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 melee 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 melee 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 Brueghe, 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 Brueghe, 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. Pharailde 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 Brueghe 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.
IV
And memory conjures up the vision of the tyrant, the author of all this
desolation, riding slowly through the portal of the gate-house into the
yard of Het Spanjaard's Kasteel a quarter of an hour or so ere the
darkness of the night will finally cover all the abomination and the
crimes, the murder, the misery and the bloodshed which the insatiable
tyranny of this one man has called down upon a peaceable and
liberty-loving people.
He rides with head erect, although fatigue and care are writ plainly on
his ashen cheeks and the wearied stoop of his shoulders. His horse has
received a wound in the flank from which the blood oozes and stains its
rider's boots. Here in the castle-yard, some semblance of order has
been brought about through the activity of the captains. The horses have
been stabled in the vaulted cellars, the men have found quarters in
different parts of the Kasteel; the musketeers and arquebusiers are up
on the walls, the artillery well-screened behind the parapets.
The night has called a halt to men, even in the midst of barren
victories and of unlooked-for defeat, and their sorrow and their hurts,
their last sigh of agony or cry of triumph have all been equally
silenced in her embrace; but over the city the sky is lurid and glowing
crimson through a veil of smoke; the artillery and musketry have ceased
their thundering; but still from out the gloom there come weird and
hideous noises of hoarse shouts and cries of "Mercy" and of "Help," and
from time to time the sudden crash of crumbling masonry or of charred
beams falling in.
But Alva pays no heed to what goes on around him. He swings himself
wearily out of the saddle and gives a few brief orders to the captains
who press close beside his stirrup, anxious for a word or a look of
encouragement or of praise. Then he curtly asks for water.
Don Sancho de Avila, captain of the castle guard, hands him the leather
bottle and he drinks greedily.
"We are in a tight corner, Monseigneur," whispers de Avila under his
breath.
"Hold thy tongue, fool!" is Alva's rough retort.
Whereupon the captain stands aside more convinced than before that
disaster is in the air.
The Duke had been the last to turn his back on the Ketel Brueghe and to
retire into the stronghold of the Kasteel. The banks of the Schelde by
now are lined with the ranks of the insurgents, and it was a musket shot
fired from the Vleeshhuis that wounded his horse--close to the
saddle-bow. His quivering lips, and the ashen hue of his face testify
to his consciousness of danger.
But his brow clears perceptibly when he sees Juan de Vargas coming out
to meet him.
"Where is thy daughter?" he asks as soon as the other is within earshot.
"In chapel, I imagine," replies de Vargas.
"No woman should be abroad this night," says Alva dryly. "Send for her
and order her to remain within her apartments."
"She has been tending the wounded, and will wish to do so again."
"Well! let her keep to the castle-yard then."
"You are not anxious, Monseigneur?"
"No. Not anxious," replies Alva with a fierce oath, "we can subdue
these rebels of course. But I would I had brought Spanish soldiers with
me, rather than these Walloon louts. They let themselves be massacred
like sheep or else run like poltroons. Vitelli declares he has lost
over a thousand men and at least a thousand more are prisoners in the
various guild-houses--probably more. We ought never to have lost ground
as we did," he adds sullenly, "but who would have thought that these
louts meant to fight?"
"Who, indeed?" retorts de Vargas with a sneer, "and yet here we are
besieged in our own citadel, and by a handful of undisciplined
peasants."
"Nay! their triumph will be short-lived," exclaims Alva savagely. "We
have over two thousand men inside the Kasteel and surely they cannot be
more than three thousand all told unless..." He broke off abruptly,
then continued more calmly: "Darkness closed in on us ere reprisals
could commence ... if I had more Spaniards with me, I would try a sortie
in the night and catch these oafs in their sleep ... but these Walloons
are such damnable fools and such abominable cowards.... But we'll fight
our way through in the morning, never fear!"
"In the meanwhile cannot we send to Dendermonde for reinforcements? The
garrison there is all Spanish and..."
"How can we send?" Alva breaks in savagely. "The way is barred by the
artillery of those bandits--save upon the north and north-east, where
that awful morass nearly half a league in length and width is quite
impassable in autumn. No! we cannot get reinforcements unless we fight
our way through first--unless one of the commandants at the gates has
realised the gravity of the situation. Lodrono at the Waalpoort has
intelligence," he continues more calmly, "and Serbelloni hath
initiative--and by the Mass! if one of them doth not get us quickly out
of this sorry place, I will have them all hanged at dawn upon their
gates!"
The Duke of Alva's fierce wrath is but a result of his anxiety. He
holds the Netherlanders in bitter contempt 'tis true! He knows that
to-morrow perhaps he can send to Dendermonde for reinforcements and can
then crush that handful of rebels as he would a fly beneath his iron
heel. He would have his revenge--he knew that--but he also knew that
that revenge would cost him dear. He has fought those Flemish louts, as
he calls them, too often and too long not to know that when the day
breaks once more he will have to encounter stubborn resistance, dogged
determination and incalculable losses ere he can subdue and punish these
men who have nothing now to lose but their lives--and those lives his
own tyranny has anyhow made forfeit.
