The great high road that runs almost in a straight line from Antwerp
to Cologne passes through many an ancient town and village, each and
all of which have owned the sway of numerous masters. For Spain once
had its grip fast on them, as also did Austria, Spain's half-sister;
dukes, reigning over the provinces, fierce, cruel, and tyrannical,
have sweated the blood from out the pores of the back-bowed peasants;
prince-bishops, such as those of Liége and Antwerp and Cologne, have
also held all the land in their iron grasp; even the Inquisition once
heaped its ferocious brutalities on the dwellers therein. Also, France
has sacked the towns and cities of the land, while armies composed of
men who drew their existence from English soil have besieged and
taken, and then lost and taken again, those very towns and cities and
villages.
Among the cities, at this period garrisoned and environed by one of
the armies of Louis le Grand, none was more fair and stately than
Louvain, though over her now there hangs, as there has hung for two
hundred years, an air of desolation. For she who once numbered within
her walls a hundred and fifty thousand inhabitants has, since the War
of the Spanish Succession, been gradually becoming more and more
desolate; her great University, consisting once of forty colleges,
exists only in a very inferior degree; where streets full of stately
Spanish houses stood are meadows, vineyards, gardens, and orchards
now.
But Louvain was still stately, as, at sunset in the latter part of May
in the year of our Lord 1702, a horseman drew up at the western
_porte_ of the city walls, and, hammering on the great storm-beaten
gate, clamoured for admission to the city. A horseman mounted on a
bright bay--one that had a shifty eye, yet, judging by its lean flanks
and thin wiry legs, gave promise of speed and endurance. A rider to
whose shoulders fell dark, slightly curling hair, and whose complexion
was bronzed and swarthy as though from long exposure to the sun and
wind and rain.
"Cease! Cease!" a voice in French growled out from the inner side of
the great gate. "Cease, in the name of all the fiends! The gate has
had enough blows dealt on it in the centuries that are gone since it
first grew a tree. Thy sword hilt will neither do it good nor batter
it down. Also, I come. I do but swallow the last mouthful of my
supper."
"I do beseech thee, _bon ami_," the traveller called back with a
mocking laugh, "not to hurry thyself. My lady can wait thy time. The
air is fresh and sweet outside, the wild flowers grow about the gate,
and I am by no means whatever pressed. Eat and drink thy fill."
"Um--um!" the voice from inside grunted. "Whoe'er you are, you have a
lightsome humour, a jocund tongue. I, too, do love my jest. _Peste!_
These sorry Hollanders know not what wit and mirth are--therefore I
will open the gate. Ugh! ugh! ugh!"
"Hast choked thyself in thine eager courtesy? Wash it down, man--wash
it down with a flask of Rhine wine."
But as the traveller thus jeered the great gate grunted and squeaked
on its huge hinges; then slowly, with many more rasping sounds, one
half of it opened wide.
"A flask of Rhine wine," muttered the warder, an elderly man clad in a
soldierlike-looking dress, and one who looked as if not only the Rhine
wines, but those of Burgundy and Bordeaux, were well known to him. "A
flask of Rhine wine. Where should I, a poor soldier of the Régiment de
Beaume, and a wounded one at that, get flasks of wine?"
"Where? Why, _camarade_, from a friend. From me. Here," and, putting
his hand to his vest pocket, the cavalier tossed down a silver crown
to the warder.
"Monsieur is an officer," the soldier said, stiffening himself to the
salute, while his eye roamed over the points of the bright bay, and
observed the handsome, workman-like sword that lay against its flanks,
and also the good apparel of the rider. "He calls me _camarade_, and
is lavish."
"Aye, an officer. Now, also disabled by a cruel blow. One who is still
weak, yet who hopes ere long to draw this again," touching his
quillon. "Of the cavalry. Now, see to my papers, and then let me on my
way."
"To the lady who awaits monsieur," the man said with a respectful
smile.
"Tush! I did but jest. There is no lady fair for me. I ride
towards--towards--the Rhine, there to take part against the Hollanders
who cluster thick, waiting to join Malbrouck." As the horseman spoke,
he drew forth a paper from his pocket, and, bending over his horse's
neck, handed it to the man.
"Le Capitaine Le Blond," the latter read out respectfully, "capitaine
des Mousquetaires Gris. Travelling to Cologne. Bon, monsieur le
capitaine," saluting as he spoke. "Pass, mon capitaine."
"Tell me first a good inn where I may rest for the night."
"There are but two, 'L'Ours' and 'Le Duc de Brabant.' The first,
monsieur le capitaine, is the best. The wine is--_o_--_hé_--superb,
adorable. Also it is full of officers. Some mousquetaires are of them.
Monsieur should go there. There are none at the other."
"I will," the captain of mousquetaires said aloud as he rode on,
though to himself he muttered, "Not I. 'Le Duc de Brabant' will
suffice for me."
