The Duke of Marlborough lost no time in utilizing the advantages
gained by the victory of Blenheim. He at once raised the siege of
Ingoldstadt, which, when all the country was in his power, must
sooner or later surrender, and detached a portion of the force
which had been there engaged to besiege Ulm, an important fortress
on the Danube. Then with the bulk of his army he marched to the
Rhine, crossed at Philipsburg on the 6th of September, and advanced
towards Landau.
Marshal Villeroi had constructed an entrenched camp to cover the
town; but on the approach of the victor of Blenheim he fell back,
leaving Landau to its fate. Marlborough followed him, and made
every effort to bring the French to a battle; but Villeroi fell
back behind the Lauter, and then behind the Motter, abandoning
without a blow one of the strongest countries in Europe.
On the 11th of September Ulm surrendered, with 250 pieces of
cannon; and upon the following day, Landau was invested. The Prince
of Baden with 20,000 men conducted the siege, and Marlborough and
Eugene with 30,000 covered the operations. Marlborough, however,
determined on ending the campaign, if possible, by driving the
French beyond the Moselle, and leaving Prince Eugene with 18,000
men, marched with 12,000 men on the 14th of October.
After a tremendous march through a wild and desolate country, he
arrived with his exhausted troops at Treves on the 29th, one day
before the arrival of 10,000 French, who were advancing to occupy
it. The garrison of 600 men in the citadel evacuated it at his
approach. He immediately collected and set to work 6000 peasants to
restore the fortifications. Leaving a garrison, he marched against
the strong place of Traesbach. Here he was joined by twelve Dutch
battalions from the Meuse; and having invested the place, he left
the Prince of Hesse to conduct the siege--which speedily ended in
the surrender of the place--and marched back with all haste to
rejoin Prince Eugene.
Leaving Eugene to cover the siege of Landau, Marlborough now
hurried away to Hanover and Berlin, to stimulate the governments of
Hanover and Prussia to renewed exertion; and by his address and
conciliatory manner succeeded in making arrangements for 8000 fresh
Prussian troops to be sent to the imperial armies in Italy, as the
Duke of Savoy had been reduced to the last extremity there by the
French.
The Electress of Bavaria, who had been regent of that country since
her husband left to join the French, had now no resource but
submission, and she accordingly agreed to disband her remaining
troops, and to make peace.
The Hungarian insurrection was suppressed by Austria, now able to
devote all its attention to that point: and Landau surrendered
towards the end of November, when its garrison was reduced from
7000 to 3500, who became prisoners of war.
All these decisive results arose from the victory of Blenheim. Had
the British Government during the winter acceded to Marlborough's
request, and voted men and money, he would have been able to march
to Paris in the next campaign, and could have brought the war to an
end; but the mistaken parsimony then, as often since, crippled the
British general, allowed the French to recover from their disaster,
prolonged the war for years, and cost the country very many times
the money and the men that Marlborough had asked for to bring the
war to a decisive termination.
But while the English and Dutch governments refused to vote more
money or men, and the German governments, freed from their pressing
danger, became supine and lukewarm, the French, upon the contrary,
set to in an admirable manner to retrieve the disasters they had
suffered, and employed the winter in well-conceived efforts to take
the field with a new army, to the full as strong as that which they
had lost; and the fruits of Blenheim were, with the exception of
the acquisition of a few fortresses, entirely thrown away.
At the battle of Blenheim, Rupert Holliday escaped untouched, but
Hugh was struck with a fragment of shell, and severely wounded. He
was sent down the Rhine by water to the great military hospital
which had been established at Bonn; and Rupert, who was greatly
grieved at being separated from his faithful follower, had the
satisfaction of hearing ere long that he was doing well.
Rupert had assigned him as orderly a strong, active young fellow,
named Joe Sedley, who was delighted at his appointment, for the
"little cornet" was, since his defeat of the German champion, the
pride of the regiment. Joe was a Londoner, one of those fellows who
can turn their hand to anything, always full of fun, getting
sometimes into scrapes, but a general favourite with his comrades.
The campaign over, Rupert, who was now a lieutenant, asked and
obtained leave to go home for the winter; he had long since been
reconciled with his mother; and it was two years and a half since
he had left home. Hugh and Joe Sedley had also obtained leave, upon
Rupert's application on their behalf.
On his way down Rupert resolved to pay a visit for a few days to
his kind friends at Dort. They had written begging him to come and
see them; and a postscript which Maria had put in her last letter
to him, to the effect that she had reason to believe that her old
persecutor was in the neighbourhood, and that her father had taken
renewed precautions for her safety, added to his desire to visit
Dort.
