in order to choose the words which might best please your ears. The offer which I am about to make to your Highness is in the name of all the citizens of Ghent, and I feel confident that your Highness will gladly acknowledge that no greater mark of loyalty could be offered by any town to our suzerain Lord the King."
"Speak!" commanded Alva.
"Next to the Prince of Orange himself," said the Procurator-General timidly, "is there not a man who hath gravely incurred your Highness' displeasure, but who hath hitherto evaded the punishment which your Highness would no doubt mete out to him?"
"Yes; there is!" replied the Duke curtly. "A man who chooses to wrap himself up in a mantle of mystery; a spy of Orange--a rebel and traitor to the King. There is such a man, sirrah! He hath several times thwarted my projects with regard to Orange. If, as you say, Orange is not in Ghent then hath that man had a hand in helping him to get away. Well! what of that man, sirrah? I want him. He is called Leatherface by my soldiers. What of him, I say?"
"Leatherface is in Ghent, Monseigneur," murmured Deynoot, scarce above his breath.
"Come! that's good! Then will our booty be even richer than we thought."
"Leatherface is in Ghent, Monseigneur," continued Deynoot, more steadily. "But he is an elusive creature. Mysterious agencies are at work, so they say, to enable him to escape the many traps that are set for him. He swims like a fish, and climbs like an ape. He entered the city last night, an hour after all the gates had been closed. In the terrible confusion which will attend the destruction of our city, he would escape again.... But just now he is in Ghent, and..."
"And you will deliver him over to me," broke in Alva with a harsh laugh, "if I will spare your city?"
The Procurator-General nodded his head in reply. His lips refused him service for that awful, that irreparable "Yes!" The five men now no longer hung their heads. White as the linen ruffles round their throats, they were gazing straight into the face of the tyrant, trying to read the innermost thoughts of that inhuman devil, who held the destiny of their city--or of a brave man--in the hollow of his claw-like hands.
Alva pondered; and while he did so his prominent, heavy-lidded eyes sought those of his colleagues no less inhuman, more devilish mayhap, than himself. And from behind the heavy portière there seemed to come a long drawn-out sigh, like some poor creature in pain. De Vargas frowned, and a muttered curse escaped his lips.
"How long has she been there?" asked Alva quickly, in a whisper.
"All the time," replied de Vargas, also under his breath.
"But this is not for women's ears."
"Nay! your Highness does not know my daughter. It was the man Leatherface who killed her first lover. She would be happy to see him hang."
"And she shall, too. She hath deserved well of us. We owe our present triumph to her."
Then he turned once more to the burghers.
"I like your offer," he said coldly, "and, in a measure, I accept it.... Nay!" he added with that cruel and strident laugh of his, seeing that at his words a certain look of relief overspread the five pale faces before him, "do not rejoice too soon. I would not give up the delight of punishing an entire city for the mere pleasure of seeing one man hang. True! I would like to hold him. Next to Orange himself, I would sooner see that mysterious Leatherface dangling on a gibbet than any other heretic or rebel in this abominable country. But to give up my purpose over Ghent, that is another matter! Once and for all, seigniors," he added with fierce and irrevocable determination, "Ghent shall burn, since Orange has escaped again. But I have said that I accept your offer, and I do. I take it as an expression of tardy loyalty, and will reward you in accordance with its value. We will burn your city, seigniors; but if when your flaming walls begin to crumble about your ears; when my soldiery have taken their fill of your money and your treasures, and human lives begin to pay the toll of your rebellion and treachery, then, if you deliver to me the person of Leatherface alive, I will, in return, stay my soldiers' hands, and order that in every homestead one son and one daughter, aye, and the head of the house, too, be spared. Otherwise--and remember that this is my last word--not one stone shall remain upon stone within the city--not one inhabitant, man, woman, or child, shall be left to perpetuate rebellion inside these walls. I have spoken, and now go--go and tell Leatherface that I await him. He hath not aided Orange's escape in vain."