When Bevill Bracton recognised Sparmann in the inn at Antwerp he knew,
as has been told, that he already stood in deadly peril. Already,
though he had scarce been ashore two hours! Nevertheless, while he
recognised this and understood that at once, without wasting a moment,
he must form some plans for quitting Antwerp, and also, if possible,
assuming a fresh disguise, he could by no means comprehend the
presence of Sparmann in the city. Nor could he conceive what this man,
a Dutchman, could have to do with the French Lieutenant of Police, an
official who must surely be hated by the townspeople as much as, if
not more than, the rest of their conquerors.
Re-entering the passage now, and approaching the bureau with the
determination of discovering something in connection with his old
enemy, if it were possible to do so, Bevill observed that the
landlord's eyes were fixed upon him with a glance that was half
menacing and half derisive, while, as he perceived this, he reflected,
"Doubtless the man is rejoiced to see one of the hated French, as he
supposes me to be, outwitted by his own countryman." After which he
addressed the other, saying:
"Who is that man who throws doubt upon my identity and the passport I
carry, issued by the French Embassy in London?"
"He! _ach_ he! One who is a disgrace to the country that bore him--
to this city, for of Antwerp he is. He was once an officer in the
Stadtholder's bodyguard, the Stadtholder who was made King of England;
yet now he serves the French, your countrymen. Bah!" and the landlord
spat on the floor. "Now he is a spy on his own. A--a--a _mouchard_."
"But why? Why?"
"He has been disgraced. He was always in trouble. A soldier--a young
one, too; an English officer, as it is said--ran him through for
jeering at the English soldiers; then, since he was despised by his
own brother-officers for being beaten, he took to drinking. At last,
he was broken. Then he joined the French, your countrymen. Only, since
he had been beaten by an Englishman, they would not have him for a
soldier. So he became _un espion_. For my part, I would that the
English officer had slain him. To think of it! A Hollander to serve
the French!"
"I fear you do not love the French," Bevill said quietly, a sudden
thought, an inspiration, flashing to his brain even as the landlord
poured out his contempt on his own compatriot. "The English appear to
have your sympathy."
"Does the lamb love the tiger that crushes it between its jaws? Does
the hare love the spring in which it is caught? Yet--yet they say,"
the landlord went on, casting a venomous glance at Bevill, "your
country will not triumph over us long. Malbrouck is coming, forty
thousand more English soldiers are coming; so, too, are the soldiers
of every Protestant country in Europe Then, look out for yourselves,
my French friends."
"So you love the English?"
"We love those who pull us out of the mire. And they have been our
allies for years."
For a moment after hearing these words Bevill stood regarding this man
while pondering deeply; then, making up his mind at once, he said:
"If I told you that at this present time that young English officer
who ran Sparmann through--this renegade countryman of yours, this
_espion_, this spy of the French, _your conquerors_--stands in
imminent deadly danger in Antwerp--here, here, in your own city--would
you help and succour him? Would you strive to save him--from Sparmann,
the spy?"
"What!" the landlord exclaimed, his fishlike eyes extending as he
stared at Bracton. "What!" while in a lower tone he repeated to
himself the words Sparmann had uttered a quarter of an hour ago:
"There was no secretary named André de Belleville at the French
Embassy. 'The statement is false.'"
"Aye," replied Bevill Bracton, hearing his muttered words, and
understanding them too, since he had learnt some Dutch when in Holland
under King William. "Aye, the statement is false, but his is true.
There was no secretary of that name. The passport was procured to help
that young officer to reach Liége and assist a countrywoman. Also, if
the day should haply come, to assist, to join Protestant Holland
against Catholic France and Spain."
"And," the man said, still staring at him, "you are he? You are an
Englishman--a Protestant?"
"I am, God be praised. I trust in you. It is in your power to help me
to escape, or you can give me up to the Lieutenant. It is in your
power to enable me to quit Antwerp ere the alarm is given at the
gates. If it be already given, my chance is gone! You hate France; you
look to England for rescue and preservation. Speak. What will you do?"
"The spy saw," the landlord said, still muttering to himself, "that
you had bought the black horse. Therefore you cannot ride that, though
it is the best. But in my stable is a bay----"
"Ah!"
"A bay! _Ja wohl_, a bay! Tricky, ill-tempered, but swift as the wind.
Once outside the city----"
"Heaven above bless you!"
"----You are safe. You speak French like a Frenchman. You have passed
before as one, it seems; you can do so again. The bay belonged to a
mousquetaire who died here of a fever when first the accursed French
seized on the city. I would not give it up since his bill was large."
"One thing only! My passport will betray, ruin me."
"_Nein_. I have the mousquetaire's papers; his French pass. He was a
captain named Le Blond. With those, and with that thing off your
head," nodding at the peruke Bevill wore, "you will surely pass the
gate. But you must be quick. Quick! Time is money, as you English say.
With you it may be more. It may be life or death."
