The Project Gutenberg eBook, I Will Maintain, by Marjorie Bowen

I WILL MAINTAIN

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

• The Viper of Milan
• Defender of the Faith
• God and the King
• The Quest of Glory
• A Knight of Spain
• The Governor of England

I WILL MAINTAIN

BY
MARJORIE BOWEN
AUTHOR OF “THE VIPER OF MILAN”

“MOI JE SERA NASSAU, JE MAINTAINDRAI”
Motto of the House of Orange

NINTH EDITION

METHUEN & CO. LTD.
36 ESSEX STREET W.C.
LONDON

CONTENTS

PART I
JOHN DE WITT, REPUBLICAN

“A man of unwearied industry, inflexible constancy, sound, clear, and deep understanding and untainted integrity; so that whenever he was blinded, it was by the passion that he had for that which he esteemed the good and interest of the State.”—Sir William Temple, Observations on the United Provinces, 1672.

CHAPTER I
THE IDEALS OF M. DE WITT

“There is one subject that we seldom touch upon,” said Sir William. “And that is one upon which I am curious to hear you speak.”

John de Witt looked up quickly.

“Ah, sir,” he smiled faintly. “You are of a probing disposition—what is this subject?”

“The Prince.”

“The Prince—” repeated M. de Witt, and an intent expression that might have been trouble came into his full brown eyes. “What is there to say of His Highness?” he added.

The English Ambassador laughed in the soft and pleasant way he had; he was standing by the long window, and, as he answered, glanced out at the wych elms and pale sunshine that filled the garden of M. de Witt.

“The situation is piquant—between good friends you must allow it——”

The Grand Pensionary rose.

“Between good friends, Sir William, the situation is dangerous. I am aware of it—but the Prince—the Prince is only a child.”

Sir William moved from the window with a little shiver.

“Your Dutch weather!” he said. “I think the damp has got into my very bones——”

“But you like the house?” asked de Witt “It hath a large garden for the children when they stay with me—and since it was not possible to remain where I was, I thought I could do no better.”

Sir William answered gently, aware of the allusion, veiled under commonplace words, to the late death of Wendela de Witt. It seemed to him, composed and close observer as he was, even of his friends, that the Grand Pensionary had changed more than a little since he had lost his wife.

“It is a noble mansion,” he said. “I could be selfish enough to wish this library at Sheen.”

He looked, with the approval of a fine taste, round the lofty apartment panelled in mellow-hued, carved wood, and lined with shelves filled with rare and costly volumes; a few handsome portraits hung above the bookcases, and over the high chimney-piece a rich but sombre picture of fruit and flowers showed; on the blue-tiled hearth were brass andirons, and on the table in the centre of the chamber candlesticks were set, also brass, but polished so that they shone like gold.

At a small desk by the far window sat a secretary in a dark dress, writing.

“The house hath been a palace,” continued Sir William.

“Therefore should not be the residence of a republican?” smiled John de Witt. “Nay,” he added simply, “the house is well enough, but I took it for the garden; and now you look on my one luxury—my books—for the rest the furnishings are simple—too simple for Cornelia’s taste, as she will tell you if you stay to dinner,—nay, I doubt not she tells my lady now.”

Sir William crossed to one of the bookcases, took a volume down and opened it at random. As John de Witt came up behind him, he spoke in a low tone, looking at the book.

“Who is the new secretary?”

The Grand Pensionary seemed slightly surprised.

“He?—a young man from Guelders.” He glanced to where the person in question sat absorbed in writing. “He was recommended to me by de Groot—he is diligent and silent—I like him.”

Sir William’s white fingers slowly turned the leaves of the volume he held.

“Then we may talk freely?”

“As always in my house.”

The Englishman glanced up. His face, which was of a dark, soft, luxurious style of indolent good looks, expressed a watchful yet friendly kind of amusement and interest; his air was slightly cynical, wholly pleasant, as if viewing follies that never tempted him to participate in them he yet found them harmless and tolerated them, good-humouredly.

“Well, then, of the Prince,” he said. “What are you going to do?”

John de Witt frowned.

“You think I am afraid of His Highness.”

Sir William answered with the ready courtesy that took all appearance of sincerity from his speech—

“All Europe knows that you are afraid of nothing—yet, for Holland’s sake, you might tremble a little now.”

The cloud did not lift from the Grand Pensionary’s noble face. He put out his hand and rested it on the edge of one of the bookshelves, and his delicate fingers tapped restlessly on the polished wood.

“Diplomacy as well as friendship dictates frankness to me,” he answered in his slow, stately, yet gentle way,—“nor is there much I could conceal from such an observer as yourself, Sir William. The Orange party have wearied me, have thwarted me, have alarmed me; I find them unreasonable, powerful and dangerous—I speak of the party, not of the Prince.”

“Why not of him?”

“I have no right. He has ever shown himself quiet, tractable, obedient,” was the quick reply. “We have never had to complain of his behaviour.”

“Yet he is the focus for much discontent,” smiled the Englishman, “the magnet for much ambition.”

The Grand Pensionary smiled also, uplifting his melancholy eyes.

“His Highness is but seventeen, immersed in study, brought up as a republican—I think he is even ignorant of these agitations in his name. He could not live more quietly.”

But it did not escape Sir William that the Grand Pensionary spoke like a man trying to reassure himself.

“The Prince is your pupil—forgive me, but, as I said, the situation is curious. You, sir, a republican—for seventeen years the head of a Republic which has been a fine nation, and a wealthy, and a lesson to all of us—you undertake the education of a Prince who is the heir of the House on whose ruin you founded your Republic; you bring this young man up in your ideas, you teach him this, that, as you will; you are not his master but his friend—he is to regard himself as a mere citizen of the country that is his heritage—well, it is a curious experiment, Mynheer de Witt.”

The Grand Pensionary answered quietly—

“I have done all I can—since we speak privately, not as politicians, I will say that I have no hope to always exclude His Highness from all power. I think that when he comes of age he will obtain the command of the army; nor do I regret it—the House of Orange has rendered such service to Holland that there should be some gratitude, some trust shown this Prince.”

Sir William closed the book he held and replaced it on the shelf.

“Meanwhile I train him to serve his country,” continued de Witt, with a faint smile.

“You serve your country well, Mynheer,” remarked the Englishman, watching him.

“I serve my ideals,” said the Grand Pensionary.

The Englishman very slightly shrugged his shoulders.

“In these days!—you have been successful, but I should watch this little Prince——”

“We stand firm—The Triple Alliance, the treaty of Breda—the Perpetual Edict,” quoted de Witt.

The diplomat who had framed the first had never approved of the last.

“There you went too far,” he said.

“There I secured the liberty of Holland,” answered the Grand Pensionary, still with that faint smile on his full, finely cut mouth, “and made impossible a recurrence of 1650—this Prince’s father brought his troops to the gates of Amsterdam, no man shall do that again; by abolishing the office of Stadtholder I do away with the fear of a king, and so, sir, secure my Republic.”

“Amen to that,” answered Sir William. “You have the confidence of the idealist. I love you for it, but I cannot be so sanguine—the Prince, if he is heir to nothing else, hath the name, the prestige, and that is a strange spell to work with the people.”

He looked, as he spoke, with the interest of the worldly man at a noble simplicity he admires but cannot comprehend. John de Witt was his friend, they had much in common, respected each other’s character and talents, but Sir William Temple had never ceased to marvel at John de Witt.

The Grand Pensionary was silent; a deep thoughtfulness came into his face. The Englishman watched him, smiling a little coldly.

“Do you think that I am not loved in the United Provinces?” asked de Witt suddenly.

Sir William fingered the ends of his cravat. The other did not wait for an answer so leisurely composed.

“This young man is popular—it sometimes seems, Sir William, as if he was heir to the heart of the people——”

“He has the name.”

“The name!—and, with the people, is not that everything? I think nothing weighs against the name. The Prince does little to make himself beloved, but there are those who clamour for him as if he owned his ancestor’s virtues with his ancestor’s titles.” And again M. de Witt repeated, “the name!”

Then, as if resolute to close the subject, he laid his hand familiarly on Sir William’s velvet sleeve.

“Will you not come into the garden?—the gardens, I have two that open into one. But you know too much, my poor trees will be shamed.”

They crossed the room and stepped out of the high window. The young secretary from Guelders leant back in his chair and watched them walking under the elms.

Not a word of their conversation had been lost on him, and now that he could no longer hear what they said he pondered, in his quick yet laborious way, over their previous speech.

He had been in M. de Witt’s service a week. It was in the course of his duty to overhear diplomatic talk, to read, and make notes on, political papers, and, though he had always considered himself well informed, he began to find that what was knowledge in Guelders was ignorance at the Hague.

He reviewed, rather sourly, the change in his feelings this week had brought about. He had been so proud of the post, so grateful for de Groot’s recommendation, so confident of what his own energy and industry would do for him; and now he did not feel at all confident.

Not that his trust in himself was diminished; but he had already begun to doubt if he had taken his services to the best market or pledged himself to the most profitable of masters.

He bit his quill and fixed his eyes on M. de Witt, who was standing, not far away, on the gravel path talking to his companion.

The secretary marked with a calculating glance the Grand Pensionary’s stately figure, clothed sombrely in black, his pale oval face, under jawed, the full but curiously firm and clean-cut mouth shaded by the slight moustache, the large, weary brown eyes, the high brow over which fell the soft dark hair that was just beginning to be touched with grey, and contrasted his melancholy, noble air with the vivacious ease of the splendid Englishman whose rich comeliness was enhanced by his elegant and costly dress.

As he looked, the young man from Guelders wondered. M. de Witt had been Grand Pensionary of the United Provinces for seventeen years; the secretary had long taken him for granted as something always there, immovable as the law he represented, and had no more questioned the authority than he had the power of this first magistrate of the Republic.

Only with difficulty and by forcing his mind back to his childhood could he recall something of the famous coup d’état that had made M. de Witt head of the State.

He recollected dimly the excitement that had filled the country when the young Stadtholder, William the Second, had tried to seize Amsterdam and the absolute power of a king. He remembered going with other boys of his own age to break the windows of a house that had sported Orange favours, and being rebuked by the minister, and made to stay longer in the gaunt white church praying for strength to curb his feelings.

He remembered, too, the news of the sudden death of the Prince who had threatened their liberties, and how they had thanked God for it solemnly. After that there had been the Republic, which he had taken unquestioningly. M. de Witt stood for the United Provinces; as for the last Prince of Orange, born after his father’s death, the heir of a fallen House, the secretary had never heard much of him. There had been quarrels as to his education between M. de Witt and his uncle the Elector, between his grandmother and his mother the English Princess.…

The secretary remembered hearing, without interest, of the death of this lady in England, and of how her son, more than ever a State prisoner, was being educated by M. de Witt.

There seemed no reason why he, Florent Van Mander, of the town of Arnheim, a prudent, able young Dutchman, honourably and profitably employed in the service of the Grand Pensionary, should be so laboriously recalling every detail he had ever heard of William of Orange.

But two things had taken hold of a nature naturally observant, cautious, yet energetic and aspiring: the first was the conviction that M. de Witt held a position by no means as secure as it seemed, a position that, despite the treaty of Breda, despite the Triple Alliance, was one that he, the new secretary, must watch carefully if he would not be entangled in a falling cause; and the second was the impression that this youth, the son of the late Stadtholder, was a latent force in Holland that might one day become tremendous, overwhelming.

“He has the name,” Sir William Temple had said, and the words had seized Florent Van Mander’s slow but not dull imagination. He thought that the Englishman had expressed less than he felt, and longed to hear him again on the subject.

He had only seen Sir William twice, but there was something in his easy, almost careless, manner, in the slightly disdainful shrewdness of his remarks, that inspired the secretary with a respect he did not entertain for John de Witt. He had an uncomfortable feeling that the Grand Pensionary was a man who might be, without much difficulty, fooled.

“I serve my ideals,” he had said.

That annoyed Van Mander. He had not a very clear conception of an idealist, but he was tolerably certain that no man could be one and still be successful in a practical way, and it had struck him as a pointless and rather weak thing to say—“I serve my ideals.”

He had noted other remarks, too, of the same trend; a certain loftiness of outlook, an unworldly tolerance of detraction and malice, that did not please him. He would have preferred a master more eagerly alive to his own advantage, more conscious of evil in others and prepared to fight it on its own grounds.

Sir William had also said other things that remained in the young secretary’s mind. He had spoken of the curious situation, the Republican Minister instructing and watching the Prince—at once tutor and jailer—and Florent Van Mander thought that it was indeed curious, and a little foolish, too, on the part of John de Witt.

And there were yet other aspects of the situation that the previous conversation had not touched on, but which were nevertheless present to the roused mind of the secretary.

This Prince was cousin of the King of France, a figure of dazzling and alarming greatness, and nephew of the King of England; and both these were of an aspect menacing to the Republic, true—there was the Triple Alliance, but——

The young secretary became aware that he had bitten his pen till it was split and useless, and he laid it down with a vexed look. He greatly disliked to do anything careless or unmethodical, or even to become absorbed in reflections not in themselves necessary to present business.

He took out another quill, mended it, and glanced again out of the window.

The Grand Pensionary and Sir William had been joined by Agneta de Witt—a pale, graceful, fragile-looking child—and Cornelia Van Bicker, the mistress of the house.

Looking at these ladies moving under the shifting, pale shadows of the trees, the young man’s rather hard eyes softened. He had the Dutchman’s intense respect for domestic affections, and to think of the recent death of Wendela de Witt moved him. He had never seen her, but he knew that she had been good and gentle, patient and adoring, like her daughter Agneta, and he guessed at the great loneliness that her loss had left in the heart of John de Witt. He thought of it whenever he saw her sister, Cornelia Van Bicker, or one of her quiet, sweet-voiced children.