V
De Vargas makes no further comment on his chief's last tirade:
remembering his daughter, he goes to transmit to her the order
formulated by the Duke. Lenora is in the chapel, and, obedient to her
father's commands, she rises from her knees and returns, silent and
heavy-footed, to her apartments.
The hours drag on like unto centuries; she has even lost count of time;
it is forty-eight hours now since she held Mark's wounded arm in her
hand and discovered the awful, the hideous truth. Since then she has
not really lived, she has just glided through the utter desolation of
life, hoping and praying that it might finish soon and put an end to her
misery.
She had acted, as she believed, in accordance with God's will! but she
felt that her heart within her was broken, that nothing ever again would
bring solace to her soul. That long, miserable day yesterday in
Dendermonde whilst she was waiting for a reply from her father had been
like an eternity of torment, and she had then thought that nothing on
earth or in hell could be more terrible to bear. And then to-day she
realised that there was yet more misery to endure, and more and more
each day until the end of time, for of a truth there would be no rest or
surcease from sorrow for her, even in her grave.
The one little crumb of comfort in her misery has been the companionship
of Grete; the child was silent and self-contained, and had obviously
suffered much in her young life, and therefore understood the sorrows of
others--knew how to sympathise, when to offer words of comfort, and when
to be silent.
Though Inez was a pattern of devotion, her chattering soon grated on
Lenora's nerves; and anon when don Juan de Vargas agreed to allow his
daughter to come with him to Ghent, Lenora arranged that Grete be made
to accompany her and that Inez be sent straight on to Brussels. The
girl--with the blind submission peculiar to the ignorant and the
down-trodden--had consented; she had already learned to love the
beautiful and noble lady, whose pale face bore such terrible lines of
sorrow, and her sister Katrine and her aunt both believed that the child
would be quite safe under the immediate protection of don Juan de
Vargas. Inez was sent off to Brussels, and Lenora and Grete are now the
only two women inside the Kasteel.
Together they flit like sweet, pale ghosts amongst the litters of straw
whereon men lie groaning, wounded, often cursing--they bandage the
wounds, bring water to parched lips, pass tender, soothing hands across
feverish foreheads. Then, at times, Lenora takes Grete's rough little
hand in hers, and together the women wander out upon the ramparts. The
sentries and the guard know them and they are not challenged, and they
go slowly along the edge of the walls, close to the parapets and look
down upon the waters of the moat. Here the dead lie in their hundreds,
cradled upon the turgid waters, washed hither through the narrow canals
by the more turbulent Schelde--their pale, still faces turned upwards to
the grey evening light. And Lenora wonders if anon she will perceive a
pair of grey eyes--that were wont to be so merry--turning sightless orbs
to the dull, bleak sky. She scans each pale face, with eyes seared and
tearless, and not finding him whom she seeks, she goes back with Grete
to her work of mercy among the wounded only to return again and seek
again with her heart torn between the desire to know whether the one man
whom she hates with a bitter passion that fills her entire soul hath
indeed paid the blood-toll for the dastardly murder of Ramon, or whether
God will punish her for that irresistible longing which possesses her to
hold that same cowardly enemy--wounded or dying--assassin though he
be--for one unforgettable moment in her arms.
VI
But it is not desolation that reigns in the refectory of the convent of
St. Agneten, for here the leaders of the rebellion have assembled, as
soon as the guns have ceased to roar. The numbers of their followers
since last night have increased by hundreds, and still the recruits come
pouring in. Those men who but four days ago had received the Prince of
Orange's overtures with vague promises and obvious indifference, rushed
to arms after the first musket shot had been fired. Ever since the
attack in the Vridachmart men have loudly clamoured for halberts or
pikes or muskets, and the captains at the various secret depots, as well
as the guild of armourers, had much ado to satisfy all those who longed
to shed their blood with glory rather than be massacred like insentient
cattle. They are men who have fought at Gravelines and St. Quentin, and
have not forgotten how to shoulder musket or crossbow or how to handle a
culverin. Since then, fifteen years of oppression, of brow-beating, of
terrorising, fifteen years under the yoke of the Inquisition and of
Spanish tyranny have worn down the edge of their enthusiasm.
When Orange begged for money and men that he might continue the fight
for liberty, the goodly burghers of Ghent forgot their glorious
traditions and preferred to bend their neck to the yoke rather than risk
the fate of Mons and of Mechlin. But now that danger is within their
doors, now that they and their wives and daughters are at the mercy of
the same brutal soldiery whom Alva and de Vargas take pleasure in
driving to bestial excesses and inhuman cruelties, now that they realise
that the fate of Mechlin is already inevitably theirs--their dormant
courage rises once more to its most sublime altitude. Die they
must--that they know!--how can they, within the enclosure of their own
city walls, stand up against the armies of Spain, which can at any
moment be brought up in their thousands to reinforce the tyrant's
troops? But at least they will die with muskets or pikes in their
hands, and their wives and daughters will be spared the supreme outrage
which they count worse than death.