He rose, and with a peremptory gesture pointed to the door. The five burghers were silent. What could they say? To beg, to implore, to remonstrate would, indeed, have been in vain. As well implore the fierce torrent not to uproot the tree that impedes its course, or beg the wolf not to devour its prey. Painfully they struggled to their feet, roughly urged along by the soldiers. They were indeed cramped and stiff, as well mentally as physically; they had done their heart-breaking errand--they had swallowed their wrath and humbled their pride--they had cringed, and they had fawned and licked the dust beneath the feet of the tyrant who was in sheer, lustful wantonness sending them and their kith and kin--guilty and innocent alike--to an abominable death.... And they had failed--miserably failed either to bribe, to cajole, or to shame that human fiend into some semblance of mercy. Now a deathlike sorrow weighed upon their souls. They were like five very old men sent tottering to their own graves.
Some could hardly see because of the veil of tears before their eyes.
But, even as one by one they filed out of the presence of the tyrant, they still prayed ... prayed to God to help them and their fellow-citizens in this the darkest hour of their lives. Truly, if these valiant people of Flanders had lost their faith and trust in God then they would have gone absolutely and irretrievably under into the awful vortex of oppression which threatened to crush the very existence of their nation, and would have hurled them into the bottomless abyss of self-destruction.
CHAPTER XV
TWO PICTURES
I
These stand out clearly among the mass of documents, details, dissertations and chronicles of the time--so clearly indeed that only a brief mention of them will suffice here.
First: Lenora in the small room which adjoined the council chamber within Het Spanjaard's Kasteel in Ghent. She had stood for close upon an hour under the lintel of the open door, her hand clinging to the heavy velvet portière; not one sound which came from the council chamber failed to strike her ear: every phase of that awesome interview between the supplicants and their vengeful tyrant struck at her heart, until at last unable to keep still, she uttered a moan of pain.
All this was his work! Not hers! Before God and her own conscience she felt that she could not have acted differently; that if it had all to be done again, she would again obey the still, insistent voice which had prompted her to keep her oath and to serve her King and country in the only way that lay in her power.
It was his work! not hers! His, whose whole life seemed to be given over to murder, to rebellion and to secret plottings, and who had tried to throw dust in her eyes and to cajole her into becoming a traitor too to all that she held dear.
It was his work, and the terrible reprisals which the Duke of Alva's retributive justice would mete out to this rebellious city lay at the door of those who had conspired against the State, and not at hers who had only been an humble tool in Almighty hands.
But in spite of her inner conviction that she had done right, in spite of her father's praise and approval which he had lavished on her all the way from Dendermonde to Ghent, she could not rid herself of a terrible sense of utter desolation and utter misery, and of a feeling of pity for all these poor people which caused her unendurable--almost physically unendurable--agony.
When anon the Lieutenant-Governor dismissed the burghers and after a few words with her father and señor del Rio left the council chamber, Lenora had a feeling as if the ground was opening before her, as if an awful chasm yawned at her feet into which she must inevitably fall if she dared look into it. And yet she looked and looked, as if fascinated by the hideousness of what she saw--pictures of cruelty and of evil far more horrible than any which had ever been limned of hell. And in the overwhelming horror which faced her now, she felt herself screaming aloud, with appealing defiance: "It is his work! not mine! Let the blood of his kinsfolk fall upon him--not me!" ere she tottered and fell back.
When full consciousness returned to her, her father was by her side. He looked pale and sullen and instinctively she drew away from him, whereat he smiled, showing his large teeth which looked like the fangs of a wolf.
"I ought never to have allowed you to come here, Lenora," he said roughly. "As His Highness said, it was not at all fit for women's ears."
"His Highness," she retorted coldly, "also said that to be here was my right ... your triumph to-day being all due to me."
"Well!" he added lightly, "'tis you wanted to come, remember."
"Yes," she said, "I wanted to come."
"I would have sent you to Brussels with Inez and a good escort. It is not too late. You can still go. Ghent will not be a fitting place for women during the next few days," he added, whilst a glow of evil satisfaction suddenly lit up his sallow face. "Would you prefer to go?"
"No, father, I thank you," she replied. "I would wish to stay."
"Ah! that's a brave daughter, and a true Spaniard," he cried, "and I promise you that you shall be satisfied with what you see. Ramon, your cousin, will be avenged more completely than even you could have dared to hope, and that assassin Leatherface will suffer: you shall see him dangling on a gibbet, never fear."