"That fellow's obstinacy is really admirable in its way," Rupert
said, on reading this news. "He has made up his mind that there is
a fortune to be obtained by carrying off Maria van Duyk, and he
sticks to it with the same pertinacity which other men display in
the pursuit of commerce or of lawful trade, or that a wild beast
shows in his tireless pursuit of his prey."
Had it not been for the postscript, Rupert would have deferred his
visit to Dort until after his return from England, but the news
caused him serious uneasiness. He knew but too well the
unscrupulous nature of this desperate man, whom he had heard of
since his last attempt upon his life as being a leader of one of
the bands of freebooters who, formed of deserters and other
desperate men, frequented the Black Forest, the Vosges mountains,
the Ardennes, and other forests and hill districts. That he would
dare lead his band down into the plains of Holland, Rupert had no
fear; still he could have no difficulty in finding men of ruined
fortunes even there to join in any wild attempt.
Leaving the army when it went into winter quarters, Rupert
travelled by land to Bonn, and there picked up Hugh, who was now
completely restored to health, and then, taking boat, journeyed
down the Rhine. Then he took horse again, and rode to Dort.
Mynheer van Duyk and Maria were delighted to see him; and Hugh and
Sedley were hospitably received by the servants, with whom Hugh
had, on the occasion of his last visit, made himself a prime
favourite.
For the first day of their arrival Rupert had all the talking to
do, and his adventures to relate from the time he set sail from
Dort. He had of course written from time to time, but his letters,
although fairly full, did not contain a tithe of the detail which
his friends were anxious to learn. The next morning, after
breakfast, he asked his host if he was unwell, for he looked worn
and anxious.
"I am well in body, but disturbed in mind," he said. "Six months
ago I stood well with my fellow citizens, and few were more popular
in Dort than myself. Now, save among the better class, men look
askance at me. Subtle whispers have gone abroad that I am in
correspondence with France; that I am a traitor to Holland; that I
correspond with the Spanish at Antwerp. In vain have I tried to
force an open accusation, in order that I might disperse it. The
merchants, and others of my rank, scoff at these rumours, and have
in full council denounced their authors as slanderers; but the
lower class still hold to their belief. Men scowl as I walk along;
the boys shout 'Traitor!' after me; and I have received threatening
letters."
"But this is abominable," Rupert said, hotly. "Is there no way of
dealing with these slanderers?"
"No," the merchant said; "I see none, beyond living it down. Some
enemy is at work, steadily and powerfully."
"Have you any enemy you suspect?"
"None, save indeed that rascal countryman of yours. He is
desperate, and, as you know, relentless. My house has always been
guarded by six stout fellows since we returned from the Hague; and
any open attempt to carry off my daughter would be useless. It is
difficult to see what he proposes to himself by stirring up a party
against me; but he might have some scheme which we cannot fathom.
Our Dutchmen are slow but obstinate, and once they get an idea in
their head it is difficult to discharge."
"You do not fear any public tumult, surely?" Rupert said.
"I do not anticipate it, and yet I regard it as possible," Van Duyk
said. "The people in our town have been given to bursts of frenzy,
in which some of our best men have been slain."
"Why don't you go down to the Hague again till this madness has
passed by?"
"I cannot do that. My enemies would take advantage of it, and might
sack my house and warehouses."
"But there is the burgher guard; and all the respectable citizens
are with you."
"That is true enough," the merchant said; "but they are always slow
to take action, and I might be killed, and my place burnt before
they came on to the ground. I will send Maria with you down to the
Hague to her aunt's. If this be the work of the man we wot of, it
may be that he will then cease his efforts, and the bad feeling he
has raised will die away; but in truth, I shall never feel that
Maria is safe until I hear that his evil course has come to an
end."
"If I come across him, I will bring it to an end, and that
quickly," Rupert said, wrathfully. "At any rate, I think that the
burgomaster ought to take steps to protect the house."
"The council laugh at the idea of danger," Van Duyk said. "To them
the idea that I should be charged with dealing with the enemy is so
supremely ridiculous that they make light of it, and are inclined
to think that the state of things I describe is purely a matter of
my own imagination. If I were attacked they would come as quickly
as they could to my aid; but they may be all too late.
"There is one thing, Rupert. This enemy hates you, and desires your
death as much as he wishes to carry off my daughter, and through
her to become possessed of my money bags. If, then, this work is
his doing, assuredly he will bring it to a head while you are here,
so as to gratify both his hate and his greed at once."