As he watched, the little party turned towards the house, Sir William in his blue-and-gold velvet ruffled with ribbon, his heavy curls falling round his handsome face, walking beside the Grand Pensionary, who had no relief to his black garments save his broad linen collar, and between them the little figure of Agneta in her white gown and prim cap, holding herself soberly, while before them moved the sister of Wendela de Witt, self-contained, plainly dressed, with the fading, changing, sunlight flickering over her dark dress.

Florent Van Mander returned to the letter he was copying, for he observed the Grand Pensionary was leaving the others and returning to the library.

When M. de Witt opened the window and entered, he rose, waiting his instructions.

“I have finished these documents, Mynheer,” he said, pointing to some papers given him by another secretary. “Van Ouvenaller thought they should be copied in case you care to submit them to Their High Mightinesses.”

“What are they?” asked John de Witt. He always spoke gently and courteously; to-night Van Mander found himself noticing it.

“Letters from the Provinces, Mynheer,” he answered, “dealing with the riots in the name of the Prince of Orange——”

“Ah, that.” The Grand Pensionary frowned thoughtfully. “The burgomasters should be able to deal with it.”

“It seems in Zeeland——”

“You have a letter from Zeeland?”

“From Mynheer Van Teel—one Michael Tichelaer is inciting the people to violence in Middelburg.”

“Michael Tichelaer,” M. de Witt repeated thoughtfully. “Yes, I remember the man—I must write to Mynheer Van Teel.” He paused a moment, then added, “I fear we are too lenient.”

The secretary sorted and neatly arranged the papers. It was not his place to offer comment, but there were many things that he burned to say.

Meanwhile the Grand Pensionary was regarding him with a kindly if remote interest. The young man had been warmly recommended for zeal and industry, and so far he had found both; he saw too, for himself, resolution and capacity in the blunt, firm features, in the alert grey eyes and erect figure.

“You are satisfied with your position, Mynheer Van Mander?” he asked.

“Quite, Mynheer,”—the secretary precisely tied the ribbons of the portfolio,—“is it not an enviable one?”

“You may make it so,” answered John de Witt quietly, yet with a kind of glow in his voice, “—because you are in the way to serve your country, and that is indeed an enviable thing.”

Florent Van Mander was silent. His country was not much in his thoughts; he meant to serve success.

“I think there is nothing more to-night,” said M. de Witt. “You will be wishing to get home—have you comfortable lodgings?” he added kindly.

“Yes, Mynheer, in the Kerkestraat.”

“You must dine with us soon. Will you leave out the letter from Middelburg? I need not remind you to be early in the morning—there is somewhat to do. Good-night, Mynheer.”

“Good-night, Mynheer.”

M. de Witt smiled in his melancholy, half tender, half distant fashion and left the room.

Florent Van Mander put away the papers, setting aside in an upper drawer the letter from Van Teel, locked the desk and placed the key on his watch-chain.

The sunlight in the garden was taking on a deeper hue and flushing the walls of the library and the well-filled bookcases to a red-gold colour; the leaves of the wych elms shook in a trembling, joyous kind of life and motion in the strong yet gentle breeze that was arising.

The deep, solemn chimes of the Groote Kerk struck six.

It was later than the secretary had supposed; he usually had his dinner at this hour. He took his eyes from the quiet beauty of the garden and hastened to leave the house.

The dining-room door was open as he passed down the hall, and he had a glimpse of the company gathered round the plainly furnished table. John de Witt at the head of it, saying grace with an earnest composure; Cornelia Van Bicker standing with folded hands, the bright English face of Lady Temple above her falling lace collar; and Sir William, tolerant, good-humouredly amused and placid.

The young secretary passed out into the street. The sunshine was pleasant down the Kneuterdyk Avenue, bright in the windows of the houses opposite, and gay in the trees that were just turning a faint tint of yellow. A saltish breeze touched Van Mander’s face, it was blowing straight across the flat country, up from the sea at Scheveningen, and brought with it memories of the dunes, the sand, and the foam.

An unnamable, an unreal excitement stole into the blood that usually ran so coolly; just as if the young man had suddenly heard commanding music or seen a flag flung out against the sky. This feeling had been with him slightly ever since he had entered the service of John de Witt; to-night it culminated.

In the Englishman’s words, he thought—

“He has the name.”

Florent Van Mander could not forget that remark nor the tone in which it was spoken. It seemed to give the clue to his own restlessness, his curiosity as to the Prince—his discontent with his new master.

The name!

The sense of it, the power, were about him in the keen breeze, in the sunlit trees, in the whole atmosphere of the royal Hague.

As he turned home he repeated it to himself—

“William of Orange.…”

CHAPTER II
THE INTRIGUERS

Florent Van Mander, comfortable after his dinner, sitting at his open window smoking, and watching the people pass up and down the Kerkestraat, was surprised, not disagreeably, by the servant entering his solitude to announce a visitor owning a foreign name she stumbled over.

Hyacinthe St. Croix—Van Mander had known him in Arnheim when he himself was a magistrate’s clerk there, ambitious, with an eye on the Hague, and the Frenchman a half disavowed agent of the Marquis de Pomponne, some one who had travelled the Provinces several times already, observing, noting, making acquaintances and gathering information where he could.

The young secretary called for candles—he had been sitting in the dark—and closed the window.

On the heels of the maid with the lights came St. Croix, better dressed, more self-confident, more assured in manner than formerly.

The two greeted each other formally.

“I did not know that you were at the Hague,” said Van Mander. “How did you find me?”

The Frenchman laid his hat and gloves on one of the high-backed chairs.

“I was passing through Arnheim the other day—I called upon your uncle and he told me. You have a good post.”

Florent put a chair for his guest and took one himself the other side of the small dark table; between them stood the two heavy branch candlesticks, glimmering each in the light of the other candles that illuminated the small, neat room with its deep window-seat, polished wood furniture, plain engravings on the walls and Delft pottery on the chimney-piece.

Florent refilled his pipe and invited the other to smoke. The two long clays soon filled the chamber with slow, fragrant smoke.

“So you are in the service of M. de Witt,” remarked St. Croix.

“Yes.”

The Frenchman smiled as he pondered on the best means of getting what he wanted from the laconic Dutchman; it was astonishingly difficult, he found, to deal with a nation so blunt and so reserved.

In the silence that followed Florent stared at him stolidly, marking every detail of his appearance, his short red jacket of the newest French fashion showing the laced shirt beneath, the cravat and ruffles of lace, the silk stockings and shoes with ribbon rosettes, the frizzled, fair hair that framed the small-featured, rather insignificant face of Hyacinthe St. Croix.

Van Mander had the national contempt of foreign luxury, but these signs of prosperity annoyed him in a slow kind of way. He knew St. Croix was of the small gentry, no better born than himself, and not so long ago no better dressed; now he contrasted this gay attire with his own serviceable grey and worsted hose, and wished he had been the one to find such profitable employment.

“How do you like M. de Witt?” asked St. Croix suddenly.

“Very well,” said Florent.

The Frenchman regarded him out of narrowed eyes, and asked again, with equal abruptness—

“Have you seen the Prince of Orange?”

“No.”

“But you have heard, since you have been at the Hague, a great deal of him?”

“I have heard of him,” answered Florent.

St. Croix laid down his pipe.

“You have drawn your own conclusions, of course,” he said. “You were always shrewd.”

Florent was flattered and excited; he managed to show neither feeling.

“I have drawn some conclusions,” was all he admitted.

“On the position of the Prince—and of M. de Witt?”

“I have only been at the Hague a week——”

But Hyacinthe St. Croix knew fairly well the man he dealt with.

“Come,” he said in an intimate tone that swept aside evasion, “you know as well as I do that this Government must fall.”

The words gave the young secretary a shock. He sat silent, sucking his pipe, not wishing to admit that he was startled.

The Frenchman leant back calmly in his chair.

“The whole feeling of the country is against M. de Witt,” he continued. “You must have seen it.”

It occurred to Florent, in a vague, impersonal sort of way, that the Grand Pensionary’s secretary had no right to be listening to these things, or even to be speaking at all to a Frenchman intriguing for his Ambassador; but he told himself that he served success, and success did not seem to lie with M. de Witt.

“Yet we are at peace at home and abroad,” he remarked, to probe the other.

St. Croix smiled.

“You think of the Triple Alliance,” he said.

“True—only signed this year,” returned Florent. “Still there is always France.”

“Also do not be too sure of England,” said St. Croix. “Despite the Triple Alliance—she stands very well with France—I could tell you something——”

Florent Van Mander looked him straight in the face.

“Do you mean that France and England might combine for the restoration of the Prince of Orange?”

The Frenchman lifted his eyebrows.

“Upon conditions—they might. If there were a war what could M. de Witt do?”

Van Mander thought a moment.

“He beat England in ’56—but now——”

“He could do nothing against France—that is obvious.”

“Yes, it is obvious,” admitted Florent.

“And the prospect is threatening.”

“I know——”

“Well, you see the part the Prince will play?”

There was a little pause, then the Dutchman said slowly—

“He is King Louis’ cousin and King Charles’ nephew——”

“You take me,” replied St. Croix, “the Prince is related to their Majesties—and he has no cause to love M. de Witt.”

Florent drew a quick breath.

“You think he … would work for France?”

“Can there be a doubt of it?” smiled St. Croix.

There was no answer from Florent. He laid down his pipe and sat still, considering.

Rumours, whispers, hints were taking at last tangible form: this young prisoner, pupil of M. de Witt, was to be the instrument to deliver the country into the rapacious hands of France. Well, there was little cause to wonder; indeed he had almost guessed it. The Prince had, as St. Croix said, little cause to love either M. de Witt or his Republic.

He raised his grey eyes and looked into the Frenchman’s face—

“These are strange things to say to a Dutchman and a servant of M. de Witt.”

St. Croix answered quickly—

“But you serve success.”

At these words, that he did not recall having ever uttered to this man, Florent was again silent. It was perfectly true; he was at the beginning of his career and ambitious; he had no desire to follow a falling cause. The Republic was no more to him than the Prince, he told himself; and there was no reason that he should not, out of the crisis that threatened, earn a place and distinction for himself.

St. Croix observed him closely. He was not afraid of having said too much, for he had read his man, some years before, in Guelders.

“It seems I serve the wrong master now,” said Florent at last, with a grim set to his mouth. “I must not look out for fortune in the train of M. de Witt.”

The Frenchman answered slowly and with meaning—

“There is fortune, and great fortune, to be found in the service of M. de Witt, by men like you who know how to look for it.…”

Once more Florent was silent. He kept his eyes fixed on the dark surface of the table, where the reflected lights of the candles glimmered. He thought that he understood.

“The Prince,” continued St. Croix, “and the power behind the Prince, can be very well served by one in the pay of M. de Witt.”

Florent was now sure that he understood. Not by being loyal to his master, but by betraying him was he to satisfy his ambitions. The way of success lay not with the Grand Pensionary—but with the Prince, who was another name for France.

For the moment his instinct was to resent this calm suggestion that he was the willing instrument of foreign intrigue, but quick reflection showed him the folly of it. St. Croix knew him; some time past, in Guelders, he had taken money for such information of Dutch politics as he could command. His hesitation took another form.

“How am I to know that this Prince of yours is worth serving—at a risk?” he said.

“You know that France is worth serving.”

“Buat died,” remarked Florent dryly, “for tampering with France.”

“Buat was a fool,” returned St. Croix; “and we do not want any knight-errantry from you—one of M. de Witt’s secretaries cannot fail to be useful—you will see how.”

“Yes, I see how,” answered Florent; “but at present M. de Witt represents the Government and the law, and the Prince is a powerless cipher——”

“Not so powerless; we are in touch with him, he commands a section of the nobles—and he has the name.”

Florent, hearing again the words used by Sir William Temple, started inwardly. It was curious that the name that owed its prestige and its weight to the fact that it was the name of the man who had first given Holland her liberty was to be used now to aid in her downfall.

“He is a boy,” said Van Mander quickly. “He has been brought up by M. de Witt—educated as a republican——”

St. Croix smiled.

“Is M. de Witt clever enough to train a prince into a commoner? I do not think so.”

Interest shone in Florent’s grey eyes.

“How far has the Prince gone—with France?”

“He is of an extraordinary caution—he will not commit himself while he is in the power of M. de Witt, but take it from me that he does not love him.… Has he cause to?—after the Act of Exclusion?… His only hope lies in England and France, and he knows it.”

“You confirm what I have ever heard,” answered Florent. “The Prince is only a figure-head,—a cloak to cover the designs of France.”

St. Croix nodded.

“Put it so if you will. And now,” he instinctively lowered his voice, “I come to the main object of my visit.”

A little colour flushed Florent’s face. He had wondered from the first what particular meaning there could be in St. Croix seeking him out. His position was one of power certainly, if put to a traitorous use, but De Pomponne must have many agents and spies. He waited.

“You will understand,” continued St. Croix, leaning forward across the table, “that the Prince is kept very close. His governor, his tutors, his gentlemen, are all M. de Witt’s men and practically his jailers. He cannot go abroad unattended nor receive any one alone; his letters are read—his movements, his speech, watched. It is almost impossible for us to convey to him any message—M. le Marquis de Pomponne’s audiences are formal, and always under the eye of some creature of M. de Witt,—here you can help us.”

Florent still waited. He would not, on the first asking, have betrayed M. de Witt wholesale, but he was not averse to some service to the other side.

The Frenchman smoothed down the ruffles at his wrist, keeping his eyes on his listener.