Thus close on five thousand volunteers file past their leaders this
night in the refectory of St. Agneten and tender their oath of
allegiance to fight to the last man for Orange and liberty. On the
faces of those leaders--of Messire van Beveren, of Lievin van Deynse, of
Laurence van Rycke and Jan van Migrode, there is plainly writ the
determination to keep up the fight to the end, and the knowledge that
the end can only be death for them all.
But in Mark van Rycke's deep-set eyes there is something more than mere
determination. There is a latent belief that God will intervene--there
is a curious exultation in their merry depths--a kind of triumphant
hope: and those who stand before him and swear that they will fight for
Orange and liberty with the last drop of their blood look him straight
in the face for a moment and then turn away feeling less grim and more
courageous with a courage not altogether born of despair.
The angel of liberty has unsheathed his sword and infused his holy
breath into these men--easy-going burghers for the most part, untrained
soldiers or even undisciplined rabble--who have dared to defy the might
of Alva.
VII
And when the first streak of dawn folds the night in its embrace and
lifts from off the stricken city the veil of oblivion and of sleep, we
see some five thousand Orangists prepared to stand up before Alva's
forces which still number close on eight. The streets are littered with
dead, with pikes and lances hastily cast aside, with muskets and plumed
bonnets, with broken rubbish and wheelless wagons, and scraps of cloth
or shoes or leather belts.
And in the cemetery of St. Jakab the flag of liberty still flaunts its
blazing orange in the pale morning light and around it men still rally,
defiant and unconquered. The Guild House of the Tanners close by is in
flames, and the tower of St. Jakab a crumbling ruin; the hostel of St.
Juan ten Dullen is a charred mass of debris, and the houses that front
on the Vridachmart a fast crumbling heap of masonry and glass.
The situation of the insurgents is more desperate than even Alva knows.
Of their three captains, Pierre van Overbeque is dead, Jan van Migrode
severely wounded, and Laurence van Rycke exhausted. Of their company of
halberdiers, all the provosts except two have fallen. The investing
lines around the Kasteel have five officers killed and twenty of their
artillerymen have fallen. Six hundred of their wounded encumber the
Vridachmart. The narrow streets which debouch upon the gates are
deserted save by the dead.
But as soon as the rising day hath touched the ruined tower of St. Jakab
with its pale silvery light, Mark van Rycke, their commander, intrepid
and undaunted, wakes the sleeping echoes with his cry: "Burghers of
Ghent! to arms! we are not vanquished yet!"
A volley of arrows from the crossbowmen upon the Waalpoort answers the
defiant cry: one arrow pierces a loose corner of Mark's doublet.
"Van Rycke!" cries the provost who stands nearest to him, "spare thyself
in the name of God! What shall we do if you fall?"
And Mark, unmoved, the fire of enthusiasm unquenched in his eyes, cries
loudly in response:
"Do? What alone can burghers of Ghent do in face of what lies before
them if they give in? Do? Why, die like heroes--to the last man."
His doublet hangs from him in rags, his hose is torn, his head bare, his
face black with powder. He grasps musket or crossbow, halberd, lance or
pike, whichever is readiest to his hand, whichever company hath need of
a leader; a beam from the burning building has fallen within a yard of
him and singed his hair: "Heroes of Ghent!" he cries, "which of you will
think of giving in?"
The morning Angelus begins to ring. For a few minutes while the pure
clear tones of the church bells reverberate above the din of waking men
and clash of arms, Spaniards and Walloons and Flemings pause in their
hate and their fight in order to pray.
Up in the council chamber of the Kasteel, Alva and de Vargas and del Rio
on their knees mock the very God whom they invoke, and when the last
"Amen!" has left their lips, Alva struggles to his feet and murmurs
fiercely:
"And now for revenge!"
Through the wide open windows, he gazes upon the spires and roofs of the
beautiful city which he hath sworn to destroy. Already many of these
are crumbling ruins, and from far away near the church of St. Jakab a
column of black smoke rises upwards to the sky. The windows give upon
an iron balcony which runs along the entire width of the Meeste-Toren:
from this balcony an open staircase leads down into the castle-yard.
The yard and vaulted cellars opposite are filled with horses, and the
corridors of the palace swarm with men. And as the Duke, anon, steps
out upon the balcony he sees before him the five breaches in the
castle-walls which testify to the power of the insurgents' culverins.
He hears the groans of the wounded who lie all round the walls upon the
litters of straw, he sees the faces of innumerable dead, floating
wide-eyed upon the waters of the moat, and the carcasses of horses in
the yard which add to the horror of the scene by their pathetic
hideousness.
And seeing all this, he hath not a thought of pity for all the innocent
whom he vows to punish along with the guilty.
"Now for revenge!" he reiterates fiercely and shakes a clenched fist
toward the tower of St. Jakab, "and if only I had my Spaniards with me,
we would have burned the town down before now."
VIII
The day drags on in the weary monotony of incessant firing, incessant
fighting--constant attacks to be repulsed, numbers of wounded to be
added to those who already encumber the yard--numbers of dead to be
added to those who encumber the waters of the moat.
