IV
The soldiers sat around the table, watching the blind man with grave attention. At a sign from Jan they soon loosened his bonds. There was something magnetic in the air just then, something that sent sensitive nerves aquiver, and of which these rough fellow were only vaguely conscious. They could not look on that drunken loon without laughing. He was more comical than ever now, with that air of bland beatitude upon his face as his slender fingers closed around the handle of the tankard which Jan had just placed in his hand.
“I would sell my soul for a butt of this nectar,” he said; and drank in the odour of the wine with every sign of delight, even before he raised the tankard to his lips.
The Lord of Stoutenburg watched the blind man, too. A deep furrow between his brows testified to the earnest concentration of his thoughts. The man knew something, or thought he knew, of that his lordship could not be in doubt. The question was, was that knowledge of such importance as the miserable wretch averred, or was he merely, like any rogue who sees the rope dangling before his eyes, trying to gain a respite, by proposing vain bargains or selling secrets that had only found birth in his own fuddled brain. Stoutenburg, remember, was no psychologist. Indeed, psychology did not exist as a science in these days when men were over-busy with fighting, and had no time or desire to probe into the inner workings of one another’s soul.
On the other hand, here was a man, thus his lordship argued to himself, who might know something of the Stadtholder’s plans. He was wont, before he rolled so rapidly down the hill of manhood and repute, to be an inimate of Maurice of Nassau. He might, as lately as yesterday, have been initiated into the great soldier’s plans for repelling this sudden invasion of the land which he had thought secure. The Stadtholder, in truth, was not the man to abandon all efforts at resistance just because his original plans had failed. True, the attempt to rescue Arnheim and Nijmegen had ended in smoke. Marquet and De Keysere were, thanks to timely warning, being held up somewhere by the armies of Isembourg and De Berg. But Maurice of Nassau would not, of a certainty, thus lightly abandon all hopes of saving Gelderland. He must have formulated a project, and Stoutenburg, who was no fool, was far from underestimating the infinite brain power and resourcefulness of that peerless commander. Whether he had communicated that project to this besotted oaf was another matter.
Stoutenburg searched the blind man’s face with an intent glance that seemed to probe the innermost thoughts behind that fine, wide brow. For the moment, the face told him nothing. It was just vacant, the sightless eyes shone with delight, and the tankard raised to the lips effectually hid all expression around the mouth.
Well, there was not much harm done, the waste of a few moments, if the information proved futile. Jan was ready with the rope, if the whole thing proved to be a mere trick for putting off the fateful hour. As the Lord of Stoutenburg gazed on the blind man, trying vainly to curb his burning impatience, he instinctively thought of Gilda. Gilda, and his hopeless wooing of her, her coldness toward him and her passionate adherence to this miserable caitiff, who, in truth, had thrown dust in her eyes by an outward show of physical courage and a mock display of spurious chivalry.
What if the varlet had been initiated in the Stadtholder’s projects? What if he betrayed them now—sold them in exchange for his own worthless life, and stood revealed, before all the world, as an abject coward, as base as any Judas who would sell his master for thirty pieces of silver? The thought turned the miscreant giddy, so dazzling did this issue appear before his mental vision. What a revelation for a fond and loyal woman, who had placed so worthless an object on a pinnacle of valour! What a disillusionment! She had staunchly believed in his integrity up to now. But after this?
In truth, what more can a man desire than to see the honour of a rival smirched in the eyes of a woman who spurns him? That was the main thought that coursed through Stoutenburg’s brain, driving before it all obstinacy and choler, ay, even soothing his exacerbated nerves.
He gave a sign to Jan.
“Bring that varlet here to me,” he commanded. “I’ll speak to him myself.”
The sound of his voice chased the look of beatitude from the blind man’s face, which took on an expression of bewildered surprise.
“I had no thought his lordship was here,” he said, with a self-conscious, inane laugh.
The men were murmuring audibly. Some of them had seen visions of good reward, shared amongst them all, after the blind man had been made to speak. But Jan paid no heed to their discontent. In a trice he had seen the blind man secure once more, with arms tied as before behind his back. Diogenes had uttered a loud cry of protest when the empty tankard was torn out of his hand.
“Jan,” he shouted, in a thick, hoarse voice, “if thou’rt a knave and dost not keep faith with me, the devil himself will run away with thee.”