“M. de Witt visits the Prince almost every day—Tuesday afternoons he devotes to instructing him in politics, afterwards going to the assembly in the Binnenhof. It is his practice to take one of his secretaries with him—it would be possible for this man to convey a packet to the Prince.”

Florent answered quietly, but his eyes shone—

“You want me to try?”

“Yes.”

“A servant of the Prince whom we have used,” St. Croix went on, “as a go-between has lately been suspected, and dismissed by M. de Witt; we are hard put to it for a means to communicate with the Prince.”

Florent straightened himself in the stiff chair. To-morrow was Tuesday.

“Van Ouvenaller accompanied M. de Witt last week,” he said. “I think it very likely that M. de Witt will request me to do so this—but I shall be left in the antechamber.…”

St. Croix shrugged his shoulders.

“As to that—you must find your chance—better wait than risk detection.… I leave it to your discretion.”

“I am not imprudent,” smiled Florent. “Give me the packet—if I go I will attempt it; if not I can, as you say, wait.…”

The Frenchman took a thick, folded letter from the inner lining of his red coat and laid it on the table between them.

“If that reach His Highness safely it will be a service M. de Pomponne will not forget,” he said impressively.

“I will do my best,” answered Florent, “but I still value my place; while M. de Witt is Grand Pensionary I think it worth while to be in his good graces.”

Hyacinthe St. Croix rose.

“France has her heel on Europe,” he said. “With the help of this little Prince she will have the United Provinces—” he began to pull on his fringed gloves—“I give this Government two—three years—no more.”

“There is England,” remarked Florent, still thinking of the Triple Alliance.

“England—like Sweden—may take her price,” returned St. Croix.

Florent rose too.

“The politics of this land are shaken up and down like sand tossed in the palm,” he said, as if he had suddenly roused himself. “I am in the employ of the Government, but in no way bound to any master—tell M. le Marquis de Pomponne so—as M. de Witt’s secretary I know something.…”

“How much?” asked St. Croix, lacing his gloves.

Florent answered steadily—

“I know that M. de Witt is afraid.”

“Of France—of England?”

“Of William of Orange.”

“He hath good cause,” answered St. Croix. He picked up his hat with the fine buckle, his satin-lined cloak. “I think if His Highness once gave the signal the whole country would be in arms. There is a strange revulsion of feeling against this ideal republic, is there not?”

Florent was taciturn again. He raised one of the brass candlesticks.

“The stairs are very dark,” he said, and opened the door. He made no show of friendliness or hospitality, no attempt to draw the Frenchman. He wanted to be alone. “When shall I see you again?” he asked.

St. Croix hitched up his sword-belt.

“Better not meet here again, nor at the house of M. le Marquis where I stay.… There is a small tavern kept by a Frenchman near the Nieuwe Kerk—the Nieuwe Doelen he calls it—we may meet there—say Wednesday evening—six of the clock.”

Florent came out on to the landing with his visitor and held the candle so that a flickering radiance was cast down the sombre stairway.

“I will come if I can,” he answered slowly.

“Au revoir,” said St. Croix, and added some laughing commonplace for the benefit of any maid-servant who might be in hearing.

Florent waited with the light until the gay feather and mantle had disappeared round the bend of the stairs, then he returned to his room and took up the letter left by St. Croix. It was sealed in three places with the Marquis de Pomponne’s signet, and addressed formally to: “His Highness William Henry, Prince of Orange Nassau,” etc., as if the scribe had enjoyed writing out the fine titles.

Fine titles indeed to belong to an insignificant tool of France—but Florent at once checked that foolish reflection. The Prince was behaving prudently, much in his way as he, Florent Van Mander, was, in following success and securing his own ambitions. He was doing, in fact, the one thing there was for him to do—a bargain with France or England was his one means of escape.

Florent turned the letter over. He was curious to know exactly what it contained; he wished that he had asked St. Croix.

He was curious, also, to see the Prince, to judge him for himself. He thrilled with unreasonable excitement at the thought of meeting him.

A distant, threatening noise coming from the street below made him quickly put the letter into his pocket and go to the window.

He was not in much doubt of what it was—another of those noisy, useless Orange riots, dispersed by the train-bands and always ignored by M. de Witt; a handful of discontented people headed by boyish enthusiasts like the young student Jacob Van der Graef. Florent was not greatly interested in them.

He leant out of the window.

Everything had faded into the heavy grey of a cloudy night; the straight lines of the houses opposite the great tower of the Groote Kerk, the poplar tree that rustled so persistently; a new moon, clear out, hard, shone through the hurrying vapours.

By the street-lamps’ feeble glow Florent could see some people running up the street towards the scene of the riot; they carried sticks and swords, and some wore Orange favours.

He smiled cynically to himself, reflecting how little they knew that the Prince whom they shouted for as an embodiment of all patriotic virtue was in reality sacrificing them to their greatest enemy, bargaining away their liberty for his personal advancement.

They are mostly fools, he thought, and shivered back from the sea wind, closing the window.

For a long while he sat silent in his comfortable room, smoking, and staring at his own shadow the candlelight cast over the dark walls. Once or twice he took the letter given by Hyacinthe St. Croix out of his pocket and fingered and scrutinised it, thinking the while—thinking.

And from without came the remote sounds of the students fighting, shouting, tussling with the train-bands in the name of William of Orange.

Florent Van Mander almost envied men who could be so simple.

CHAPTER III
MASTER AND PUPIL

“Do you accompany M. de Witt to-day?” asked Van Ouvenaller.

Florent replied without looking up—

“Yes.”

“I think he will be out of humour,” remarked the other secretary,—“I do not mean angry, like other men, but sad.”

The note of admiration in his voice was marked. Florent continued docketing the papers, letters from England, before him; Van Ouvenaller, who had just entered the library, stood against the desk looking down at him.

“It is this pastor,” he continued. “He has very ill repaid M. de Witt’s courtesy.”

“Mynheer the Pastor Simon Simonides?” inquired Florent. “I saw him—why did he come here?”

“By the order of Their High Mightinesses,” answered the other, with some satisfaction, “to ask M. de Witt’s pardon for a sermon he preached some days ago—before you came to the Hague.”

Florent glanced up.

“A treasonable sermon?”

“He strove to stir the people into sedition by accusing them of ingratitude to the Prince of Orange, and spoke very burningly against the Republic.”

“He looked sour and fierce,” said Florent, “but M. de Witt was very gracious to him.”

“Too gracious,” returned Van Ouvenaller, with some heat. “He said as sole reproof—‘Mynheer, you have outstepped your duty, which is to heal, not to create, discord,’ and with that made him stay to dinner. But the old man was not softened; he left as hot against us as he had come.”

“Why should M. de Witt care?” asked Florent.

Van Ouvenaller slightly smiled.

“You do not know him; he cannot bear to feel any against him—if he thinks the people dislike, distrust him, it strikes at his heart. It is the same with the Prince. I swear that since Mynheer took over His Highness’ education his one idea has been to gain his friendship.”

The speaker’s worn, plain face lit; it was clear he admired his master—to a foolish extent Florent thought.

Van Ouvenaller spoke again.

“You have not seen the Prince?”

“No—I am curious.”

The older secretary made no answer. He fixed his eyes on the picture of the garden seen through the straight window, with the afternoon sunshine in the trees and the figure of Agneta de Witt seated in the shade, spinning, her brass-bound Bible beside her.

Florent gazed too.

“This must be dull for M. de Witt’s children.”

Van Ouvenaller answered quickly—

“They do not live here, but with M. de Witt’s sister, at Dordt. This is a visit.”

“Then without them,” smiled Florent, “this great house must be very dull indeed.”

“It is quiet,” said Van Ouvenaller simply, “but one is too immersed in affairs to notice it; and M. de Witt will always live quietly now Madame de Witt is dead.”

Then he drew out his watch and added, in a changed tone—

“M. de Witt will be waiting for you—have you the papers?”

Florent put them into the red velvet bag that went daily to and fro in the Hague, containing, as a foreigner remarked, half scornful, half admiring, “the most important documents in Europe,” took his hat and cloak from the wall, saluted Van Ouvenaller and stepped into the hall. He did not need to betake himself to the Grand Pensionary’s private cabinet, for John de Witt came down the wide, pleasant stairs with his hat on.

“You are punctual.” He smiled, drawing on his gloves slowly. He was entirely in black save for his falling lace collar, and looked pale and tired. “I have been a little delayed to-day. We go first, Mynheer Van Mander, to His Highness’ house”—he avoided pointedly the word “palace,”—“afterwards to the Binnenhof.”

Florent ventured on no comment. He half resented the notable simplicity with which the Grand Pensionary of the United Provinces walked through the streets of the Hague attended only by himself carrying the famous red bag. Of what use was power, he thought, if it but meant the taking up of an enormous weight of cares and anxieties and receiving in return the treatment of an ordinary burgher citizen?

John de Witt did not speak as they went along, and it was with an absorbed, though courteous, air that he returned the many salutations bestowed. Florent wondered what he was reflecting upon, and if the grim unfriendliness of the old Calvinist pastor still troubled him. Then, as they reached the low buildings of the Palace, he snatched his own thoughts to the moment. He must have his wits about him—there was St. Croix’s letter.

They were received by Mynheer Van Ghent, the Prince’s governor, in a fine but gloomy chamber with a painted ceiling.

Half the Palace, considered now the property of the State, was locked up, and the Prince allowed but the use of one wing. To Florent the room had an air of mournful splendour—built for a palace and used as a prison—there was a sense of sombre dreariness over the whole building; the furniture was scant and plain, there were no pictures on the walls, and the bookcases, plain and austere, held volumes of a severe look and character, mostly on mathematics or tactics.

A gloomy place for a young man to live in, watched by enemies; a dreary place for a Prince to be brought up in, surrounded by cold faces, by suspicion, distrust, and enmity; a cheerless habitation for the heir to a ruined House, friendless, early orphaned, and forced to guard his every word and look.

M. de Witt’s policy might be that of conciliation and concession; he might hold out his hand sincerely, and with his heart in it, but it was not easy to imagine life as very pleasant for the young Prince in these stern environments.

Mynheer Van Ghent talked a little with the Grand Pensionary. Florent had heard that the Prince hated his governor; it was common knowledge that he had fallen ill of chagrin when forced to part with his former tutor, his uncle Mynheer de Zuylestein. Florent therefore observed Mynheer Van Ghent closely, and found in him nothing displeasing, but rather a kind of melancholy austerity and a gentle demeanour.

He stood a little apart from him and his master, and could not hear what the two were saying; their voices were low and guarded. He wondered where the Prince was; if he would see him; if he would, possibly, be able to convey Pomponne’s letter.…

The heavy door at the end of the room, which was not far from him, opened quietly; a young man stepped into the apartment and closed the door after him.

Florent was startled, taken aback, confused. The young man regarded him out of a pair of remarkable eyes, gave him a slow, mournful, unsmiling glance, and seemed to hesitate.

Florent was not sure. The youth was plainly, even shabbily dressed, and looked too grave and tall for seventeen.

But de Witt turned and held out his hand.

“I find Your Highness well?” he inquired.

William of Orange crossed the room.

“I am very well,” he answered respectfully. He bent his head to his governor and to the Grand Pensionary. “Will you come into the other room to-day, Mynheer?” he added. “I have desired a fire there.”

Florent Van Mander was studying him greedily now, cursing himself, too, for a lost chance. That moment when the Prince entered he could have slipped the package into his very hand if only he had known him at first sight. He drew the letter out of his pocket, watching the Prince the while.

M. de Witt had his back to him.

Certainly His Highness was tall for his age, and with none of the awkwardness of boyhood; he was elegant rather, delicately made, and carried himself with an air of unnatural, almost dangerous, quiet and control.

Despite his plain dress and subdued manner, he was not in the least insignificant, but of a noticeable and princely appearance. To Florent, even at this first glance, a personality masterful and attractive.

The three came down the room towards the secretary, the Prince a little in advance.

Florent could note his face, pale and clear complexioned, with a high-arched nose and curved lips set firmly, wonderful eyes, hazel green, large and brilliant under dark reddish brows, and a low white forehead shaded with heavy auburn curls that fell on to his linen collar,—M. de Witt’s secretary had that swift impression of the Prince and as swift an inspiration. He stooped as if to pick something up.

“Your Highness dropped this,” he said as the Prince reached him. He held out his handkerchief, concealed in it the Frenchman’s letter.

William of Orange turned his head. There was a look about his brow and mouth as if he controlled incessant pain, but neither that nor the expression of gravity that made him appear old for his years could destroy the charm of his youth. His eyes fixed on Florent.

“Thank you, Mynheer,” he said, and put out his small, aristocratic hand.

Florent thrilled as their fingers touched. The Prince slipped the handkerchief into his pocket and passed on.

Now that it was done Florent marvelled that he had had the temerity to venture it. The Prince, though he must have known that it was not his handkerchief, and have felt at once the packet inside the cambric, gave not the slightest sign of discomposure. It was perfectly done; Florent saw in it the training of one brought up amid spies and enemies—but he had risked something in taking this youth’s prudence so for granted.

The Prince did not look at the secretary again, but passed into the next chamber with M. de Witt.

As he closed the door he gave a sharp glance at the Grand Pensionary, then crossed to a little table by the window and seated himself there.

They were in a small room, lit by a fire that burnt pleasantly between the andirons on the blue-tiled hearth. The walls were hung with stamped leather; in one corner stood a globe, and beside it a desk covered with maps and plans.

M. de Witt took the chair by the fireplace and turned so that he faced the Prince. His sad, tender eyes were fixed with an almost yearning expression on the graceful figure of the young man who, half leaning against the desk, sat waiting, in an expressionless, quiet attitude.