The finest general the victorious Spanish armies have ever known is
besieged in his stronghold by a few hundred undisciplined, untaught,
unseasoned rebel troops. What is happening beyond the wide tract of
open ground which lies all round the Kasteel the Duke cannot get to
know. The Orangist lines are all round him screened by the buildings
which face the further bank of the Schelde; and though his culverins
have turned the magnificent Vleeshhuis into a smoking ruin, those of the
Orangists have made serious havoc in the castle walls.
The last onslaught delivered a couple of hours after noonday resulted in
the crumbling together of three of the widest breaches already existing,
making one huge yawning cavity, which has to be strongly and
persistently defended--a defence which exacts an enormous toll of
wounded and dead every time the Orangist artillery and musketry return
to the attack.
"We cannot hold out till nightfall!" Captain de Avila cries
despairingly. "We have lost two hundred men in less than two hundred
minutes. If we get no help we are undone!"
"Help!" cries Alva fiercely, "where are we to get help from if those
oafs at the city gates do not find us some?"
On the north-east side of the Kasteel lies the open way to
Dendermonde--where Captain Gonzalo de Bracamonte is quartered with a
garrison of five thousand men, and between that open way of salvation,
and those who hold the Kasteel, there lies a league of spongy morass.
The way through it is free from the Orangist musketry. Nature alone
bars it, and does so effectually.
Three times to-day has Alva tried to send runners through that way.
Stripped to the skin they are lowered by ropes from the parapet, and at
first find firm foothold at the base of the walls. From up above Alva
and his captains watch the naked men who walk on boldly, proud of their
achievement; their skins shine like metal beneath the grey, autumnal sky
on which the smouldering ruins of a devastated city have painted a
crimson tint. Alva watches them until they appear as mere black dots
upon the low horizon--tiny black specks that move for a while, slowly
along, with arms swinging as the mud gets deeper and walking heavier.
Then suddenly the speck ceases to move ... the arms are thrown up with
frantic wheelings and beatings of the air ... sometimes the speck will
turn and move back slowly toward the castle, but more often than not it
grows shorter and shorter still, till even the tall arms
disappear--engulfed in the morass.
Three times have men been sent out on this errand of death ... three or
four at a time ... twice has one man come back from those hideous,
yawning jaws of a loathsome death--livid, covered with green slime,
trembling in every limb as if stricken with ague. After that, men
refuse to go ... Alva commands and threatens ... another batch go off
... another spectre returns from the shores of another world.... Then
the men are obstinate ... to insist, to command, to threaten further
would provoke mutiny, and the stronghold once more lapses into utter
isolation.
The din of musketry from end to end of the city drowns every other
sound, smoke from smouldering ruins obscures the view beyond the
Schelde. What has happened in the centre of the city during all these
hours, whilst the high and mighty Lieutenant-Governor and
Captain-General of the Force of Occupation is a virtual prisoner in the
hands of the rebels, he himself cannot possibly tell.
"The rebels have lost more heavily than we have," says de Avila, whilst
he snatches a brief rest during the afternoon, "and they must be getting
short of powder."
"So are we," says Alva grimly.
"Surely Captain Lodrono has come in touch with Captain Serbelloni by
now. It is inconceivable that the garrisons at the gate-houses can do
nothing."
"Those Netherlanders are fighting like devils," says de Vargas with his
evil sneer, "they have nothing to lose ... they know that they are
doomed, every man, woman and child of them ... aye! if I had my way,
every man who speaks the Flemish tongue."
"Aye!" retorts Alva with a curse, "but in the meanwhile, if Serbelloni
or Lodrono have not sent a runner to Dendermonde, those Flemish louts
will carry this castle by storm, and when I am a prisoner in their
hands, they'll either slaughter us all or dictate their own terms."
"Ah!" says Avila quietly, "they have not got the Kasteel yet."
"How long can we hold out?" queries de Vargas, who at Alva's grimly
prophetic words, had become livid with fear.
"Unless those rebels have lost more heavily than we hope, we cannot hold
out more than another few hours. We still have three thousand men and a
goodly stock of powder.... The breach we can defend with stones of
which there is a large store; we killed or wounded over a hundred of
those louts at their last assault ... we can go on like this until
nightfall. But if at dawn they attack us again in full force--and we
lose many more men to-day ... why..."
"Hold thy tongue," cried Alva fiercely, for at the senior captain's
words, many of the younger ones have exchanged quick, significant
glances. "Shall I have to hang some of my captains so as to discourage
the men from playing the coward too?"
IX
The evening Angelus has just ceased to ring, and a man is ushered into
the presence of the Captain-General; he is naked, and his body is
covered with sticky mud and dripping with slime; his face is hardly
recognisable through a thick mask of sweat and grime.
"I come from Braepoort, Magnificence," he says in a low, quaking voice,
for obviously he is all but exhausted. "I ran round the town, and struck
into the morass ... I am a man of Ghent ... I know a track ... that's
why Captain Serbelloni sent me."
"With what news?" queries Alva impatiently.