Even as the landlord spoke Bevill had torn off his wig and shaken out
his own dark hair, after which the former said:
"I will go get the papers. Then will I saddle the bay myself. She is
in the stable in the back of the garden. You can pass out that way and
through a back street. If you have luck, you are saved. If not----"
"I _shall_ be saved. I know it--feel it. But you--you--he warned you
of what might befall----"
"Bah! You will have escaped unknown to me. For proof, I can show that
you even left the black horse behind in your haste. How shall they
know that I gave you another in its place?" And the landlord left his
bureau and ran up the stairs, saying he would be back with the papers
of Captain Le Blond ere many moments had passed.
Thus it was that the supposed captain of mousquetaires escaped the
first peril he encountered on the road towards Liége, towards
assisting Sylvia Thorne to quit that city. He had escaped, yet he had
done so by means that were abhorrent to him--by a false passport, the
papers of a man now in his grave. He who--Heaven pardon him!--could he
have had matters as he desired, would have ridden boldly and openly to
every barrier, have faced every soldier of the enemy, and, announcing
himself as what he was, have got through or finished his mission
almost ere it was begun.
Yet that escape was indeed perilous, and, though Bevill Bracton knew
it not, he had, even with the aid of the landlord, only missed
discovery by a hair's breadth.
For, but a quarter of an hour before he rode towards the city barrier,
the guard had been changed; a troop of the Régiment d'Orléans had
relieved a troop of the Mousquetaires Gris. Had Bevill, therefore,
arrived before this took place, he would at once have been discovered
and his fate sealed, since all would have known that le Capitaine Le
Blond had been dead for months. But with the men of the Régiment
d'Orléans it was different, since they had but marched in a week or so
before, and probably--though it need by no means have been so--knew
not the name or appearance of the officers of the mousquetaires.
[Illustration: "'Would you strive to save him--from Sparmann, the
spy?'"]
Bevill soon learnt, however, that Sparmann had wasted no time. Had he
not acquired those papers, his undertaking must have ended here. The
sergeant at the barrier, who came forward to inspect the paper he
presented, carried in his hand another, which he read as Bevill rode
up; and the latter divined, by the swift glance the trooper cast at
his horse, and divined it with a feeling of actual certainty, that on
that paper was a description of the black horse and his own
appearance. But the horse was not the same, the peruke was wanting,
and his riding cloak hid all that was beneath. Consequently, with a
muttered "_Bon voyage_, M. le capitaine," and a salute, the sergeant
stood back as Bevill rode through on the bay mare, who justified the
character her recent owner had given her by lashing out with her hind
legs and prancing from one side of the road to the other in her
endeavour to unseat her rider. Soon finding, however, that she had her
master on her back, she settled down into a swinging stride and bore
him swiftly along the great, white east road.
And now he was in Louvain, after having passed by numberless
implements of warfare collected by the roadside and watched over by
French soldiery, as well as having passed also two French regiments
marching swiftly towards Antwerp, there to reinforce the garrison,
since, as war was declared, none knew how soon the forces of the
redoubtable Marlborough, or Malbrouck, as they called him, might
appear.
He was in Louvain, riding up an old, quiet street full of Spanish
houses with pointed roofs that almost touched those of the opposite
side, and allowed only a glimpse of the roseate hue of the early
summer sunset to be seen between them. And soon, following the
directions given him by the soldier at the gate, he reached the
hostelry "Le Duc de Brabant," a house that looked almost as old as
Time itself. One that, to each of its numerous windows, had huge
projecting balconies of dark discoloured stone, of which the house
itself was composed; an old, dark mansion, on whose walls were painted
innumerable frescoes, most of which represented sacred subjects but
some of which also depicted arrogantly the great deeds and triumphs of
the Dukes of Brabant. A house having, too, a huge pointed gateway, the
summit of which extended higher than the top of the windows of the
first floor, and down one side of which there trailed a coiled rope
carved in the stone, while, on the other side, was carved in the same
way an axe, a block, and a miniature gibbet.
"Ominous signs for those who enter here," Bevill thought to himself,
while the mare's hoofs clattered on the cobblestones as he rode under
the archway. "Ominous once in far-off days for those who entered here,
if this was some hall of justice, or the residence of their,
doubtless, tyrannical rulers. Yet will I not believe that they are
ominous for me. I have no superstitions, and, I thank Heaven devoutly,
I have no fear. Yet," he muttered to himself as he prepared to
dismount, "I would I had not to resort to so many subterfuges. Rather
would I be passing for what I should be--a soldier belonging to those
who have sworn to break down the power of this great ambitious king,
this champion of the bigotry that we despise." Then, in an easier vein
he added, as though to console himself, "No matter! What I do I do to
help, perhaps to save, a helpless woman; to reinstate myself in the
calling I love, the calling from which I was unjustly cast forth.
And," he concluded, as he cast the reins to the servitors who had run
into the courtyard at the clatter made by the mare's hoofs, "it is war
time, and so--_à la guerre, comme à la guerre!_"