The Grand Pensionary loosened his heavy cloak.

“We will have no lesson to-day, Highness,” he said. “I have to speak of practical politics—and am here to talk gravely with you.”

“That is as you wish, Mynheer,” answered William. He had a voice naturally changeful and musical, but, like his eyes and his movements, it was controlled to a cold expressionlessness.

“I hope that it will also be your wish,” said M. de Witt, “when I tell you that it is of the affairs of Holland I desire to speak.”

“I am always at the disposal of Their High Mightinesses,” replied William, with the slightest inflection of sarcasm.

John de Witt made an open gesture with his fine right hand as if to sweep aside all formality and convention.

“It must not be like this between us, Highness,” he said, with great gentle sweetness. “Of late you have met me somewhat coldly. Why?”

William sat up slowly, his eyes were averted.

“I have often assured you, Mynheer,” he answered, “of my duty and affection. Have Their High Mightinesses anything to complain of?”

Again there was that faint stress on the pompous title.

M. de Witt regarded him steadily.

“I spoke for myself, Highness, thinking that the services I have rendered you, the affection I have always felt for you might have kept me some place in your esteem.”

Still the Prince would not answer the appeal in the words, even by raising his eyes.

“I have always striven,” he said, “to express my gratitude to you, Mynheer, for your constant care.”

There was a look almost of wonder on the noble face of M. de Witt, as if he could hardly credit the unmoved composure of this boy.

“I have not come, Highness, to exchange with you the language of diplomacy,” he said.

William looked up now.

“It is the only language I have had the chance to learn, Mynheer.”

John de Witt gazed at him gently and sadly.

“I have never taught you anything but frankness, Highness—I have deserved both your trust and your affection. It has been my dearest wish, my most cherished hope, that I might educate you to become my friend, my ally in the government of the United Provinces.”

The Prince made the slightest movement and again averted his eyes.

“You are no child now,” continued M. de Witt; “and must fairly well understand your position … and mine.”

“I understand both, Mynheer,” answered William.

“You have been educated as a citizen of Holland, and it is to the citizen of Holland that I have come to speak to-day.” M. de Witt paused a moment. He was slightly flushed, and his voice was full of emotion. “I have striven to make you worthy of your grandfather and of that ancestor of yours who secured us our liberty, and it is my wish to obtain for you those dignities that are the heritage of your House—all that are compatible with the safety of this Republic.”

William, still looking away, spoke slowly—

“The Republic has nothing to fear from me, Mynheer. I, surely, am of but little account in the State.”

M. de Witt was observing him very closely.

“You have the name, Highness,” he said; “you must know that. And it is a power, you must know that also. You are the heir of the family that once ruled Holland, and you are used as the rallying point of all the malcontents.”

William glanced up with a curious, intense expression.

“You speak very frankly, Mynheer.”

“I have no object to serve by dissimulation,” answered John de Witt. “I come to you single-mindedly. I can claim to have always spoken openly to you, Highness, since you first were of an age to understand these matters.”

He paused, bending his eyes on the Prince. His manner and speech were weighty. His entire thought, his entire energy seemed concentrated on what he said; as if he, the great and lofty statesman, strove by sheer force of strength of character to overwhelm, rouse, and conquer the impassive youth before him.

“Openly I spoke to you once before, Highness. When Their High Mightinesses passed the Perpetual Edict I told you that we abolished the office of the Stadtholder out of regard for the liberty of the country. I assured you of my friendship—but I told you plainly that we would risk no recurrence of 1650.”

The Prince coughed slightly and lowered his eyes.

“I remember, Mynheer, very well.”

“And now, again, I have to speak of the safety of the United Provinces, Highness.”

William answered without moving—

“What have I to do, Mynheer, with the safety of the State?”

“I will make that clear to you,” said John de Witt gravely. “I cannot tell how much you know of what this party does in your name; I refuse to believe that you encourage them——”

“Could I have been more dutiful to the State, more quiet than I have been?” interrupted William. He gave no sign of any feeling or agitation save that the wild-rose colour of delicate health had deepened in his thin cheeks.

“You have been too quiet,” answered the Grand Pensionary. “I want you to act, Highness.”

He waited a second, but the Prince did not speak.

“I am greatly troubled,” continued M. de Witt, with a stately simplicity, “by these men who strive to hinder and oppose the Government. You know their names, Count Frederick William, M. Beverningh, M. Zuylestein, M. Fagel——”

“None of these are my friends save M. Zuylestein,” returned the Prince; “and you have good cause to know, Mynheer, that I see nothing of him——”

“M. Zuylestein left your service because I doubted his loyalty to the Republic,” said John de Witt sternly; “and now he works discord in Zeeland. And for the others, whether you know it or not, they traffic in your name, Highness.”

“In what manner, Mynheer?”

“In what manner?—they meddle with France and England, they sow dissension in the town councils, in the Assembly itself; they riot in the street—I think that you must know it, Highness.… Every reasonable concession hath been made, but no reasonable concession will content them. It was agreed that the question of the Captain-Generalship, of the seat in the Council of State, should be postponed until you were of age; they agitate for these honours now—you must know this also, Highness.”

The Prince glanced at him sideways, then looked very quickly down again.

“In Zeeland, where you are premier noble, your partisans make the excuse of your titles of Ter Veere and Flushing to demand your appearance in their council now they consider you of age.” And for the third time he added—“You must know this, Highness.”

He paused impressively, and his eyes were dark and ardently commanding on the Prince.

William put his hand to his brow as if he made a mechanical movement to ease a constant pain there.

“What do you wish me to do?” he asked quietly.

M. de Witt answered at once—

“I want you to disown this party—they may act without your sanction, they cannot act in face of your disapproval—I want you as an ally, as a friend——”

“I am powerless as either, Mynheer,” returned the Prince; “and,” he suddenly turned his wonderful eyes on the Grand Pensionary, “since you designate these you speak of as my friends, to what in me do you appeal to act against them?”

There was a flash of imperiousness in his tone new to M. de Witt. It was almost the manner of a king to a subject; it gave the Grand Pensionary the bewildered sense that he, with twenty years’ experience of affairs and the management of men, was not equal to this boy whom he had seen grow up, whom he had himself educated.

“I appeal to you as a citizen of the Republic,” he said. “I have not brought you up to put yourself before your country—” he hesitated a moment before continuing, “I have always thought you of too great a nature to prefer the phantom of personal aggrandisement to the good of the Commonwealth——”

It seemed as if, on an impulse, William was about to speak, but he checked himself, and M. de Witt went on—

“Will you let yourself, Highness, be used to stir up faction in the State?—will you be an instrument in the hands of ambitious place-seekers?”

“I cannot help my birth, Mynheer,” answered the Prince, “nor prevent the people from using my name.”

He had not lowered his clear, brilliant glance, and the two pairs of eyes met across the small, firelit room. John de Witt’s met a fathomless, inscrutable look, and a horrible mistrust of this too composed youth crept into his mind—a distrust he had known before and always fought against and dismissed—

But William of Orange was the nephew of Charles of England and the cousin of Louis of France.

“I believe France meditates the destruction of the United Provinces,” De Witt said suddenly. “Colbert envies our commerce and King Louis is mad for conquest.… I do not trust England.”

The Prince, never altering his easy attitude, nor changing the level tones of his voice, nor in any way taking heed of the feeling that surged behind de Witt’s words, put his hand slowly to his breast, where, in the pocket of his black waistcoat, lay the letter wrapped in Florent Van Mander’s handkerchief.

“What has this to do with the object of your coming, Mynheer?” he asked.

The Grand Pensionary found the almost unnatural composure and control of this boy agitating him; the colour came into his face.

“France might seize any pretext,” he said. “Any pretext—if we are to stand we must be united——”

William slightly raised his fine red brows.

“So distinguished a statesman as yourself, Mynheer—will know how to meet any misfortune that threatens you.”

M. de Witt regarded him earnestly. Had he failed—had the royal breed been too powerful for all his careful training? He thought he traced in the commanding eyes and curved mouth of the Prince the arrogance, the hauteur of regal blood, not so easy to quench or overcome—had he failed?… Many had foretold he would. Had he undertaken too confidently the task of making into a staunch, loyal republican the heir of the oldest House in Europe, the son of a man who had risked all in an attempt at sovereign power and of a woman too proud to speak to a commoner.…

“You speak as if with hate of me,” he said, and there was a half sad confession of failure in the words. “But for Holland—you love Holland?”

William was leaning against the side of his chair, resting his hand on the arm of it.

“Both you and my country, Mynheer,” he replied, “have my duty and my affection; my position makes me powerless to help either.…”

M. de Witt gave him a flashing glance.

“You can serve your country, Highness, by withdrawing from all association with these noisy partisans of yours—by letting it be known that you do not desire to be regarded as the Prince of Orange, heir to an extinct office, but as a citizen of the United Provinces.”

The Prince coughed, and again put his hand to his head. The delicate colour had faded from his face, he was pale to the lips.

“You best qualify yourself for the offices that may one day be yours by quiet study and severe application,” continued M. de Witt. “Not by endeavouring to thrust yourself (upon the selfish suggestions of sordid ambition) into power for which your youth renders you unfit, and into places from which the law debars you.”

William gave one of his rare, slow smiles; it seemed to rob the Grand Pensionary’s speech of half its weight and meaning.

“My docility hath not deserved this, Mynheer,” he said. “Half the people at the Hague would not know me if they saw me, and you accuse me of endeavouring to win the suffrage of the mob——”

“No,” interrupted De Witt. “No.…”

“You accuse me,” continued William, “of selfish ambition.… I have not lifted a finger to alter my position—I have always been the humble servant of yourself, Mynheer, and Their High Mightinesses.”

“This is evasion,” said the Grand Pensionary in a mournful anger. “I came to Your Highness with an appeal—will you work with me or no?”

“I am always at your service,” answered the Prince.

It seemed that in no way could M. de Witt break through this even, immovable courtesy. His anger began to rise against a nature that could turn to him this hard reserve. He recalled his patient services, his honest attempt to win the Prince, his frankness towards the Orange party, his loyal endeavour that his young ward should not suffer for the misfortune of his House, his eagerness to establish a friendship with the Prince so that one day they might work together for the good of the land. Now it would seem all this had largely been in vain. The first time he put it to the issue he found that he dealt with intractable, unyielding, perhaps treacherous, material … treacherous—that stinging thought, not to be banished, roused him almost unbearably.

“You shut me out of your confidence, Highness,” he said. “You will neither trust me nor be frank with me.… I do not know what policy you pursue, nor whose advice you follow in refusing to treat me as what I have ever endeavoured to be—your friend.… I do not know, I say, your counsellors, but I think they advise you ill.…”

“I follow mine own counsels, Mynheer.”

John de Witt rose; the firelight cast the leaping shadow of his tall, stately figure upon the wall behind him.

“I have been very patient,”—his voice was strong, full of emotion,—“but I have the dignity of the Republic to consider … and if I thought——”

He caught himself up. The Prince raised his eyes, and their expression goaded de Witt.

“What did Buat die for?” he asked.

William answered calmly—

“For selling the secrets of Holland to France.”

“For betraying his country, Highness; and he was of the Orange party. Madame Buat is one of their most active agents now. But I have had enough of it … if you dare——”

The Prince sprang lightly to his feet.

“—If you dare, Highness,” repeated De Witt sternly, “the Republic will know how to act.”

“Mynheer de Witt,” said William in a stifled voice, “what do you mean?”

“Have you dealings with your uncle Charles Stewart? Are you secretly tampering with the agents of France?” demanded the Grand Pensionary. “There is my meaning.”

He paused. The Prince did not alter the hard quiet of his manner, though his great eyes showed a tumult of feeling.

“What right have you to ask that of me?” he demanded.

The words were a challenge, as such M. de Witt answered them.

“Your father sought foreign aid when he attempted the liberties of Holland——”

Like a sword swiftly unsheathed the Prince’s passion slipped his control—

“I will not hear of my father from you, Mynheer,” he cried. “For what he did I have paid … and for your insults——” His words were checked in a fit of coughing that shook his frail frame, he had to support himself against the back of the chair. This evidence of the ill health that decided many doctors in declaring he could not live long instantly softened the noble heart of John de Witt, touched also by the Prince’s quick anger.

“Forgive me,” he said. “I had no right—I ask your pardon, Highness.”

William sank into his chair, pulled out his handkerchief and pressed it to his lips; he still coughed a little.

“Forgive me,” he answered, quiet again, but breathing with difficulty. “I forgot myself.… I have taken so much,” he added, “I might well have taken that. But it is not often, Mynheer, that I fail to recognise your position and … mine.”

The words hurt M. de Witt.

“I would not be your master but your friend,” he said eagerly. “Trust me and I will do more for you than these ill-judged factions.…”

William looked round; his face was colourless, and he held himself as if exhausted.

“Mynheer,” he said, speaking with something of an effort, “I do not know why you think I am occupied in stirring up sedition in the State. You know how I spend every moment of my time; I have no opportunity nor—desire. I am your very good friend and the servant of Their Noble Mightinesses.… I have, obviously, no influence with the party that you speak of. As for my uncle and my cousin of France, they do not make me their confidant … not counting me, doubtless, of sufficient importance.”

John de Witt looked him in the eyes with a deep, questioning glance.

“Have I satisfied you, Mynheer?” asked the Prince courteously.

The Grand Pensionary could press no further. He was half baffled, half angered; yet he found himself remembering that this Prince, who was behaving so like a veteran diplomat, was in fact only a boy, often ill and lonely.