"None too good, Magnificence," replies the man. "The commandants at the
gates are sorely pressed ... I hailed the guard at the Bruegge and
Waalpoorts as I passed ... they are isolated ... every one of them ...
and each separately attacked by bands of rebels who fight
desperately.... The Braepoort cannot hold out much longer ... Captain
Serbelloni asks for help even before nightfall."
"Help?" vociferates Alva savagely, "how can I send them help? We are
besieged in this accursed place; we cannot fight our way through the
rabble, unless some of those oafs at the city gates come to our
assistance. Help? 'Tis I want help here."
"The gates are being bravely defended, Magnificence. But the rebels
still hold the centre of the city. They have seized 'Sgravensteen. Two
thousand Walloons have surrendered to them..."
"Two thousand!" exclaims Alva with a fierce oath, "the miserable
poltroons."
"At least three thousand rebels threaten the Kasteel."
"I know that well enough," retorts Alva roughly. "They have made five
breaches in our wall! ... the bandits! Help! 'tis I want help!" he
reiterates with a loud curse.
"Captain Serbelloni bade me tell your Highness that he hath sent to
Dendermonde for immediate reinforcements. He hoped your Highness would
forgive him if he hath done wrong."
Alva's eyes flash a look of satisfaction, but he makes no immediate
comment. Not even his colleagues--not even de Vargas his
intimate--should see how immense is his relief.
"Did he send a mounted man," he asks after a while, "or two? Two would
be better in case a man gets hurt on the way."
"The Captain sent three men, Magnificence. But they had to go on foot.
We have no horses at the gates. The insurgents rounded them all in long
before nightfall. But the men hope to pick up one or more on their
way."
Alva, as is his wont, smothers a savage curse. The small body of
Spanish cavalry which he had with him in the town had been the first to
run helter-skelter over the Ketel Brueghe into the Kasteel, whilst a
whole squadron perished in the Schelde. One of those horses down there
in the yard would mean reinforcements within a few hours.
"When did the messenger start for Dendermonde?" he asks again.
"When the Angelus began to ring at noon, Magnificence."
"Why not before?"
"The captain was undecided. He thought that every moment would bring
help or orders from your Highness. He also tried to send messengers to
Captain Lodrono at the Waalpoort, but the messengers must all have been
intercepted and killed, for no help came from anywhere."
"Dost know if the message which thy captain sent to Dendermonde was
couched in urgent terms?"
"I believe so, Magnificence. The senor captain was growing very
anxious."
Once more the Duke is silent; his brows contract in an anxious frown.
His active brain is busy in making a mental calculation as to how soon
those reinforcements can arrive. "The men will have to walk to
Dendermonde," he muses, "and cannot get there before nightfall.... the
commandant may start at night ... but he may tarry till the morrow....
It will be the end of the day before he and his men are here ... and in
the meanwhile..."
"At the Braepoort?" he queries curtly, "how many of the guard have been
killed?"
"We had a hundred and twenty killed when I left, Magnificence, and over
three hundred lay wounded on the bridge. We have suffered heavily,"
adds the man after a slight moment of hesitation--the hesitation of the
bearer of evil tidings who dreads his listener's wrath.
Alva remains silent for a moment or two, then he says abruptly: "Dost
know that I have half a mind to kill thee, for all the evil news which
thou hast brought?"
Then he laughs loudly and long because the man, with a quick cry of
terror has made a sudden dash for the open window, and is brought back
by the lance of the provost on guard upon the balcony. The pleasure of
striking terror into the hearts of people has not yet palled upon his
Magnificence.
"If I had a whole mind to kill thee," he continues, "thou wouldst have
no chance of escape. So cease thy trembling and ask the provost there
to give thee water to cleanse thyself, food to put inside thy belly and
clothing wherewith to hide thy nakedness. Then come back before me.
I'll give thee a chance to save thy life by doing a service to thy
King."
He makes a sign to one of the provosts, who seizes the man roughly by
the shoulders and incontinently bundles him out of the room.
In the council chamber no one dares to speak. His Highness has become
moody, and has sunk upon his high-backed chair where he remains inert
and silent, wrapped in gloomy meditations, and when he is in one of
those sullen moods no one dares to break in on his thoughts--no one
except senor de Vargas, and he too is as preoccupied as his chief.
X
"De Vargas!" says Alva abruptly after a while, "dost mind that to-morrow
is not only Sunday, but the feast of the Blessed Redeemer and a holy day
of obligation?"
"Aye, Monseigneur," replied de Vargas unctuously, "I am minded that if
we do not go to Mass to-morrow, those of us who die unabsolved of the
sin will go to hell."
"The men are grumbling already," breaks in don Sancho de Avila, captain
of the bodyguard. "They say they will not fight to-morrow if they
cannot go to Mass."
"Those Walloons..."
"Not only the Walloons, Monseigneur," rejoins de Avila, "the Spaniards
are better Catholics than all these Netherlanders. They fear to die
with a mortal sin upon their soul."
Nothing more is said just then; the grey day is already yielding to
dusk; the fire of artillery and musketry is less incessant, the clash of
pike and halberd can be heard more distinctly, and also the cries of the
women and the groans of the wounded and the dying.