A slight shudder went right through her. Her face was as white as her gown; and as she made no reply, her father continued blandly:
"You little thought that your marriage would bring such a magnificent harvest of reprisals quite so soon! The city of Ghent and the man Leatherface! The destruction of the one and the death of the other are your work, my daughter."
She closed her eyes; for she saw that awful chasm once more yawning at her feet, and once more she felt herself falling ... falling ... with no one to cling to but her father who kept asking her whether she was satisfied with what she had done.... His voice came to her as through a shroud ... he talked and talked incessantly ... of Ghent ... of rebels ... of murder and pillage and gibbets and torture-chambers ... of women and children and fathers of families ... of sons and of daughters ... and of one--Leatherface ... of the High-Bailiff of Ghent ... of Laurence and of Mark ... her husband.
"I wonder where that fool is now," she could hear her father saying through a muffler which seemed to envelop his mouth. "On the high road to Brussels mayhap with a message from you to me ... did you say you had sent him on from Dendermonde or straight away from Ghent? I am half sorry I gave in to your whim and brought you here with me ... but 'tis you wanted to come ... eh, my girl? ... you were so obstinate ... I was weak enough to give in ... but I ought not to have let you listen to those mealy-mouthed Flemings! ... ah! you are my true daughter ... you wanted to see these traitors punished, what? and Ramon's murder avenged! Well! you shall see it all, my dear, I promise you.... But I wish you could tell me what has become of that fool of a husband of yours ... we shall have to know presently if you are still wife or widow...."
He said this quite gaily and laughed at his own jest, and Lenora, pale and wild-eyed, echoed his laugh. She laughed as she had done two nights ago at Dendermonde when a face made up of lighted windows grinned at and mocked her across the Grand' Place. She laughed until the whole room began to dance a wild galliarde around her, until her father's face appeared like one huge, mocking grin.
Then she just glided from the couch down on to the floor. And there she lay, white and inert, whilst señor de Vargas, cursing the megrims of women, went calmly in search of help.
II
The second picture has for background the refectory in the convent of St. Agneten at the same hour as when last night the newly chosen, mysterious leader had roused boundless enthusiasm in the hearts of all his hearers. There is no lack of enthusiasm now either, but tempers are more subdued--gloom hangs over the assembly, for Messire the Procurator-General has just given a graphic account of his mission to the Lieutenant-Governor.
When he has finished speaking, the man with the mask who sits at the head of the table at the top of the long, low room, asks quietly:
"Then he refused?"
All the five men who this morning had knelt humbly before the tyrant, exchange silent glances, after which Messire Deynoot says firmly:
"He refused."
"Nothing will save our city," insisted Leatherface solemnly, "except if we track the Prince of Orange and bring him bound and a prisoner to the feet of Alva?"
"Nothing! save Orange's person will move Alva from his resolve."
Leatherface sits for a moment quite still, with his head buried in his hands: and the vast crowd now assembled in the room waits in breathless silence for his next word. There are far more than two thousand men here this night; the number has indeed been more than doubled. The deadly danger which threatens the city has already brought over three thousand new recruits to the standard.
Suddenly with a resolute gesture Leatherface draws his mask away and rises to his feet in full view of all the crowd.
"Mark van Rycke!" comes as one cry from several hundred throats.
"Aye!" he says with a light laugh, "your ne'er-do-well and frequenter of taverns was just the watch-dog of our noble Prince. Unknown I was able to render him some small service. Now that you are no longer called upon to throw me as a bait to the snarling lion, I'll resume mine own identity, and hereby ask you, if--knowing me for what I am--you still trust me to lead you to victory or to death?"
"To victory!" shout the younger men enthusiastically.
"To die like men," murmur the older ones.
"To-morrow we fight, seigniors!" says Mark earnestly, "to-morrow we defend our homes, our wives, our daughters, with scarce a hope of success. To-morrow we show to the rulers of the world how those of the down-trodden race can die whilst fighting for God and liberty."
"To-morrow!" they all assent with unbounded enthusiasm.