“His Magnificence will hear what thou hast to say,” Jan retorted gruffly. “After that, we’ll see.”
He led the prisoner through into the banqueting-hall, and despite the men’s murmurings, he closed the door upon them. He sat the blind man down in a chair, opposite his lordship. The poor loon had begun to whimper softly, just like a child, and continued to appeal pitiably to Jan.
“If his lordship is satisfied,” he murmured confidingly, “you’ll see to it, Jan, that I do not hang.”
“Jan has his orders!” his lordship put in roughly. “But take heed, sirrah! If your information is worth having, you may go to hell your own way; I care nought! But remember,” he added, with slow and stern emphasis, “if you trick me in this, ’twil not be the rope for you at dawn—but the stake!”
Diogenes gave a quick shudder.
“By the lord,” he said blandly, “how very unpleasant! But I am a man of my word. Jan put good wine into me. He shall be paid for it. And I’ll tell you what the Stadtholder hath planned for the defeat of the Lord of Stoutenburg.”
“Well,” his lordship retorted curtly. “I wait!”
There was silence for a moment whilst the blind man apparently collected his thoughts. He sat, trussed and helpless in the chair, with his head thrown back, and the full light of the candles playing upon his pale face—the latter still vacant and with a childish expression of excitement about those weird, dark orbs. The Lord of Stoutenburg, master of the situation, sat in a high-backed chair opposite him, his chin resting in his hand, his eyes, glowering and fierce, searching that strange, mysterious face before him. Strange and mysterious, in truth, with those sightless eyes, that glittered uncannily whenever the flickering candlelight caught the abnormally dilated pupils, and those quavering lips which every moment broke into a whimsical and inane smile.
“Jan, my friend,” the blind man asked after a while, “art here?”
“Ay!” Jan replied gruffly. “I’m here right enough to see that thou’rt up to no mischief.”
“How can I be that, worthy Jan?” the other retorted blandly, “since thou hast again trussed me like a capon?”
“Well, the sooner thou hast satisfied his lordship,” Jan rejoined with stolid indifference, “the sooner thou wilt be free—”
“To go to hell mine own way!” Diogenes put in with a hiccup. “So his lordship hath pledged his word. Let all those who are my friends bear witness that his lordship did pledge his word.”
He paused, and once again a look of impish cunning overspread his face. He seemed to be preparing for a fateful moment which literally would mean life or death for him. An exclamation of angry impatience from Stoutenburg recalled him to himself.
“I am ready,” he protested with eager servility, “to do his lordship’s pleasure.”
“Then speak, man!” Stoutenburg retorted savagely, “ere I wring the words from thee with torture!”
“I was only thinking how to put the matter clearly,” Diogenes protested blandly. “The Stadtholder only outlined his plan to me. There was so little time. My friend Klaas will remember that after his Highness’s horse bolted across the moor I was able to stop it—”
“Yes—curse your interference!” Stoutenburg muttered between his teeth.
“Amen to that!” the blind man assented. “But for it, I should still have the privilege of beholding your lordship’s pleasing countenance. But at the moment I had no thought save to stop a runaway horse. The Stadtholder was mightily excited, scented that a trap had been laid for him. My friend Klaas again will remember that, after his Highness dismounted he stopped to parley with me upon the moor.”
Nicolaes nodded.
“Then it was,” Diogenes went on, “that he told what he meant to do. I was, of course, to bear my part in the new project, which was to make a feint upon Ede—”
“A feint upon Ede?”
“Ay! A surprise attack, which would keep De Berg, who is in Ede, busy whilst the Stadtholder—”
“Bah!” Stoutenburg broke in contemptuously, “De Berg is too wary to be caught by a feint.”
“So he is, my lord, so he is!” Diogenes rejoined with solemn gravity. “But if I were to tell you that the surprise attack is to be made in full force, and that the weight will fall on the south side of the town, what then?”
“I do not see with what object.”
“Yet you, my lord, would know the Stadtholder’s tactics of old. You fought under his banner—once.”
“Before he murdered my father, yes!” Stoutenburg broke in impatiently. He did not relish this allusion to his former fighting days, before black treachery had made him betray the ruler he once served. “But what of that?”