A few moments later a tall, lean man in the borrowed dress of a Spanish
halberdier is ushered into the presence of the council. Water, food and
clothes have effected a transformation which Alva surveys critically,
and not without approval. The man--lean of visage and clean of
limb--looks intelligent and capable; the Duke orders him to advance.
"'Tis good for thee," he says dryly, "that thy death is more
unprofitable to me than thy life. I want a messenger ... art afraid to
go to the miserable wretch who dares to lead a rebel horde against our
Sovereign King?"
"I am afraid of nothing, Magnificence," replies the man quietly, "save
your Highness's wrath."
"Dost know where to find the rebel?"
"Where musket-balls fly thickest, your Highness."
"Then tell him," says Alva curtly, "that as soon as the night has fallen
and the fire of culverins and muskets has ceased, I will have the
drawbridge at the south-east of this castle lowered, and I will come
forward to meet him, accompanied by my captains and the members of my
council. Tell him to walk forward and meet me until we are within
earshot of one another: and to order his torch-bearers to throw the
light of their torches upon his face: then will I put forward a proposal
which hath regard to the eternal salvation of every man, woman and child
inside this city. Tell him to guard his person as he thinks fit, but
tell him also that from the ramparts of this Kasteel three hundred
muskets will be aimed at his head, and at the slightest suspicion of
treachery the order will be given to fire. Dost understand?"
"Every word, your Highness," says the man simply.
"Then go in peace," concludes Alva, and the man is dismissed.
XI
An hour later the drawbridge at the south-east gate of the Kasteel was
lowered. Twilight had now faded into night; the dull, grey day had
yielded to black, impenetrable night. Here and there far away in the
heart of the city lurid lights shot through the darkness, and every now
and then a column of vivid flame would strike up to the dense black sky,
and for a while illumine the ruined towers, the shattered roofs and
broken chimneys around ere it fell again, sizzling in the damp
atmosphere.
The Duke of Alva rode out in the gloom; he was seated upon his black
charger, and was preceded by his torch-bearers and by his bodyguard of
archers. Behind him walked his captains and the members of his council.
The procession slowly wended its way under the portal of the gate-house
and then over the bridge. At the farthest end of the bridge the Duke
reined in his horse, and his bodyguard, his captains and the members of
his council all stood behind him so that he immediately faced the tract
of open ground beyond which were the Orangist lines.
The flickering light of resin torches illumined the commanding figure of
the Duke, dressed in sombre clothes and silk-lined mantle, and wearing
breast and back plates of armour, with huge tassets over his wide
breeches and open steel morion on his head. To right and left far away,
toward the open country, the bivouac fires of the insurgents gleamed
weirdly in the night.
All noise of fighting had ceased, and a strange silence had fallen over
the city--a silence which hid many secrets of horror and of despair.
Suddenly something began to move, something that at first appeared
darker than the darkness of the night; a few moments later it appeared
as a speck of ruddy light which moved quickly--now toward the castle
bridge; anon it was distinguishable as a group of men--a dozen or
so--with a couple of torchbearers on in front, the light from whose
torches fell full upon a tall figure which stood out boldly amongst the
others. Now the group came to a halt less than fifty paces away, and
those upon the bridge could see that tall figure quite clearly; a man in
ragged doublet and hose, with grimy hands and face blackened with
powder; he held his head very erect and wore neither helmet nor armour.
At sight of him, de Vargas gave a cry of rage and surprise.
"Mark van Rycke!" he exclaimed. "What hath he to do with it all?"
"Thy daughter's husband," said Alva coolly. "Nay, then we'll soon make
her a widow."
But to the Orangists he called peremptorily: "'Tis with the rebel whom
ye call Leatherface that I wish to speak."
"I have been known as Leatherface hitherto," retorts Mark van Rycke
coolly. "Speak without fear. I listen."
Vargas' cry of rage was echoed by more than one Spanish captain present.
They remembered Mark van Rycke, the ne'er-do-well with whom they had oft
drunk and jested in the taverns of Ghent and Brussels, aye! and before
whom they had oft talked openly of their plans.
"Spy as well as rebel!" they cried out to him wrathfully.
"Pity he cannot hang more than once," added de Vargas with bitter spite.
But to Alva the personality of the rebel was of no consequence. What
cared he if the man was called van Rycke and was the husband of his
friend's daughter? There stood an abominable rebel who had gained by
treachery and stealth a momentary advantage over the forces of his
suzerain Lord the King, and who would presently suffer along with the
whole of this insurgent city the utmost rigour of Alva's laws! In the
meanwhile he deigned to parley with the lout, for he was sore pressed
inside the Kasteel, and the messengers who were speeding to Dendermonde
for reinforcements could not possibly bring help for at least another
four-and-twenty hours.
Therefore, now he--the Lieutenant-Governor of the Netherlands and
Captain-General of His Majesty's forces--demanded attention in the name
of the King.
"Do ye come as traitors?" he asked in a loud voice, "or as loyal men?
If as traitors ye shall die ere ye advance another step. But if ye are
loyal men, then listen, for I will speak with you in amity and peace."