The ardour of a noble cause is in their veins. Not one of them here hesitates for one second in order to count the cost. And yet every one of them know that theirs is a forlorn cause. How can a handful of burghers and apprentices stand up before the might of Spain? But they are men at bay! they--the sober burghers of a fog-ridden land, steady, wise of counsel, without an ounce of impetuosity or hot-headedness in their blood; and yet they are ready to go into this desperate adventure without another thought save that of selling their lives and the honour of their women folk as dearly as they can.
For leader they have a man! for help they have only God! For incentive they have their own dignity, their pride, their valour ... for weapon they have the justice of their cause, and the right to die like men.
CHAPTER XVI
THE RIGHT TO DIE
I
And after the lapse of three hundred and more years the imagination projects itself into that past so full of heroic deeds, so full of valour and of glory, and stands still wondering before the glowing pictures which the insurrection of Ghent reveals.
Memory--the stern handmaiden of unruly imagination--goes back to that 21st day in October 1572 and recalls the sounds and sights which from early dawn filled the beautiful city with a presage of desolation to come; the church bells' melancholy appeal, the deserted streets, the barred and shuttered houses, the crowds of women and children and old men sitting at prayer in their own halls, the peaceful folk of a prosperous city quietly preparing for death.
At four o'clock in the afternoon the Duke of Alva rides out of the Kasteel with his staff and his bodyguard, which consists of three squadrons of cavalry, one bandera of Spanish infantry--halberdiers and pikemen--and five companies of harquebusiers, The Bandes d'Ordonnance--the local mounted gendarmerie--are on duty in the Vridachmart, and thither the Duke repairs in slow and stately majesty through silent streets, in which every window is shuttered, and where not one idler or gaffer stands to see him pass by. A cruel, ironical smile curls his thin lips beneath the drooping moustache as he notes the deserted aspect of the place.
"Terror," he mutters to himself, "or sulkiness. But they cannot eat their money or their treasures: and there must be a vast deal of it behind those walls!"
On the Vridachmart he halts with his armed escort grouped around him, the Bandes d'Ordonnance lining the market place, his standard unfurled behind him, his drummers in the front. Not a soul out upon the mart--not a head at any of the windows in the houses round! It seems as if Don Frederic Alvarez de Toledo, Duke of Alva, Lieutenant-Governor of the Netherlands and Captain-General of the Forces, was about to read a proclamation to a city of the dead.
A prolonged roll of drums commands silence for His Highness--silence which already is absolute--and then the Duke, in his usual loud and peremptory voice, demands the immediate surrender of the Prince of Orange now an outlaw in the town. And suddenly from every house around the huge market comes the answering cry: "Come and take him!" And from every doorway, from every adjoining street men come rushing along--with pikes and halberds and muskets, and from end to end of the town the defiant cry arises: "Come and take him!"
The Bandes d'Ordonnance, hastily summoned by the Duke to keep back the rabble, turn their arms against the Spanish halberdiers. Taking up the cry of "Come and take him!" they go over in a body to the side of the insurgents.
At once the Walloon arquebusiers are ordered to fire. The rebels respond this time with their own battle cry of "Orange and Liberty!" and a death-dealing volley of musketry. Whereupon the mêlée becomes general; the cavalry charges into the now serried ranks of the Orangists who are forced momentarily to retreat. They are pushed back across the mart as far as the cemetery of St. Jakab. Here they unfurl their standard, and their musketeers hold their ground with unshakable valour, firing from behind the low encircling wall with marvellous precision and quickness whilst two bodies of halbertmen and pikemen pour out in numbers from inside the church, and their artillerymen with five culverins and three falconets emerge out of the Guild House of the Tanners which is close by, and take up a position in front of the cemetery.
Alva's troops soon begin to lose their nerve. They were wholly unprepared for attack, and suddenly they feel themselves both outnumbered and hard-pressed. The Duke himself had been unprepared and had appeared upon the Vridachmart with less than two thousand men, whilst the other companies stationed in different portions of the city had not even been warned to hold themselves in readiness.
And just when the Spanish cavalry upon the Market Square is beginning to give ground the cry of "Sauve qui peut" is raised somewhere in the distance.