“I came with no suspicions,” he said. “Only to put before you, Highness, something of the state of the Republic and to ask your help——”

“If I can ever be of service I shall be glad,” answered William. He looked up, and added abruptly, “Mynheer de Witt, might Mynheer Cornelius Triglandt come back?—I would rather have him for my chaplain than any man I know.”

M. de Witt was taken by surprise, but he had his reply ready.

“M. Triglandt was removed from your person for the same reason as M. Zuylestein,” he said gently. “He hath an unruly tongue and a heart disloyal to the Republic. Their High Mightinesses could not allow his return. If you esteemed him, I am sorry.”

William was silent.

The Grand Pensionary glanced at the bronze clock on the mantelshelf.

“I have outstayed my time—I am due, Highness, at the Binnenhof.”

The Prince rose.

“Next time,” continued M. de Witt, “I will examine you in your studies. Till then I commend what I have said to your consideration.… Think of them always, Highness, as the words of a sincere friend.”

“I am grateful, Mynheer.”

The Grand Pensionary went to the door, and there hesitated.

“Believe me,” he said, looking back, “in the matter of Mynheer Triglandt I would gladly pleasure you … it is the will of the States.”

William bent his head.

John de Witt opened the door in silence and was gone.

The Prince remained by the table; a long breath escaped him and a bright look shone under his heavy lids. He cried to himself in the words used by the great Philip to his ancestor—

“Not the States, but you! you!”

Then he sank into the chair again, resting his elbow on the table and his head in his hand, while he drew from his pocket the letter given him by Florent Van Mander. He looked at the writing and the seals, then replaced it in his waistcoat.

He coughed slightly and glanced towards the door which had closed on the Grand Pensionary.

“Not the States,” he repeated, “but you, Mynheer de Witt, you!”

CHAPTER IV
M. DE WITT’S SECRETARY

Florent Van Mander sat at his desk by the open window and looked out on to the garden of M. de Witt.

The mysterious, damp, and misty days of autumn had set in. Thin sea vapours blew from morning till night across the Hague; the sunshine was faint as if it came from a great distance.

No fire burnt in the library, but the secretary had quietly set the window open, heedless of the chilly air.

For M. de Witt was walking in the garden talking to his brother, M. Cornelius de Witt, Ruard of Putten, who had come up to-day from Dordt, and Florent was listening to their conversation as it came clearly through the tranquil stillness.

“If you do not send more troops, brother,” the Ruard was saying, “I think Zeeland will get beyond all management. Count Tilly would be the man to quiet them.”

“I cannot spare Tilly from the Hague,” answered the softer voice of the Grand Pensionary. “And I have written to the burgomaster of Middelburg.”

“You hold the reins too gently,” returned Cornelius de Witt. “I think the Prince is in touch with these agitators in Zeeland——”

“It is hardly possible … he is kept too close.…”

“You should keep him closer. Are you sure of those about him?”

“They are of mine own choice—even to his gentlemen.”

“Well,” said the Ruard grimly, “he may have corrupted them.”

Florent leant forward cautiously. The brothers had halted close to the window. The Grand Pensionary’s back was towards him, but he could see the fine, rugged face of the Ruard, frowning now, and shaded by the great black beaver he wore.

“I have his assurance of loyalty,” said John de Witt. “I do not think he is of a nature to be false … he is quiet——”

“Take care he be not as cunning as he is quiet.”

“I have no right to think it,” answered the Grand Pensionary.

There was impatience in his brother’s reply.

“You have always been too just … the time has gone past for concessions.…”

They moved on slowly; Van Mander could hear their footsteps on the gravel but not what they said.

He had had his dismissal for the day; probably M. de Witt thought he had already gone. He locked his desk and put on his hat and cloak, then softly shut the window.

Before he left the building he went upstairs to M. de Witt’s private cabinet to return some papers he had copied for M. Van den Bosch, the head secretary, who, in company with the two confidential clerks, M. Bacherus and M. Van Ouvenaller, always sat there.

Van Mander returned to the hall with a dislike of these busy, quiet, dry men so intent on serving their master—machines he called them, what could they ever hope to rise to?—and they had all the secrets of M. de Witt in their hands.

There would be a game worth playing supposing that he possessed the keys of those desks. But they never entrusted him with anything of importance—save yesterday when he had carried the red velvet bag——

His mind leapt back to the letter he had given the Prince. He stepped out of John de Witt’s pink brick house into the sea-mist that was increasing as the sun set, and turned in the direction of the Nieuwe Kerk which lay towards the gates.

The vapour rested lightly on the water of the Vyver, and clung to the yellowing chestnut trees that surrounded it; beyond rose the straight walls of the Binnenhof, dimly seen, looming darkly from the mist.

Florent crossed the empty Plaats. Before him the threatening lines of the blunt roof of the Gevangenpoort, the prison gate, seemed to spring from out the fast thickening fog as if they were shaped from dark clouds and had no foundation on the earth. One barred window showed in the gloomy structure, and above it the flag of the Republic glimpsed through the obscurity.

Florent passed under the low, deep arch and came out into the Buitenhof. The soldiers on duty here, the few passers-by, seemed unreal and remote, so wrapped about and mysterious were they rendered by the damp, encroaching mist.

Florent was impressed, subdued by the silent, all-pervading personality of the town wearing the sea-fog like a veil over her ancient glories—like a veil of mourning, maybe, for her coming downfall. All the splendour of the Seven Provinces, all their strength, their endurance, their simplicity, their heroism were symbolised in these buildings, rising staunch and heavy through the sad, dripping fog. The gables and turrets of the Hall of the Knights; the tourelles and pale brick of the Binnenhof, with the bright painted shutters faintly showing, and here and there a light gleaming at a window; and above all the great tower of the Groote Kerk rising through the fog that the sea, ever beating on the shores and dykes of Holland with a persistent and sinister purpose, sends rolling drearily over the land it cannot yet reclaim.

Florent traversed the courts of the Binnenhof, and entered the Spuistraat, where the street-lamps and the lights in the shops cast faint haloes on the mist; here he followed the canal that led to the Nieuwe Kerk.

Crossing the bridge, under which slow barges passed winding along the grey water, through the grey land towards Ryswysk, he circled the clumsy, grim church, and discovered behind it, at the corner of Bezemstraat, the Nieuwe Doelen.

There in the quiet, plain back parlour of the inn he found Hyacinthe St. Croix.

Florent greeted him with his habitual brevity and went to the fire. He was chilled, his garments damp; even here the mist had penetrated, and filled the room with a salt sense of wet and cold.

St. Croix ordered dinner and, leaning back, surveyed his company.

Florent looked up suddenly. The firelight stained his linen collar, his pale face, to ruddiness.

“I delivered your letter.”

The Frenchman answered, not allowing himself to show any satisfaction—

“I thought you would.”

Florent was silent a while, rubbing his hands together over the blaze.

“How do you hope to receive an answer?” he said at last.

“If the Prince wishes to send one he will contrive it.”

Florent started at that.

“We are quite safe here,” remarked St. Croix easily. “This is M. le Marquis’ house.”

“Ah!” Florent glanced round the small, neat room, with the herbs hanging from the beams, the blue-and-white pottery, the shining brass,—an inn room like a hundred others. “M. le Marquis does it very well,” he said.

“Naturally,” smiled St. Croix. “What was your opinion of the Prince?” he added.

Florent ignored the question.

“I was wondering,” he said slowly, “how the Prince could communicate with any one—he is kept marvellously close.”

St. Croix shrugged his shoulders.

“I said he would contrive,—I think he is as clever as M. de Witt.”

Florent reflected on the words he had heard the Grand Pensionary use that evening to his brother.

“Those about him are all of M. de Witt’s choosing,” he said.

“The Prince might win some—one of them.”

Florent looked up quickly.

“Do you imagine him the sort of man to win—devotion?”

“I do not know. What is your opinion?”

Florent smiled rather sourly.

“I suppose some would serve him from policy, because they saw a restoration,” he answered; “but he is greatly beloved in Holland.”

“He has done nothing to win the suffrage of the people.”

“No,” said Florent; “he has done nothing.”

“It is the name,” resumed St. Croix lightly, “and the prestige of the House of Orange.”

Supper was brought in, and more candles. Florent crossed to the window.

Outside the mist was rolling past like waves, white and curling. The sound of the struggling, large poles could be heard through it; the noise of the wet mast striking the wet deck as it was lowered to pass under the bridge, and the men’s voices, shouting to each other, hoarse, remote.

Florent glanced askance over his shoulder at St. Croix. A man who was despising him, no doubt, as one of a fallen race; anticipating the time when the King of France would be master of Holland—the dictator of Europe. He began to find that he hated St. Croix, and that he was angry with himself for being there, playing into the Frenchman’s hands.

He thought of the quiet, worn men in M. de Witt’s Cabinet whom he had, at the moment, so despised. Now he was ready to wish his hands as clean as theirs. He resented the look of insolent superiority he thought to read in the powdered face of Hyacinthe St. Croix.

But the Frenchman spoke pleasantly—

“Will you not come to dinner?”

Florent silently complied. He found that the little inn, supported by the pay of M. le Marquis de Pomponne, provided of the best; food and wine were both better than he was accustomed to. This further set him against St. Croix, who was buying him in this paltry way as surely as was William of Orange being bought by the power and wealth of France and England.

“What was in that letter I delivered?” he demanded suddenly.

Hyacinthe St. Croix gave answer with a fine appearance of frankness—

“You have heard of the feeling in Zeeland?—His Highness is its premier noble, and, now that he is in his eighteenth year, the people consider him of age—and desire him to take his seat in the Council there——”

“M. de Witt would never allow it.”

“Mon Dieu, no, M. de Witt would never allow it—but it is possible that Monseigneur the Prince might act without permission.”

“Ah!” said Florent. He leant back, his hand round his wineglass, his eyes fixed across the candles’ shine on the Frenchman’s face. “And M. le Marquis would help him in this?”

“Making of it a challenge, the glove thrown down,” assented Hyacinthe St. Croix. “It would be a bold move for His Highness to make. If he once outwits M. de Witt he opens his eyes for always, and there can be no more confidence between them; yet maybe he would hazard it——”

“Under the protection of France,” interrupted Florent.

“You wonder we think it worth while,” returned St. Croix quickly, “but there are many reasons.… This young man is His Majesty’s cousin, and M. de Louvois sees how good use may be made of him. He is already of some influence in the State, and his party grows.”

“M. de Pomponne is ready to help him to raise revolt in Middelburg?”

“Yes.”

“Is M. Temple in this?” asked Florent abruptly.

St. Croix smiled.

“He is like M. de Witt, hopelessly honest.”

Florent emptied his glass slowly.

“We have made overtures to the Princess of Orange, but she is old and cautious,” continued St. Croix. “Also to M. de Zuylestein and Prince John Maurice. The letter you passed to Monseigneur the Prince contained an offer on the part of M. le Marquis to connive at his escape to Middelburg.”

“How could it be done?” mused Florent.

“M. le Marquis could accomplish it—M. Van Ghent is away——”

Florent looked up sharply.

“Yes, he left on a visit to his estate in Guelders to-day. The Prince hath then thrown in his lot with you—” he added, “put himself under the protection of France?”

“Mon Dieu, what else is there for him to do?”

Florent pushed back his chair. He had eaten very little, nor did St. Croix press it, though he had dined well himself after an indifferent, easy fashion that nettled his guest.

“Ugh! this mist of yours,” shivered the Frenchman suddenly glancing about the room. “Nothing will keep it out—how much of it do you have?”

“I am new to the Hague, but there is plenty of it, until we get the frosts—then too, sometimes.”

St. Croix made a wry face.

“I would the Holy Virgin had placed my talents elsewhere. Here there is nothing wherewith to amuse one’s self save the contemplation of Dutch virtue and the effort to avoid rheumatism. How do you endure it, my friend?”

“By being Dutch,” answered Florent, gazing at him steadily. “You speak very plainly to me—I am Dutch.”

St. Croix laughed.

“You think me overbold. But I tell you this, my master is more powerful in the Seven Provinces than any Dutchman—as you are ambitious you had best not offend him.”

So, they threatened—they felt themselves strong enough for that.

“I have my own interests at heart,” commented Florent dryly, after a pause. “I see that the Orange party is the one to serve.… I shall serve it, knowing quite well, M. St. Croix, that it is another name for France.”

The Frenchman blinked his fair eyes.

“His Highness may be called the lever with which His Majesty will heave the United Provinces on to the map of France,” he remarked.

“You seem very sure of him,” said Florent, “and I believe that you are right. But … it is curious in all the discussions concerning this Prince, whose name we all use alike to serve our ends—among all the factions that clamour for William of Orange—is there never one to think of him as other than the tool of France? Does it never enter the thoughts of any that he might prove as honest as M. de Witt—as faithful to his country?”

“This is not an age of heroes,” smiled St. Croix; and added, half insolently, “Do you regret the fact, Monsieur?”

“M. de Witt is a hero.”

“M. de Witt is a saint and a fool,” replied the Frenchman. “And the Prince of Orange is neither.”

“Some must believe in him.…”

“As an instrument to gratify their ambition. M. Beverningh, M. de Zuylestein, and Prince John Maurice believe in him certainly—after that fashion.”

“I do not mean them—but these people in the street—Jacob Van der Graef——”

“A silly young man,” remarked St. Croix, lighting his pipe. “Yes, perhaps those people do believe in the glory of the old dynasty. But things have changed since the days of William the Taciturn; as I say, there are no heroes nowadays.”

Florent suddenly shrugged his shoulders.

“These are foolish matters for us to be discussing. You know where my interests lie, Monsieur; and,” he added, with a strange note of defiance, “you have pointed out that safety also rests with my silence. You need not fear that I should betray you to M. de Witt, or be over faithful to him. I, at least, am not a fool.”