"It is a pity that you cannot make some public statement, that
unless your daughter marries a man of whom you approve you will
give her no fortune whatever."
"I might do that," Van Duyk said; "but he knows that if he forced
her to marry him, I should still give her my money. In the second
place, she has a large fortune of her own, that came to her through
her mother. And lastly, I believe that it is not marriage he wishes
now, for he must be sure that Maria would die rather than accept
him, but to carry her off, and then place some enormous sum as a
ransom on condition of her being restored safe and unharmed to me.
He knows that I would give all that I possess to save her from his
hands."
"The only way out of it that I see," Rupert said, "is for me to
find him, and put an end to him."
"You will oblige me, Rupert, if, during the time you remain here,
you would wear this fine mail shirt under your waistcoat. You do
not wear your cuirass here; and your enemy might get a dagger
planted between your shoulders as you walk the streets. It is
light, and very strong. It was worn by a Spanish general who fell,
in the days of Alva, in an attack upon Dort. My great-grandfather
shot him through the head, and kept his mail shirt as a trophy."
"It is a useful thing against such a foe as this," Rupert said,
putting it on at once. "I could not wear it in battle, for it would
be an unfair advantage; but against an assassin all arms are fair."
During the day Rupert went out with his host, and the scowling
looks which were turned upon the latter convinced him that the
merchant had not exaggerated the extent to which the feeling of the
lower class had been excited against him. So convinced was he of
the danger of the position, that, to the immense surprise of Hugh
and Joe Sedley, he ordered them to lie down at night in their
clothes, with their swords and pistols ready by them. With eight
armed men in the house--for four of the porters engaged in the
merchant's warehouse slept on truckle beds placed in the
hall--Rupert thought that they ought to be able to repel any
assault which might be made.
It was on the fourth night after Rupert's coming to Dort, that he
was aroused by a touch on his shoulder. He leapt to his feet, and
his hand, as he did so, grasped his sword, which lay ready beside
him.
"What is it?" he exclaimed.
"There is mischief afloat," Van Duyk said. "There is a sound as of
a crowd in front of the house. I have heard the tramp of many
footsteps."
Rupert went to the window and looked out. The night was dark, and
the oil lamps had all been extinguished; but it seemed to him that
a confused mass filled the place in which the house stood.
"Let me get the men under arms," he said, "and then we can open the
window, and ask what they want."
In two minutes he returned.
"Now, sir, let us ask them at once. They are probably waiting for a
leader or order."
The merchant went to the window, and threw it open.
"Who is there?" he asked. "And what means this gathering at the
door of a peaceful citizen?"
As if his voice had been the signal for which they waited, a roar
went up from the immense crowd. A thunder of axes at the door and
shutters, and a great shout arose, "Death to the traitor! Death to
the Frenchmen!"
Shots were fired at the windows, and at the same moment the alarm
bell at the top of the house pealed loudly out, one of the serving
men having previously received order to sound the signal if needed.
In answer to the alarm bell, the watchman on the tower, whose duty
it was to call the citizens from their beds in case of fire, struck
the great bell, and its deep sounds rang out over the town. Two
minutes later the church bells joined in the clamour; and the bell
on the town hall with quick, sharp strokes called the burgher guard
to arms.
Van Duyk, knowing now that all that could be done had been
effected, ran to his daughter's room, bade her dress, and keep her
door locked until she heard his voice, come what may. Then he ran
downstairs to join the defenders below.
"The shutters are giving everywhere," Rupert cried. "We must hold
this broad staircase. How long will it be, think you, before the
burgher guard are here?"
"A quarter of an hour, maybe."
"We should beat them back for that time," Rupert said. "Light as
many lights as you can, and place them so as to throw the light in
their faces, and keep us in the shade."
In two or three minutes a smashing of timber and loud shouts of
triumph proclaimed that the mob were effecting an entrance.
"For the present I will stand in front, with one of these good
fellows with their axes on each side of me. The other two shall
stand behind us, a step or two higher. You, Hugh and Joe, take post
with our host in the gallery above with your pistols, and cover us
by shooting any man who presses us hard. Fire slowly, pick off your
men, and only leave your posts and join me here on the last
necessity."
They had just taken the posts assigned to them when the door fell
in with a crash, and the mob poured in, just as a rush took place
from the side passages by those who had made their way in through
the lower windows.
"A grim set of men," Rupert said to himself.