The Spanish and Walloon soldiery quartered in the various guild-houses, the open markets or private homesteads were just as unprepared for attack as was the garrison of the Kasteel. They had been promised that as soon as the evening Angelus had ceased to ring they could run wild throughout the city, loot and pillage as much as they desired, and that until that hour they could do no better than fill their heads with ale so as to be ready for the glorious sacking and destruction of the richest town in the Netherlands. Therefore, a goodly number of them--fresh from Mechlin--have spent the afternoon in recalling some of the pleasurable adventures there--the trophies gained, the treasure, the money, the jewels all lying ready to their hand. Others have listened open-mouthed and agape, longing to get to work on the rich city and its wealthy burghers, and all have imbibed a great quantity of very heady ale which has fuddled their brain and made them more and more drowsy as the afternoon wears on. Their captains too have spent most of the day in the taverns, drinking and playing hazard in anticipation of loot, and thus the men are not at the moment in touch with their commanders or with their comrades, and all have laid aside their arms.
And simultaneously with the mêlée in the Vridachmart, the insurgents have made a general attack upon every guild-house, every market, every tavern where soldiers are quartered and congregated. With much shouting and to-do so as to give an exaggerated idea of their numbers they fall upon the unsuspecting soldiers--Walloons for the most part--and overpower and capture them before these have fully roused themselves from their afternoon torpor; their provosts and captains oft surrender without striking a blow. In almost every instance--so the chroniclers of the time aver--fifty and sixty men were captured by a dozen or twenty, and within half an hour all the guild-houses are in the hands of the Orangists, and close on fifteen hundred Walloons are prisoners in the cellars below; whilst all the arms stowed in the open markets go to swell the stores of the brave Orange men.
But some of the Walloons and Spaniards contrive to escape this general rounding up and it was they who first raised the cry of "Sauve qui peut!"
Now it is repeated and repeated again and again: it echoes from street to street; it gains in volume and in power until from end to end of the city it seems to converge toward the Vridachmart in one huge, all dominating wave of sound: "Sauve qui peut!" and the tramp of running feet, the calls and cries drown the clash of lance and pike.
Suddenly the bowmen of the Orangists scale the low cemetery wall as one man and their defence is turned into a vigorous onslaught: the cavalry is forced back upon the market square, they catch up the cry: "Sauve qui peut! They are on us!Sauve qui peut!" They break their ranks--a panic hath seized them--their retreat becomes a rout. The Orangists are all over the cemetery wall now: they charge with halberd and pike and force the Spaniards and Walloons back and back into the narrow streets which debouch upon the Schelde. Some are able to escape over the Ketel Brüghe, but two entire companies of Spanish infantry and a whole squadron of cavalry are--so Messire Vaernewyck avers--pushed into the river where they perish to the last man.
II
At this hour all is confusion. The picture which the mind conjures up of the stricken city is a blurred mass of pikes and lances, of muskets and crossbows, of Spaniards and Walloons and Flemings, of ragged doublets and plumed hats--a medley of sounds: of arrows whizzing with a long whistling sound through the air, of the crash of muskets and clash of lance against lance, the appeal of those who are afraid and the groans of those who are dying--of falling timber and sizzling woodwork, and crumbling masonry, and through it all the awful cry of "Sauve qui peut!" and the sound of the tocsin weirdly calling through the fast gathering night.
And amidst this helter-skelter and confusion, the Duke of Alva upon his black charger--untiring, grim, terrible--tries by commands, cajoleries, threats, to rally those who flee. But the voice which erstwhile had the power to make the stoutest heart quake had none over the poltroon. He shouts and admonishes and threatens in vain. They run and run--cavalry, infantry, halbertmen and lancers--the flower of the Spanish force sent to subdue the Netherlands--they run; and in the general vortex of fleeing cavalry the Duke is engulfed too, and he is carried along as far as the Ketel Brüghe, where he tries to make a stand.
His doublet and hose are covered with mud and grime; his mantle is torn, his hat has fallen off his head and his white hair floats around his face which is as pale as death.
"Cowards!" he cries with fierce and maddened rage: "would you fly before such rabble?" But his voice has lost its magic; they do not heed him--they fly--past him and over the bridge to the safety of Het Spanjaard's Kasteel.