“I think you are shrewd enough,” answered St. Croix, “and I have trusted you with a delicate matter. The way to your fortune is plain: for the present, stay where you are, keep quiet and docile to M. de Witt.”

Florent smiled.

“He is not difficult to fool,” he said grimly, “—M. de Witt.”

“No,” assented St. Croix, lazily watching his rings of smoke; “but he is difficult to lie to.”

Florent was silent; a dusky colour flushed into his cheeks.

“M. le Marquis,” continued the Frenchman, “hath told me that he finds the Grand Pensionary more troublesome to deal with than any clever rogue.”

“Yet he is simple, credulous,” said Florent. “See, in this matter of the Prince, how he trusts him.”

“He hath his own wisdom,” answered St. Croix; “but his day is over.”

He looked shrewdly at the young secretary, and added—

“I must bring you to speech of M. le Marquis.”

Florent made no answer; he rose.

“You are going?” asked St. Croix, leaning indolently on the table.

“I have some work to do—M. de Witt must not find me amiss.”

It was not the truth; the secretary’s duties ended when he quitted the Grand Pensionary’s house, but St. Croix accepted the excuse.

“You will hear from me again in a day or so,” he said. “The lodgings in the Kerkestraat will always find you?”

“Yes.”

Florent picked up his hat and cloak from the bench that ran round the wall and turned to leave.

“I shall keep my eyes and ears alert,” he said. “Good-night.”

“Good-night,” nodded St. Croix. “A sullen brute,” he thought as the door closed on Florent. “But these Dutchmen,”—he shrugged his shoulders,—“one must use them as one finds them.…”

Florent Van Mander cared nothing what impression he had made; his one desire was to get away, to be alone. He welcomed the cold white fog after the brightly lit parlour and the intolerable Frenchman sitting there over his wine. He hated it and all it symbolised; hated it so suddenly and so bitterly that he could not have stayed a second longer in the company of the man whom, for his own ends, he was serving.

Such emotions were quite new to him; he could not understand them. He had always despised people who allowed sentiment to interfere with ambition. One could not be great by following a falling cause.… What should it matter to him, a diplomat, whether he was paid by England or France or Holland, so he achieved his aim?

Fortune was not attained by sitting in M. de Witt’s Cabinet, like M. Van den Bosch; and the Grand Pensionary had not inspired Florent with any great enthusiasm or admiration. He had judged him coldly, seen failure ahead of him, and decided not to entangle his fortunes with the Republican Government. But nevertheless he felt this strange wrath, and distaste, against himself and what he did. It was as if something had suddenly touched and aroused feelings that lay so deep he did not know till now that he possessed them.

The Seven Provinces an appanage of France—they who had been the richest nation in Europe——

Florent checked his thoughts, wondering what had put into his mind—this folly.

Almost he imagined that the brief moment in which he had looked into the eyes of William of Orange had awakened him to this uneasy questioning. Yet that made double folly, since the Prince himself was but the tool of France, intriguing with de Pomponne—truckling to Louis.…

He had walked through the mist, along the Spuistraat, with no thought of his destination, but when he reached the Binnenhof he pulled himself up and stopped.

The lamps showing at intervals on their red posts displayed the fog in great pale circles, but their light did not penetrate far, and Florent realised that he began to take note of what he was doing in a thick, hurrying darkness of vapour no moon could pierce. The canal had ceased, and he knew that he must be by the Binnenhof. No one seemed abroad; the fog gave the effect of complete isolation.

Keeping close to the stone wall of the building, he made his way through the black arch of the Gevangenpoort on to the Plaats.

Here the closer-set street lights revealed the railings encircling the Vyver. Florent followed them a little way, then, gathering his cloak closely round him, paused and looked down on to the water, an abyss of fathomless darkness which, where the feeble rays of the lamp struck it, revealed billows of curling mist, which seemed to be sucked down into measureless depths of obscurity.

Florent leant against the railing, as completely shut away from the world as if in a secret chamber. All ordinary sights and sounds had receded, vanished; he could not even discern the lights in the Binnenhof or Maritshuis. His hair was wet his hat limp with damp; beads of moisture clung to his heavy frieze cloak, he could feel the water trickling under his collar, and there was a salt taste on his lips. He stood quite still watching the twisting, striving thickness of vapour disclosed by the beams of the lamp. Then suddenly a light was flashed over him, and a voice, conveying a slightly foreign accent, spoke in a low tone close beside him—

“Are you Mynheer Van Mander, clerk to M. de Witt?”

Florent lifted eyes startled from absorbed contemplation. He saw, through the curtain of the filmy mist, the figure of a man, wearing, like himself, a heavy mantle, and carrying a lantern.

“I am sure that you are,” the speaker continued. “I have been following you a considerable time.”

“For what purpose?” asked Florent.

The stranger, who had loomed up so quietly out of the fog, came a little nearer.

“You were at the Palace yesterday?”

Florent turned to face him.

“Yes.”

The other raised his lantern.

“I am Bromley,” he said simply,—“Matthew Bromley, the Prince’s gentleman, and I have come to give you the answer to the letter that you delivered to His Highness.”

Florent bent his brows on him. As far as he could see anything he saw a tall man with a fair, handsome face showing under the broad-brimmed hat.

“Will you hand this to the person who entrusted you to deliver that letter?”

Florent took the packet held out to him.

“If His Highness has servants as devoted as you appear, Mynheer,” he said, “you might have conveyed the letter in the first instance.”

And he remembered how St. Croix had lamented that he had now no ally in the Prince’s household.

“The paper is unsealed,” answered Matthew Bromley, “and I think it is His Highness’ wish that you read it.”

“Read it!” echoed Florent.

The mist seemed to be lifting, blowing in long trails, rapidly, to extinction. The Prince’s gentleman hung his lantern on the fence.

“You can read it here and now,” he said.

Florent glanced up from the still folded paper.

“You are English?”

“Yes, I am English,” answered Bromley.

Florent gazed at him keenly.

“You know something of the Prince’s affairs,—do you know why he wishes to make a confidant of me? Why I am to read this?”

Their voices were low and guarded; between them hurried the long veils of fog, blurring the street-lamp and the light of the lantern, in which their figures loomed indistinctly.

“You were aware what M. de Pomponne’s message contained?”

“Yes.”

“Therefore the Prince wishes you to know his answer.”

The lights in the Binnenhof, in the Maritshuis, began to be visible; sparks of yellow showed, too, in the windows of the houses in the Kneuterdyk Avenue; a cold wind was rising. Florent shivered; with chilled, damp fingers he took the paper from its cover and, bending towards the light, looked at it. The signature caught his eye first.

“This is M. de Pomponne’s letter!” he cried.

“It is also the Prince’s answer,” returned Mr. Bromley. “You may show it to M. de Witt—if you will.”

A swift excitement shook Florent.

“Then … what dealings has he—the Prince—with France?”

“You may imagine—he returns M. de Pomponne’s letter.”

“He is subservient to M. de Witt—he will not go to Middelburg——?”

“He will do nothing under the protection of M. de Pomponne.”

The gentle radiance of a young moon conquered the vanishing mist. Florent saw the shapes of the trees on the Vyverberg, the outlines of the Binnenhof, and the tourelles of the Gevangenpoort rising against a clear sky.

“This is a rebuke to me,” he said.

“You may take it so,” replied Mr. Bromley.

“I am not in the pay of the French,” said Florent, instantly aware this man could ruin him with his master, “though I suppose the Prince thinks so,—I work for my own ends, serving no party,” he added defiantly.

“The Prince has not thought of you at all, Mynheer, save to desire you to know he hath no secret dealings with M. de Pomponne. You will return that letter?”

“Yes,” said Florent, concealing it. He thought, grimly, that he had no choice.

“Then, good-night, Mynheer.” Mr. Bromley saluted gravely, took his now useless lantern from the fence and extinguished it.

Florent’s pulses were beating quickly; he was bewildered, confounded. There were many things he longed to ask the Prince’s gentleman, and not one that he could bring over his tongue. He stood foolishly watching Mr. Bromley disappear through the arch of the Gevangenpoort.

What game was the Prince playing? Was this a pose to deceive him, the secretary of M. de Witt, or did William really prefer the Grand Pensionary for a master rather than France?

Or perhaps he is merely timid, reflected Florent, crushing scornfully down the rush of pride and unreasonable exaltation he had sustained at the wild idea that the Prince was actually spurning M. de Pomponne.

He stared at the dark, tranquil waters of the Vyver, revealed now in the faint moonshine.

A boy, he sneered to himself, would he possess the wit and courage to undertake unaided this flight to Middelburg? No, he had always shown caution—he would remain under the wing of M. de Witt.

Yet Florent found himself pondering over the devotion of Matthew Bromley to his master—Bromley also had once been M. de Witt’s man.

CHAPTER V
THE CHALLENGE

A bar of sunshine fell across the quiet room in the Binnenhof, but it did not touch John de Witt, from head to foot he was in shadow.

The French Ambassador had just left him—a duel of words, an exchange of courtesies; through the formalities one sentence of de Pomponne had leapt.

“If the Prince of Orange gave the signal for a restoration … what would rise to answer it?”

“He will never give that signal,” de Witt had answered, and he believed it.

Yet strange it was for him, First Minister of a Republic almost his creation, to reflect upon this fact—the people of that Republic clamoured for the heir of the House that had threatened to set its heel on them.

He moved half restlessly in his chair. If William were indeed working secretly to undermine him he might find his labour of twenty years gone for nothing, and live yet to see his country under foreign dominion.

He rose and went to the window. The Hall of the Knights showed its painted and pointed shutters against a faint blue sky; the trees in the courtyard of the Binnenhof were shedding their leaves, caught by the wind and whirled in eddies that rose a little way then sank again to the ground.

The sunlight fell now directly on the face of John de Witt. It revealed how grey he was growing round the temples, how weary and lined were his eyes.

He was still standing by the window when a tall soldier entered.

“Ah, M. de Montbas!” the Grand Pensionary turned. “I desired to see you about these riots in Zeeland and Groningen.”

“You wished me to go there, Mynheer, I think your letter said.”

The speaker was a sallow, sickly looking man, with lank hair and dark, unhappy eyes.

“To Groningen—yes.”

M. de Witt returned to his seat in the shadow.

“I fear that we have been too lenient,” he continued; “the Government must make some show of strength.”

“That is only wise,” answered the Count de Montbas; “and should, Mynheer, have been done before.”

“It has never been my policy to use force where persuasion might prevail,” said M. de Witt. “When one is adamant in great things one may be careless in little,—these rioters are mostly ignorant people——”

“They are encouraged by the Prince of Orange,” put in de Montbas quickly.

“There I think you are wrong,” returned the Grand Pensionary quietly. He knew that ill feeling existed between the House of Orange and M. de Montbas, whose father, an exiled Frenchman, had offered his services to the late Stadtholder only to have them refused.

M. de Montbas gave a half-nervous laugh.

“You are too confident, Mynheer.”

The Grand Pensionary ignored the remark and touched a bell upon his table.

“I will read you the report of the disturbances in Zeeland and Goeree,” he said.

It was Florent Van Mander who entered with the papers. M. de Witt bade him stay, and he went quietly to the back of the room and waited, observing, with cruel precision, the two men before him.

He had heard a good deal of M. de Montbas, one of the staunchest republicans in the army of the United Provinces, and the man whom the Grand Pensionary always put forward in opposition to the Prince of Orange as candidate for the post of Captain General, a position that he now, at least nominally, held.

Florent saw a dark, gloomy-featured man, stooping in the shoulders and awkward in bearing, yet with a certain elegance of manner; a man who talked in a nervous and disjointed fashion, and fidgeted with the tassels on his military gloves.

His black-and-silver uniform, with the embroidered baldric and heavy sword, sat badly on him. Florent found him neither attractive nor calculated to inspire confidence, and wondered at the Grand Pensionary’s choice of a general. Glancing away, he studied M. de Witt himself.

Behind the desk where the Grand Pensionary sat hung a dark yet bright picture of fruit and flowers, and against this the brown hair and pale face of John de Witt were thrown into relief.

Pale certainly, even above his white, falling collar and black dress, but of a strength not to be mistaken and a power not to be ignored.

Florent listened to the conversation between these two with an expressionless face but inward interest, for they had begun to discuss the Prince of Orange.

“He is not at the Hague to-day,” M. de Witt was saying. “M. Van Ghent is in Guelders, and His Highness wrote to me requesting permission to try some hawks and hounds sent him by the King of England—for that purpose he hath gone to Breda.”

“What quarry does he hunt at Breda?” asked M. de Montbas, and it seemed to Florent that he spoke like a man afraid.

The Grand Pensionary smiled.

“What should he hunt but herons, Mynheer?—you are too suspicious.”

“By Heaven! I would not have let him go.”

M. de Witt turned over the reports brought him by Florent.

“He hath gone, Count, nor will he return till to-night. To-morrow I will, as you urge me, again see him on the subject of these disturbances.”

“And also concerning his party in the Assembly,” added Montbas, “who hamper us at every step——”

“He has no power with them.”

“I do not know—they use his name——”

“And would do that whether he would or no——”

“And the Princess Amalia,” interrupted M. de Montbas. “Look to her—she is ever intriguing.”

“I know; yet it is to little purpose,—at heart she is afraid of us.”

“But she will serve her grandson’s cause—and by any means—if she have but the chance.”

“I might see her also,” mused M. de Witt. “I know she is timid——”

The door was opened, and M. Van Ouvenaller took a few steps into the room.

“A man hath just ridden up to the Binnenhof, Mynheer, who earnestly desires to see you,” said the secretary. “His name is Captain Van Haren, of the garrison at Vlaardingen.”