"Thou knowest best, Magnificence," came Mark's clear voice out of the
group, "if we are loyal men or no. Thou didst send an emissary to us;
he goeth back to thee unhurt: thou standest before our bowmen even now
and not an arrow hath touched thine armour. We are loyal men and are
prepared to listen to what ye have to say."
"Listen then," resumed the Duke curtly, "but let no false hopes lure ye
the while. Ye are rebels and are under the ban of the law. Nothing but
unconditional surrender can win mercy for your city."
"Nothing but humility can save thee from the wrath of God," retorted
Mark boldly. "We are unconquered, Magnificence! and 'tis thou who
askest to parley--not we."
"I do not ask," retorted Alva loudly, "I demand."
"Then since 'tis the vanquished who demand, let us hear what they wish
to say."
"To-morrow is Sunday, rebel, hadst forgotten that?"
"No, tyrant, I had not. God hath forbidden us to work on that day, but
not to fight against oppression."
"He hath also enjoined us to attend Mass on His day. Are ye heretics
that ye care naught for that?"
"We care for the Lord's Day as much as Spaniards do."
"Yet will ye prevent His people from praying in peace!"
"We'll pray for those whom thy tyranny keeps locked up within thy castle
walls."
"Not so," exclaims Alva, "my men are free to go: they will attend Mass
in the churches of this city. Will you butcher them whilst they are at
prayer?"
There was no immediate reply to this taunt, but from the insurgents'
ranks there came a loud, warning call:
"Do not heed him, van Rycke! Remember Egmont and Horne! Do not fall
into the tyrant's trap! There's treachery in every word he says."
Alva waited in silence until the tumult had subsided. He knew what he
wanted and why he wanted it. A few hours' respite would mean salvation
for him ... a few hours! ... and the garrison of Dendermonde would be on
its way to Ghent. He wanted to stay the hand of time for those few
hours and had invented this treacherous means to gain that end.
"'Tis no wonder," he said quietly as soon as the clamour on the Orangist
side was stilled, "that ye who are traitors should seek treachery
everywhere. What I propose is loyal and just and in accordance with
God's own decrees. If ye refuse, ye do so at the peril of thousands of
immortal souls."
"We know not yet what it is ye ask," said van Rycke quietly.
"We demand a truce until the evening Angelus to-morrow--the Lord's Day
which is also the feast of the Holy Redeemer. We demand the right to
attend Mass in peace ... and in exchange we'll agree not to molest you
whilst ye pray and whilst ye bury your dead."
"A truce until the evening Angelus," broke in Mark hotly, "so that ye
may send for reinforcements to the nearest garrison town. We refuse!"
"You refuse?" retorted Alva. "For two days and a night ye have raised
your arms against your lawful King. If you fight to-morrow you will add
sacrilege to your other crimes."
"And thou, treachery to thine!" said van Rycke boldly. "Whence this
desire to keep holy the Sabbath day, tyrant? Wouldst thou have ceased to
destroy, to pillage or to outrage this day if we had not raised our arms
in our own defence?"
"Well said, van Rycke!" cried the Orangists.
"The immortal souls which your obstinacy would send to hell," said the
Duke of Alva, "will return and haunt you till they drag you back with
them."
"Can you not pray in your Kasteel?" retorted Mark.
"We have no priest to say Mass for us."
"We will send you one."
"We have no consecrated chapel."
"The priest will say Mass in your castle-yard, beneath the consecrated
dome of heaven. The Walloon prisoners whom we have taken are receiving
the ministry of our priests in the guild-houses where they are held."
"Nay! but such makeshift would not satisfy the children of Spain who are
also the chosen children of the Church. But," continued Alva with a
sudden assumption of indifference, "I have made my proposal. Take it or
not as ye list. But remember this: the dead who lie unburied in your
streets will have their revenge. Pestilence and disease will sweep your
city of your children, as soon as we have vanquished your men."
"Treachery!" cried some of the Orangists, "do not heed him, van Rycke."
But of a truth the cry was not repeated quite so insistently this time.
Alva's last argument was an unanswerable one. Pestilence these days was
a more formidable foe than the finest artillery wielded by a powerful
enemy: there were over two thousand dead lying unburied in the city at
this hour: as the tyrant said very truly, these would take a terrible
revenge. And there was something too in the sanctity of the Lord's Day
which touched the hearts of these men who were deeply religious and
devout and had a profound respect for the dictates of the Church. Most
of them were Catholics--the importance of attending Mass on the Lord's
Day on pain of committing a deadly sin weighed hard upon their
conscience. Alva was quick to note the advantage which he had already
gained, and when the first dissentient voice among the Orangists was
heard to say: "A truce can do no harm and 'twere sacrilege to fight on
the Lord's Day," he broke in quickly:
"Nay! 'tis not fighting ye would do, but murder. Aye! murder on the Day
of the Holy Redeemer who died that ye should live.... My men are
Catholic to a man! not one of them but would far rather let himself be
butchered than commit a deadly sin. Rebels, who have outraged your
King, to-morrow morning the church bells will be calling the faithful to
the Holy Sacrifice: the truce which you refuse to hold with us we will
grant you of our own free will. We will not fight you on the day of the
feast of the Holy Redeemer. But to-morrow every Spaniard and every
Walloon in our armies will go unarmed and present himself at your church
doors. I--even I--with my captains and the members of the King's
Council will attend Mass at the church of St. Baafs and we will be
unarmed, for we shall have placed ourselves under the care of the Holy
Redeemer Himself. And now tell thy soldiers, rebel, tell them that
Spaniards and Walloons will be in the churches of Ghent in their
thousands and that they will be defenceless save for the armour of
prayer which will encompass them as they kneel before the altar of God!"