Then prudence dictates the only possible course, or capture might become inevitable. Cursing savagely and vowing more bitter revenge than ever before, the Duke at last wheels his horse round and he too hastens back to the stronghold--there to work out a plan of campaign against the desperate resistance of that handful of Flemish louts whom His Highness and all Spanish grandees and officials so heartily despise.
III
Half an hour later, and we see courier after courier sent flying from Het Spanjaard's Kasteel to every corner of the city.
The city gates--thank the God of the Spaniards!--have been well garrisoned and well supplied with culverins and balls, it is from there that help must come, for--strange to tell--those louts have actually invested the Kasteel and have the pretension to lay a regular siege to the stronghold.
Was there ever such a farce? A couple of thousand of an undisciplined rabble--they surely cannot be more--daring to pit themselves against a picked guard! Courier to the Waalpoort where Lodrono is in command! courier to the Braepoort!--Serbelloni is there with two culverins of the newest pattern and two hundred musketeers, the like of whom are not known outside the Spanish army!
The only pity is that the bulk of the forces inside the city are Walloons! such poltroons as they have already proved themselves, surrendering in their hundreds to those confounded rebels! they have been scattered like flies out of a honey-pot, and the entire centre of the city is in the hands of the Orangists. But, anyway, the whole affair is only a question of time; for the moment the evening is closing in fast and the position cannot therefore be improved before nightfall; but in the morning a general closing-in movement, from the gates toward the centre would hold the rebels as in a claw and break their resistance within an hour. In the meanwhile the morale of the troops must be restored. Attend to that, ye captains at the city gates!
Courier follows courier out of the gate-house of the Kasteel: naked men, ready to crawl, to swim, or to dive, to escape the vigilance of the Orangist lines. Impossible! Not one is able to cross the open ground beyond the castle moat; the houses on the further bank of the Schelde are filled with Orangists; bows and muskets are levelled from every window. The culverins are down below, covered by the angles of the cross-streets; the messengers either fall ere they reach the Schelde or are sent back the way they came.
Attend to the morale of your men, ye captains at the city gates! The Duke of Alva, with some three or four thousand men, is inside the Kasteel, and no orders or communication can be got from him now before morning. And just like the flies when driven out of the honey, fly, scared, to the edges of the pot, so the Walloon soldiers, those who have escaped from the guild-houses, go and seek refuge in the shadow of the guard-houses at the gates. But the tactics of the Orangists have worked upon their nerves. At first there had appeared but a rabble upon the Vridachmart, but since then the numbers are swelling visibly; insurgents seem to be issuing out of every doorway, from under every arch in the city ... they rush out with muskets and crossbows, with pikes and halberds; and to the Walloons--already unnerved and fatigued--their numbers appear to be endless and their arms of a wonderful precision. Their muskets are of the newest pattern such as are made in Germany, and these they use with marvellous skill, discharging as many as ten shots in one quarter of an hour, and none but the picked French musketeers have ever been known to do that.
And they are led by a man who seems to know neither fatigue nor fear. Here, there and everywhere he appears to the Walloon and Spanish soldiers like a mysterious being from another world. He wears no armour, but just a suit of leather which envelopes him from head to foot, and his face is hidden by a leather mask. His voice rings from end to end of the market place one moment; the next he appears inside the enclosure of the cemetery. Now he is at St. Pharaïlde and anon back at St. Jakab. Three of Alva's couriers hastily despatched to the commandants at the various gate-houses fall to his pistol, which is the only weapon he carries, and it is he who leads the last attack on the Ketel Brüghe which results in the flight of Alva and all his cavalry to the safe precincts of the Kasteel.
Before the evening Angelus has ceased to ring, the whole of the centre of the city is swept clear of Alva's troops, and the insurgents have completely surrounded the Kasteel. Darkness finds the Orangists bivouacking in the open markets and along the banks of the Schelde and the Leye with their artillery still thundering against Alva's stronghold and the gate-houses of the city, like bursts of thunder-clouds in a storm. The mantle of night has fallen over a vast hecatomb of dead and dying, of Walloons and Flemings and Spaniards, of brothers who have died side by side, with muskets raised in fratricide one against the other, and of women and children who have died of terror and of grief.