The Grand Pensionary did not know the name.

“Nay, I cannot see him now,” he answered, “his business must wait; nor should you have broken in upon us with this, Van Ouvenaller.”

“Mynheer,” answered the secretary, colouring, “this man says he bears a letter from the Prince of Orange.”

“From the Prince of Orange!” cried de Montbas, rising.

“I beseech you,” breathed John de Witt, giving him a quick look; then he turned to Van Ouvenaller, “Admit this Captain Van Haren.”

Florent felt his pulses throbbing, his blood stirring. He advanced a little farther into the room, glancing furtively from the agitated countenance of the Count de Montbas to the composed features of John de Witt.

Captain Van Haren entered, a stout and stolid soldier, muddy and wet.

“You are unknown to me, Mynheer,” said the Grand Pensionary quietly.

“I am the commander of the garrison at Vlaardingen on the Maas, Mynheer. His Highness the Prince of Orange rested there this morning—he dispatched me with this letter.”

“The Prince at Vlaardingen!” cried M. de Montbas, and rapidly flushed and rapidly paled again.

For the second time the Grand Pensionary checked him with a look, holding out his hand for the letter. Without lowering his eyes to it he spoke—

“What took the Prince to Vlaardingen?”

“He was on his way to Bergen-op-Zoom they said, Mynheer.”

“He goes to Zeeland?” questioned de Witt, and his eyes narrowed.

“I think so, Mynheer.”

A fierce exclamation broke from de Montbas, but John de Witt in silence tore the seals of the letter.

It was headed—

“Vlaardingen on the Maas

“11th Sept. 1668

“Mynheer,” it ran, “as I am now arrived at an age when I can claim the heritage of my House, I am proceeding, on the invitation of Zeeland, to Middelburg, there to take my seat as premier noble of that State. Her Highness the Princess of Orange, and His Serene Highness the Elector of Brandenburg, have been pleased to declare me of age. I did not consider it necessary to request permission of Their High Mightinesses before I took this journey. Upon my return to the Hague I shall be desirous of personally conveying to you my affection and duty,

“William, Prince of Orange.”

John de Witt laid the letter down. Florent thought that his face, his whole bearing, had wonderfully changed.

“His Highness was accompanied?” he asked.

“By his household and a company of young nobles.”

“He hath gone to rouse Zeeland!” cried M. de Montbas.

De Witt handed him the Prince’s letter.

“You should not have allowed His Highness to leave Vlaardingen,” he said sternly to Captain Van Haren. “Not he, but Their High Mightinesses are your masters.”

“His Highness told me that he went to join Prince John Maurice,” answered the soldier. “I did not know that it was against the wishes of Their High Mightinesses.”

“Against their wishes and mine,” said John de Witt. “This is an act of rebellion on the Prince’s part—we have been too lenient. Get back to Vlaardingen, Captain Van Haren, and be careful how ye serve the States.”

To Florent, eagerly watching, was revealed a new phase of the Grand Pensionary; he saw him moved if composed, roused and dominant. The gentleness that might have covered weakness was shown to be but the cloak of undaunted strength. He held his head high, and the prominence of his jaw was emphasised by the set of the mouth.

“Get back to Vlaardingen,” he repeated; “and remember that Their High Mightinesses will endure no riots nor disturbances in the name of this most presumptuous young man.”

The Captain saluted and withdrew. As the door closed on him M. de Montbas looked up from the letter fluttering in his hand.

“This is a challenge,” he said.

John de Witt’s brows were contracted.

“Yea, I think so.”

“We have been fooled!” cried M. de Montbas bitterly; “fooled by this docile, sickly boy!” He rose and dashed the letter on to the table. “Where is your policy of concession now? What of this good citizen you were making out of a tyrant’s son?”

“I have been deceived,” answered the Grand Pensionary sternly. “As ye say, fooled!” His eyes expressed an anger that Florent would not have believed them capable of, so utterly did it contradict their usual look of stately kindliness. “Who would have thought that there were such guile and deception in this young man!”

“I have warned you,” said M. de Montbas. “He was over quiet; and never could I imagine that one of his House would be content with a subservient position.”

“My eyes are opened now!” De Witt rose. “Perhaps it is better that he and I should meet without disguise. Since he hath rejected my friendship it is well that I should know it.”

He drew a quick breath, and for a moment it seemed as if the old hatred fought against so long, carefully concealed and never acted upon, was asserting itself,—the hatred of the stern republican for princely insolence and tyranny; the hatred of the son of Jacob de Witt, the innocent prisoner of Loevenstein, for the son of the man who had flung him there.

M. de Montbas saw the expression, and read it by the light of his own bitter dislike to William of Orange.

“You have been acting on your principles instead of your instincts,” he said. “In your heart you never trusted him.”

“I have ever done him justice,” answered John de Witt, “and treated him in such a manner that this act of his, this contemptuous blow in the face of my authority, is base ingratitude.”

“You never loved him,” insisted M. de Montbas in the same kind of trembling, nervous anger. “Though ye have had the tutoring of him, ye never loved him.”

The Grand Pensionary looked straightly into the soldier’s face.

“Nay, I never loved him,” he said. “It was not possible.”

“But you trusted him.”

“It is my habit,” returned M. de Witt proudly, “to trust those with whom I deal.”

M. de Montbas shrugged his shoulders impatiently. To Florent’s covertly observant eyes he seemed in an agitation bordering on fear.

“To join Prince John Maurice at Breda!” ejaculated the Grand Pensionary. “It is a scheme concocted with the Princess Dowager—the Prince was recently at Cleves. Who, besides, would he have with him?—Heenvliet, Renswoude, and Boreel, I thought that I could have trusted them; but Bromley and Van Odyk, I had intention of replacing … they are at the bottom of this——”

“The Prince, and no one but the Prince, is at the bottom of this!” cried M. de Montbas.

The Grand Pensionary gave a stern smile.

“You think I have been weak; I have only acted as I considered right, and as I should act again. Maybe even yet I may by persuasion overcome this youth’s worldly ambition. If not, we, the States and I, are capable of sterner measures.”

“They should have been used before.” M. de Montbas suppressed his impatient voice. “Where you have once been so utterly deceived, can you ever confide again? If William of Orange will do this, what will he not do?” The speaker’s sallow face flushed with the energy of his feelings. “France and England, who neglected him when he was nothing in the State, begin to court him now. Why should he not revenge himself on the party that deprived him of his inheritance by intriguing for sovereign power with our enemies——”

“M. de Montbas, you go too far,” interrupted the Grand Pensionary. “We have neither right nor reason to suspect the Prince of these deep designs. He is a boy, misled by his ambitions.”

“This is clever work for a boy,” replied the Count, with a sour smile. “He has outwitted you, Mynheer.”

“That is no shame to me.”

“It may be a danger to the State,” was the swift answer.

“You blame me,” said the Grand Pensionary quietly. “I do not doubt that, on all sides, I shall receive censure.”

He moved slowly back to his desk, and M. de Montbas sprang from his chair.

“Ay! You have been wrong from the first! You cannot tame an eagle with sugar and smiles; if you want to keep him you cage him, otherwise he will fly as soon as he is able, though he may have taken your friendliness while his wings were growing.”

“I did what I would do again,” repeated John de Witt firmly, and without bitterness.

He picked up the Prince’s letter and looked at it again.

“The Princess and the Elector, his guardians, declare him of age—it follows he will be claiming a seat in the Council of State,” he remarked.

“Zeeland will demand the restoration of the Stadtholdership,” added M. de Montbas.

“Maybe.” De Witt spoke thoughtfully. “There will be a fierce fight; perhaps I could gain the Princess, at least I will see her.”

He glanced at the blue china clock on the mantelshelf.

“The Assembly is now sitting,” he remarked.

“We have not yet decided the question of these riots,” said M. de Montbas.

“This letter puts a different complexion on the matter.” M. de Witt folded and placed it in his pocket as he spoke. “I must set the whole affair before the Assembly.” He turned to the secretary, “Will you lock up those papers in my desk, Mynheer Van Mander?”

“Yes, Mynheer.”

Without further speech the Grand Pensionary and M. de Montbas left the room.

Florent did as he had been directed. With a mechanical intelligence of the hands, leaving free the excited workings of his brain upon what he had just heard and the meaning of it, he put away the papers, neatly, in their various drawers.

He was about, in the same absorbed fashion, to lock the desk, when a sudden, unexpected thought held him still.

What were these papers? Without a doubt valuable to Hyacinthe St. Croix—to William of Orange.

And they lay there before him, at his mercy to read, to copy—to steal.

Prudence no longer restrained him. In the last half-hour he had decided to remain not another day in the service of M. de Witt. He had nothing to gain from the Grand Pensionary.

Yet he stood in the hazy sunlight hesitating, the key in his hand and the open desk before him.

St. Croix would pay him well, but he was not thinking of St. Croix.

What would the Prince give for the contents of the private desk of M. de Witt?

Florent did not want money—but he craved to stand for something—to be of value—to merit consideration in the eyes of this young man who had suddenly unfurled the Orange standard.

And what had he to offer but the poor services any clerk could give?

Still he hesitated; but that same recollection that filled him with hot desire to serve William of Orange held him back. Thinking of William of Orange, he could not do it.

He locked the desk and went into the outer room to give the key to M. Van den Bosch.

The clerks of M. de Witt were discussing the situation in a subdued agitation. Florent tendered the key, half defiantly.

“Are you leaving?” asked M. Bacherus, with a look of surprise on his wrinkled face.

Florent answered briefly, and took his hat and cloak down from a peg.

“What do you think of this news from Zeeland?” asked Van Ouvenaller, adjusting his spectacles.

“I am sorry for M. de Witt,” returned Florent dryly.

Van Ouvenaller rubbed his chin.

“These are troublesome times,” he remarked gloomily.

Florent left the room and the Binnenhof.

The Hague was already alive with excitement; the streets seethed with unrest. The daring of the Prince’s exploit made it almost unbelievable; this and that rumour were spread and contradicted. The burgher companies were out, and by the time Florent had reached the Plaats it was announced that M. de Montbas was in council with the States, and that a message had been sent to Hellevoetsluis, where De Ruyter lay with the Fleet. These messages, intended to quiet the people’s fears of a coup d’état on the part of the Prince, were received with derision. There were more orange favours worn than white ones, and more satisfaction than anger expressed at the success of the Prince’s enterprise.

In the Kneuterdyk Avenue, close to M. de Witt’s house, Florent met St. Croix.

They exchanged hasty greeting in the crowd.

“You have heard the news?” the Frenchman smiled.

“You received the returned packet?” retorted Florent.

“Yes; the Prince is prudent to refuse to enter into negotiations that are bound to be detected.”

Such was not Florent’s reading of the action.

“Will you come to my lodgings to-night?” he asked. “We cannot talk here.”

“To-night——? Agreed.”

They parted.

Florent smiled rather grimly to himself. St. Croix would find his new prey flown, since M. de Witt’s secretary had decided not to remain another hour in the Hague.

CHAPTER VI
MIDDELBURG

“Crowds came in on all sides, the streets were nearly impassable; windows, roofs, even masts and trees, black with spectators. The Abbey was so full of people in carriages and on foot that it was hardly possible to reach the Prince’s apartments. Nor must I forget to tell Your Highness that during the two hours the Prince stood at the window the civic militia fired salutes in his honour,—and they are still sending up fireworks from the Stadhuis. His Highness reached here yesterday at three o’clock; his yacht sailed through shipping dressed with flags, and these vessels answered his salutes with a triple discharge of their guns. The Magistrates of the town had come down to the quay to receive him; the burgher companies were under arms. He entered a coach and six and was conducted to the Abbey, where the Deputies of the State came to congratulate him. The councillor pensionary made a speech to him in their name, and the different representatives of the provincial government followed his example. To-morrow His Highness is to be conducted to the Hall of Assembly. The loyalty of the people is beyond a question.

“Prince John Maurice of Nassau hath remained at Bergen-op-Zoom, under pretence of illness, fearing to compromise himself in the eyes of the Government by sharing in this dangerous enterprise; but Your Highness need have no fear, the prudence of the Prince balances his youth, and he would have reason to complain of me if I did not say that his management of this affair has shown a wisdom far beyond his years.”

Lange Jan struck, after a prelude of dancing bells, the hour of two, and Mr. Bromley laid down his pen and looked round.

His own elation and excitement had found pleasurable vent in this letter to the Princess Dowager, which he wrote, by the Prince’s orders, to give some account of the reception in Middelburg. He had sat over it longer than he had thought; it was with some slight shock that he realised it to be deep into the night.

Middelburg was still at last. The crowds had departed from the courtyard of the Abbey, the bells had ceased to ring, the military salutes were hushed; the town lay silent under the September stars.

Mr. Bromley went to the small, pointed, Gothic window of his chamber and looked out.

Opposite, clear in the moonlight rose the three, pointed towers of the southern side of the Abbey; the windows projecting from the sloping roof threw distinct shadows, and the vanes on the three turrets turned slowly in the wind. Through the low-arched, dark gate, above which could be seen, carved deep in the stone, the Zeeland Lion rising from the waves, was the figure of the sentry walking up and down, the moonlight glittering on his halbert.

The courtyard was filled with trees, now almost bare of their leaves, that cast a dark tracery of shadow on the ground with their softly stirring branches.

Again the melancholy little air rang out, and Lange Jan struck a quarter past the hour. The sound was close and loud, since the Groote Kerk adjoined the Abbey wing and the tall clock-tower rose immediately behind Mr. Bromley’s room, a small chamber communicating with the Prince’s apartments.