“For then your lordship would remember,” the blind man went on placidly, “that the Stadtholder’s favorite plan was always to draw the enemy away by a ruse from his own chief point of attack.”
“But where would the chief point of attack be in this case?” Stoutenburg queried with a frown.
“At a certain molen your lordship wot of on the Veluwe.”
“Impossible!”
“Oh, impossible? Your lordship is pleased to jest. Some days ago, spies came into Utrecht with the information that the Lord of Stoutenburg had his camp at an old molen, which stands disused and isolated on the highest point of the Veluwe, somewhere between Apeldoorn and Barneveld.”
“My camp? Bah! The mill was only a halting place—”
“The spies averred, my lord,” the blind man broke in blandly, “that vast stores of arms and ammunition are accumulated in that halting-place. And that the attack on Amersfoort was planned within its rickety walls.”
Then, as the Lord of Stoutenburg made no comment on this—indeed, he had cast a rapid, significant glance on Nicolaes, who throughout this colloquy had appeared as keen, as interested, as his friend—the blind man went on slowly:
“The Stadtholder’s objective is the molen on the Veluwe.”
“What? From Ede!” Nicolaes exclaimed.
“No, no! Have I not said that the attack on Ede would be a feint? It will be the Stadtholder himself who, with a comparatively small force, will push on toward Barneveld and the molen, and at once cut off all communication between Ede and Amersfoort.”
“I understand,” Stoutenburg rejoined, with a grave nod. “But if it is a small force we can easily—”
“You can now,” Diogenes assented coolly, “since you are warned.”
“Quite right! Eh, friend Nicolaes?” his lordship retorted, and strove to let his harsh voice express a world of withering contempt. “If all this is not a trick you varlet hath served us well. What say you? Shall we let him go to hell his own way, and save the hangman a deal of pother?”
“If it all prove true,” Nicolaes put in cautiously. “But what proof have we?”
“None, in truth. Nor would I let this craven vagabond out of Jan’s sight until we do make sure that he hath not lied. But there’ll be no harm in being prepared. Here, sirrah!” his lordship continued, once more addressing the blind man. “With how strong a force doth the Stadtholder propose to cut us off from Ede?”
But, during this brief colloquy between the two friends, the blind man had begun to nod. His head fell forward on his chest, the heavy lids veiled the stricken eyes, and anon a peaceable snore came through the partially open mouth. Stoutenburg swore, as was his wont, the moment his choler was roused, and Jan shook the prisoner roughly by the shoulder.
“Eh? Eh? What?” the latter queried, blinked his sightless eyes, and turned a pale and startled face vaguely from side to side. “What is it? Where’s that confounded—?
“Answer his lordship’s question!” Jan commanded briefly.
“Question? What question? Your lordship must forgive me. I am so fatigued, and that tankard of—”
“I asked thee, knave,” Stoutenburg broke in impatiently, “with how strong a force the Stadtholder proposed to cut us off from Ede?”
“Call it four thousand, my lord,” the blind man babbled, “and let me go to sleep.”
“You shall sleep till Judgement Day when I’ve done with you, sirrah! Will the Stadtholder lead that force in person?”
The blind man winked and blinked, tried to collect his thoughts, which apparently had all wandered off toward the Land of Nod. Then he said:
“The plan was to leave the bulk of that force to menace Amersfoort. But the Stadtholder himself meant to push on as far as the molen, with but a few hundred of his picked men. He thought to seize the stores of arms and ammunition there and then to await the coming of the Lord of Stoutenburg, who, driven out of Amersfoort and cut off from Ede, would make of necessity for his headquarters.”
“Ah!”
The exclamation, deep and prolonged, came from three pairs of lips. Stoutenburg, Nicolaes and Jan looked at one another, and there was triumph and satisfaction depicted in their glance. The same thought had occurred simultaneously to these three traitors; the Stadtholder, with a comparatively small force, pushing on to the lonely molen on the Veluwe, not knowing that some of De Berg’s troops were holding the Ijssel beyond.
He would be caught like a rat in a trap; and the question was whether it would not be better to allow him to carry out his plan, not to oppose him on his way, to let him reach the molen and then close in behind him, so that he would have but two alternatives before him—to surrender in the molen or to turn his small force in the direction of the Zuider Zee, and therein seek a watery grave.