"And in the meanwhile," retorted van Rycke, "ye will be sending to
Dendermonde and Alost and Antwerpen: and when after the evening Angelus
we take up arms once more against your tyranny, there will be five
thousand more Spaniards at our gates."
"By the Holy Redeemer whom I herewith invoke," said Alva solemnly and
raised his hand above his head with a gesture of invocation, "I swear
that no messenger of mine shall leave the city before ye once more take
up arms against your King. I swear that no messenger of mine hath left
this city for the purpose of getting help from any garrison town, and
may my soul be eternally damned if I do not speak the truth."
Those who were present at this memorable interview declare that when
Alva registered this false and blasphemous oath a curious crimson light
suddenly appeared in the East--so strong and lurid was it that the
perjurer himself put up his hand for a second or two as if blinded by
the light. Philip de Lannoy, seigneur de Beauvoir, assures us that the
light was absolutely dazzling and of the colour of blood, but that he
took it as a warning from God against the sacrilege of fighting on this
holy day, and that it caused him to add the weight of his influence with
Mark van Rycke to grant the truce which the Spaniards desired.
Undoubtedly, the solemn oath spoken by the tyrant who was such a devout
and bigoted Catholic greatly worked upon the feelings of the Orangists:
never for a moment did the suspicion of the oath being a false one enter
their loyal heads: nor must they be blamed for their childish confidence
in a man who had lied to them and deceived them so continuously for the
past five years. They were so loyal themselves, such a trap as Alva was
setting for them now was so far from their ken, that it was impossible
for them to imagine such appalling treachery: as for the sanctity of an
oath, they would as soon have thought of doubting the evidence of their
own eyes.
Mark van Rycke, it is true, held out to the last. He knew these
Spaniards better than those simple burghers did: not in vain had he
spent his best years in the uncongenial task of worming out their secret
plans--their treacherous devices--over tankards of ale and games of
hazard in Flemish taverns. He mistrusted them all, he mistrusted Alva
above all! he had no belief in that execrable monster's oath.
"God is on our side!" he said quietly, "we'll bury our dead when we can,
and pray when God wills. He'll forgive the breaking of His Sabbath for
the justice of our cause.
"They are weary of the fight," he added obstinately, "we are not."
But already every one of his friends was urging him to grant the truce:
"For the sake of our women and children," said van Deynse who voiced the
majority, "let there be no fighting to-morrow. The tyrant has pledged
his immortal soul that he will not play us false. No man would dare to
do that unless he meant to be true."
"Rebel!" now shouted Alva impatiently, "I await thine answer."
"Accept, van Rycke, accept," cried the Orangists unanimously now, "it is
God's will that we accept."
"I await thine answer, rebel," reiterated Alva.
"What answer can I give?" retorted van Rycke. "You say your men will go
to our churches unarmed. We are not butchers as ye would have been."
"You will let them pray in peace?"
"As thou desirest. You who were prepared to destroy our city and to
murder our women and our children will have nothing to fear from us
while ye are unarmed and at prayer."
"Until the evening Angelus ceases to ring?"
"Until then."
"And until that hour we remain as we are. Our guard at the gates...."
"Our prisoners in our hands."
"And may God guard thee," concluded Alva unctuously.
"May God have mercy on thy soul if thou hast lied to us," said Mark van
Rycke quietly.
To this Alva made no reply, but his grim face looked in no way troubled.
Special absolution even for speaking a false oath could easily be
obtained, alas! these days by any Duke of Alva or other tyrant powerful
enough to demand it; and no doubt the Lieutenant-Governor, sent to
subdue the rebellious Low Countries, was well provided with every kind
of dispensation which embodied the principle that "the end justifies the
means!"
He wheeled his horse round and, wholly callous and unconcerned, he rode
back slowly over the bridge.
As soon as the last of the Spaniards had filed under the gate-house of
the Kasteel and the drawbridge was once more raised, Mark van Rycke
turned with unwonted peremptoriness to his friends who were crowding
round him, eagerly approving of what he had done.
"Van Deynse," he said curtly, "to-morrow at dawn, see that your
musketeers are massed inside the ruins of the Tanners' Guild House, and
you, Laurence, place three hundred of your picked archers under the
cover of the Vish Mart. Lannoy, your pikemen beneath the arcades of the
Abbey opposite St. Baafs, and you, Groobendock, yours in the doorways of
the houses opposite St. Pharailde, and every one of you under arms. Let
the Spaniards pray in peace if they have not lied. But at the first
sign of treachery, remember your wives and your daughters and do not
spare the murderers of your children or the desecrators of your homes."