These chimes, that at every quarter of an hour were ringing out over the Seven Provinces day and night, had a curious, almost uncanny meaning for the Englishman. He had never become used to them. Often, at the Hague, he would wake up to hear the chimes of the Groote Kerk, and always with a start; so loud, so insistent, yet so melancholy were these old bells, ringing out dutifully, as their long-dead makers had bidden them, as every fifteen minutes passed.

So had they rung here in Middelburg when the Counties of Holland stepped this Abbey; so did they ring in the sunny spaces of the afternoon above a silent town; and so in the utter stillness of the night their mournful carillon played unheeding the notes of warning, of sadness, of remembrance.

Mr. Bromley took his heavy brass candlestick from the table and placed it on the mantelshelf, put away his unfinished letter, and was about to undress when a soft knock upon the door interrupted him.

He opened it. M. Heenvliet, the Prince’s first gentleman-in-waiting, stood without, holding a candle. He was fully dressed.

“The Messenger from the Hague has arrived. I and M. Van Odyk were not yet abed, so saw him come up to the Abbey; M. Van Odyk thinks His Highness should see the letters now.”

“From whom are they?” asked Mr. Bromley.

“The Princess and M. de Witt.”

“They can wait till the morning—the Prince sleeps so ill.”

“M. Van Odyk thought he should have time to consider them before he makes his speech in the Assembly to-morrow.”

“Is every one else abed?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I will go rouse His Highness,” said Mr. Bromley reluctantly. “Will you desire M. Van Odyk to come up with the letters?”

M. Heenvliet withdrew, and Mr. Bromley crossed to the adjoining chamber, a long, low apartment that the fitful light of his single candle showed hung with tapestries and to be plainly but richly furnished.

Middelburg Abbey had been the palace of the Prince’s ancestors, and still retained some of the splendour of those days.

At the farther end of this room was the door leading into the Prince’s bedroom. Mr. Bromley hesitated; he was inclined to think the letters might have waited. William slept badly at best, and to-night must need all that he could get of rest. There was no intermediary whom Mr. Bromley might consult since the Prince had left both valet and page at the Hague, having, indeed, no excuse for taking servants on a hunting expedition.

He knocked gently and received no answer.

Lange Jan shook his chimes into the night again. There was a pause as his melody died away, then Mr. Bromley opened the door.

The candle revealed a handsome, square room with a painted, beamed ceiling, walls hung with stamped leather, and two windows, unshuttered and set open. The moonlight streamed through and lay along the polished floor.

The bed, with its plain but richly worked hangings, stood fronting the window.

On a table at the foot were a silver candlestick, a couple of small books, and a watch lying on a lace handkerchief.

Across the high-backed, wooden chair beside the bed were spread the Prince’s green velvet riding-coat, his black sash, his gloves and Mechlin cravat, and hanging on the wall above his beaver with the long ostrich plume.

Another chair, set in a corner, and covered with a high Gothic canopy, held across its carved arms the Prince’s sword-belt and the piled up addresses presented to him yesterday.

Mr. Bromley paused. He could hear the regular, rather laboured, breathing of the sleeper, and no other sound.

He went up to the bed, and, shading the candle, looked down.

The curtains were gathered back within their cords, and revealed the Prince lying on his side, his head raised by a pile of pillows, his hands outside the coverlet.

Any one not knowing him so well as did Mr. Bromley would have been startled by the extreme pallor of the face, which had an almost deathlike look in contrast with the tumbled auburn hair. His whole appearance was more that of one in a swoon than in normal sleep, save that his lips were closed firmly and his fine nostrils quivered with his breathing.

“Your Highness,” said Mr. Bromley, and moved his hand so that the candlelight flashed over the bed.

William gave a little sigh and opened his great eyes.

“Is that you, Bromley?”

“Yes, Sir, it is I.”

The Prince sat up, in a moment alert and composed. It was wonderful how his eyes gave life and animation to his pale and frail appearance. The look of great delicacy so noticeable in his sleep seemed hardly there when his brilliant glance dominated his face.

“What is it?” he asked.

“A Messenger from the Hague, Highness, with letters.”

“They could have waited till the morning,” answered William fretfully.

“One is from M. de Witt.”

“Still, it could have stayed. Ye need not have roused me for a message from M. de Witt.”

“Another is from the Princess Dowager.”

The Prince pushed the heavy hair back from his forehead.

“She is a silly old woman,” he declared, “and a letter from her does not interest me at all.”

Mr. Bromley, who had an unconfessed liking for the Princess, ventured to answer—

“Her Highness hath been under great anxiety as to your safety, Sir.”

“Oh, pshaw!” returned William. “She hath made her peace with the Republic by now. Who suggested waking me?”

“M. Van Odyk, Highness; he is coming up. He thought you would wish to consider these letters at once.”

“M. Van Odyk sometimes exceeds his duty,” remarked the Prince calmly. “And nothing any one can write or say will cause me to alter my intentions. I wish you would put that candle down, Bromley, it is flickering horribly.”

Mr. Bromley obeyed.

“It is caused by the open windows, Highness,” he answered. “No candle will burn straight in this draught.”

“Close them,” said the Prince petulantly.

Mr. Bromley again obeyed, forbearing to comment on the fact that the room was chilled with the night air, for he knew that the Prince could not sleep, or indeed hardly breathe, with the windows shut.

William leant back against the head of the bed; his lawn shirt, the sheets, pillows, and his face were turned to the same ivory hue in the candlelight.

“Why were you not abed, Bromley?” he asked.

“I was writing to the Princess, Highness.”

“Did you say Prince John Maurice had stayed at Bergen-op-Zoom?”

“Yes, Highness.”

“He will have told the Princess himself,” remarked William. “Being by now recovered of his sickness,” he added dryly.

“Shall I see if M. Van Odyk hath returned?” asked Mr. Bromley.

“Bring him here,” commanded William briefly.

The Englishman returned in the dark to his room, and reached it as M. Van Odyk appeared at the door.

“The Prince is awake and will see you—but he was not over pleased to be roused.”

“The matter is important,” answered M. Van Odyk.

Mr. Bromley had no more to say. William Van Odyk, rich, a connection of the House of Orange, clever, son of the man who was once the most trusted adviser of the Prince’s mother, had perhaps as much of William of Orange’s confidence as he ever bestowed on any one; for those placed about the Prince were not of his own choosing, he had always been too restricted to be able to find advisers or confidants. His grandmother he had never forgiven for her overtures to the republican party, and such men as he had given his rare friendship to, Cornelius Triglandt, the Lord of Zuylestein, and William Bentinck, had been removed from him by M. de Witt.

The few who had followed him to Middelburg he tolerated. He had no great trust in them, but relied on his own genius for command to make these, or any others, subservient to him.

When Mr. Bromley returned with M. Van Odyk to the Prince’s chamber, they found him half dressed and seated at the table at the foot of his bed snuffing the candle.

He looked up as they entered, and smiled with his eyes.

“Bromley,” he said, “I have absolutely no clothes at all—and those we begged from Prince John Maurice,” he added, with a touch of humour, “are so utterly too large.”

Mr. Bromley was compunctious.

“I am sorry, Highness—it was forgotten——”

“I can procure you anything you wish in the town to-morrow Highness,” interrupted M. Van Odyk.

“Nay, it is no matter,” answered the Prince, “only to-night I should have been grateful to the States of Zeeland for a dressing-gown. Now, where are these letters, Mynheer?”

M. Van Odyk laid them on the table, and Mr. Bromley withdrew.

The Prince picked up the letter from M. de Witt and opened it, bending closer to the candle.

William Van Odyk, Lord of Beverwaert, handsome, gay, worldly, a frivolous youth behind him and no ambitions ahead beyond the pleasure of an adventure, stood in the window embrasure and observed him curiously. So slight a boy to have thrown down this bold challenge to the power whom he regarded as a usurper, thereby destroying at a blow the policy of conciliation John de Witt had pursued so unflinchingly for eighteen years. But William of Orange had been pursuing his policy almost as long. A diplomat from his cradle, he had affected a resignation to his position that the Grand Pensionary had never doubted, and that the Lord of Beverwaert himself had been deceived in until within the last two years.

He recalled now, as he watched the Prince read his letter, with what interest he had followed William’s behaviour in the hands of the republican party. How he and other partisans of the House of Orange had had their hopes half crushed by the Prince’s taciturn gravity and natural reserve, which made it impossible to guess his real designs.

He had grown up in an atmosphere of adversity, been educated in a school of distrust; and the constant necessity he was under of concealing his passions had made him, while yet a child, an adept in dissimulation.

He had never made the slightest attempt to gain the affection or confidence of the faction always loyally supporting his House. He had neither the virtues nor the vices that are loved by the crowd; his life was austere, his tastes sober, he was rarely seen and always silent. Van Odyk was thinking now how little he really knew of him. Twice this boy’s age, and man of the world as he was, he had never drawn more from the Prince than his now almost public intention to claim the inheritance of his family.

The Lord of Beverwaert brought energy, talents, and goodwill to the cause, but little confidence. Of the mighty, almost regal, power that had once belonged to the House of Orange, nothing remained to this young man but the renown of his ancestors, and what force, courage, or strength he might find in himself.

William Van Odyk wondered, and fixed his pleasant blue eyes in such an intent fashion on the Prince that the latter looked up and glanced at him keenly.

“M. de Witt writes at length,” he said, and laid the letter down.

“To what purpose does he write?” asked the Lord of Beverwaert.

William motioned to the chair on the other side of the table.

“Will you not sit, Mynheer?”

Van Odyk took his place opposite to the Prince, and the solitary candle that illuminated them both showed a striking contrast in their persons: the Lord of Beverwaert, florid, fair, his gallant good looks displayed to advantage by his handsome red uniform, his gold baldric and bullion-fringed sash, tall, stoutly built, bearing every sign of easy, pleasant living, with eyes slightly dissipated, and a mouth a little full and soft in contour; the Prince, delicate, and even weakly, in appearance, his green coat flung on carelessly over his laced shirt, wearing riding-breeches and dusty top-boots, drooping a little as he sat with an air of weariness and gravity at variance with his years, yet conveying with every movement the charm of youth and an unconscious aristocratic grace, a precocious maturity stamped on his proud and composed features, yet showing in his brilliant eyes the fire of youthful blood and the energy of a haughty race.

He tore open the other letter, glanced over it and put it down.

“M. de Witt has seen the Princess,” he said. “She is, of course, frightened——”

“For your safety, Highness?”

“For her own share in this affair; flattered too, I think, by M. de Witt’s overtures. She never could resist tampering with the Republic—she has always injured me with her intrigues,” he added, with feeling.

“And M. de Witt?”

“He bids me take care what I say to the States of Zeeland, warns me that he withdraws his promise with regard to the Council of State—that he will, in fact, do all in his power to prevent my election, and that since I have proved myself his enemy he cannot treat me as his friend. There is a great deal more, very worthy matter, but that is the pith of it.”

He took up his grandmother’s letter.

“Her Highness would keep on good terms with M. de Witt. She advises me to say as little as possible here, and to return as quietly as may be.…”

“What do you think of this advice?” asked M. Van Odyk.

William gave him a quick, keen glance.

“Do you imagine that it could make any difference?”

“To your intentions, Highness?”

“Yes.”

“I think it will not, Highness,” smiled the Lord of Beverwaert.

“I shall speak in the Assembly as I intended to speak,” said the Prince composedly.

“Yet it would be worth a little prudence to secure the good graces of M. de Witt.”

The Prince’s eyes flickered over him at this in a manner conveying that M. Van Odyk had but a small share of William’s confidence or esteem.

“I have never lacked caution,” he said quietly; “and you know, Mynheer, that I had to forego M. de Witt’s good graces when I undertook this journey.”

“I know; but now the thing is done, you can excuse yourself——”

William interrupted.

“Mynheer, what use are the good graces of M. de Witt to me?”

The Lord of Beverwaert shrugged his shoulders.

“He represents the United Provinces.”

The Prince pushed back the heavy, reddish curls that gave such a marked character to his face.

“The United Provinces and I understand each other,” he answered impatiently, “without the intervention of M. de Witt.”

Then, seeing the look in M. Van Odyk’s face, he blushed with vexation lest he had been betrayed for once into an expression too outspoken.

“I shall offend M. de Witt no further than I can help,” he added, his manner instantly restrained again. He looked down at the Princess’s letter that he still held.

“We will return to the Hague to-morrow, Mynheer, and I will see Her Highness before she becomes enmeshed in intrigues.”

“You have not much confidence in Her Highness,” remarked the Lord of Beverwaert.

“What can one expect from a woman?” returned the Prince in a tone of quiet but boundless contempt. “I thank God I can take my affairs into my own hands,”—uncontrollable annoyance clouded his face,—“but for her I had never lost Orange—and my estates have been utterly mismanaged, it will be a month’s work straightening her accounts; the land hath been left unsold and I have as many debts as a captain of cavalry——”

He checked himself with his habitual distrust, as if he repented already of such a long speech, and rose, taking up the candle.

M. Van Odyk accepted his dismissal.

“I need not have disturbed Your Highness,” he said, rising.

“It is no matter,” answered the Prince, with a little cough.

Lange Jan struck, but neither noticed how his noisy chimes broke the stillness of the night, for each had heard such peals ringing out over the Seven Provinces every hour of every day and night since they could remember anything.

The Lord of Beverwaert took the candle from the Prince and opened the door.

“I forgot to tell Your Highness, a man came here—from the Hague. He desired to see you, but the crowd made it impossible. He wished to join your service. I do not think that it was a matter of any importance.”

“Who was he?” asked William, holding his brow.

“One Florent Van Mander, who has been with M. de Witt.”