They were indeed a grim set. Many bore torches, which, when once
need for quiet and concealment was over, they had lighted.
Dort did a large export trade in hides and in meat to the towns
lying below them, and it was clear that it was from the butchers
and skinners that the mob was chiefly drawn. Huge figures, with
poleaxes and long knives, in leathern clothes spotted and stained
with blood, showed wild and fierce in the red light of the torches,
as they brandished their weapons, and prepared to assault the
little band who held the broad stairs.
Rupert advanced a step below the rest, and shouted:
"What means this? I am an officer of the Duke of Marlborough's
army, and I warn you against lifting a hand against my host and
good friend Mynheer van Duyk."
"It's a lie!" shouted one of the crowd. "We know you; you are a
Frenchman masquerading in English uniform.
"Down with him, my friends. Death to the traitors!"
There was a rush up the stairs, and in an instant the terrible
fight began.
On open ground, Rupert, with his activity and his straight sword,
would have made short work of one of the brawny giants who now
attacked him, for he could have leapt out of reach of the
tremendous blow, and have run his opponent through ere he could
again lift his ponderous axe. But there was no guarding such
swinging blows as these with a light sword; and even the advantage
of the height of the stairs was here of little use.
At first he felt that the combat was desperate. Soon, however, he
regained confidence in his sword. With it held ever straight in
front of him, the men mounting could not strike without laying open
their breasts to the blade. There must, he felt, be no guarding on
his part; he must be ever on the offensive.
All this was felt rather than thought in the whirl of action. One
after another the leaders of the assailants fell, pierced through
the throat while their ponderous axes were in the act of
descending. By his side the Dutchman's retainers fought sturdily,
while the crack of the pistols of Hugh, Joe Sedley, and the master
of the house were generally followed by a cry and a fall from the
assailants.
As the difficulty of their task became more apparent, the yells of
fury of the crowd increased. Many of them were half drunk, and
their wild gestures and shouts, the waving of their torches, and
the brandishing of knives and axes, made the scene a sort of
pandemonium.
Ten minutes had passed since the first attack, and still the stairs
were held. One of the defenders lay dead, with his head cloven to
his shoulders with a poleaxe, but another had taken his place.
Suddenly, from behind, the figure of a man bounded down the stairs
from the gallery, and with a cry of "Die, villain!" struck Rupert
with a dagger with all his strength, and then bounded back into the
gallery. Rupert fell headlong amid his assailants below.
Hugh and Joe Sedley, with a shout of rage and horror, dashed from
their places, sword in hand, and leaping headlong down the stairs,
cutting and hewing with their heavy swords, swept all opposition
back, and stood at the foot, over the body of Rupert.
The three Dutchmen and Van Duyk followed their example, and formed
a group round the foot of the stairs. Then there was a wild storm
of falling blows, the clash of sword and axe, furious shouts, loud
death cries, a very turmoil of strife; when there was a cry at the
door of "The watch!" and then a loud command:
"Cut the knaves down! Slay every man! Dort! Dort!"
There was a rush now to escape. Down the passages fled the late
assailants, pursued by the burgher guard, who, jealous of the
honour of their town, injured by this foul attack upon a leading
citizen, cut down all they came upon; while many who made their
escape through the windows by which they had entered, were cut down
or captured by the guard outside. The defenders of the stairs made
no attempt at pursuit.
The instant the burgher guard entered the hall, Hugh and Joe threw
down their bloodstained swords, and knelt beside Rupert.
"Ough!" sighed the latter, in a long breath.
"Thank God! He is not dead."
"Dead!" Rupert gasped, "not a bit of it; only almost trodden to
death. One of my stout friends has been standing on me all the
time, though I roared for mercy so that you might have heard me a
mile off, had it not been for the din."
"But are you not stabbed, Master Rupert?"
"Stabbed! No; who should have stabbed me? One of you somehow hit me
on the back, and down I went; but there is no stab."
"He had a dagger. I saw it flash," Hugh said, lifting Rupert to his
feet.
"Had he?" Rupert said; "and who was he?
"If it was an enemy, it is your coat of mail has saved me," he
continued, turning to Van Duyk. "I have never taken it off since.
But how did he get behind me I wonder?
"Run," he continued energetically, "and see if the lady is safe.
There must have been mischief behind."
Mynheer van Duyk, closely followed by the others, ran upstairs to
his daughter's room. The door was open. He rushed into the room. It
was empty. The window was open; and looking out, two ladders were
seen, side by side.
It was clear that while the fray had been raging, Maria von Duyk
had been carried off.