Georg descended the stairs in a state of bewilderment. Both halves of the book, in which ever since the wedding at Delft he had written a succession of verses to Maria, lay in his hand.

The light of the kitchen-fire streamed into the entry. He followed it, and before answering Barbara’s kind greeting, went to the hearth and flung into the fire the sheets, which contained the pure, sweet fragrance of a beautiful flower of youth.

“Oho! Junker!” cried the widow. “A quick fire doesn’t suit every kind of food. What is burning there?”

“Foolish paper!” he answered. “Have no fear. At the utmost it might weep and put out the flames. It will be ashes directly. There go the sparks, flying in regular rows through the black, charred pages. How pretty it looks! They appear, leap forth and vanish—like a funeral procession with torches in a pitch-dark night. Good-night, poor children—good-night, dear songs! Look, Frau Barbara! They are rolling themselves up tightly, convulsively, as if it hurt them to burn.”

“What sort of talk is that?” replied Barbara, thrusting the charred book deeper into the fire with the tongs. Then pointing to her own forehead, she continued: “One often feels anxious about you. High-sounding words, such as we find in the Psalms, are not meant for every-day life and our kitchen. If you were my own son, you’d often have something to listen to. People who travel at a steady pace reach their goal soonest.”

“That’s good advice for a journey,” replied Georg, holding out his hand to the widow. “Farewell, dear mother. I can’t bear it here any longer. In half an hour I shall turn my back on this good city.”

“Go then—just as you choose—Or is the young lady taking you in tow? Nobleman’s son and nobleman’s daughter! Like to like—Yet, no; there has been nothing between you. Her heart is good, but I should wish you another wife than that Popish Everyday-different.”

“So Henrica has told you—”

“She has just gone. Dear me-she has her relatives outside; and we—it’s hard to divide a plum into twelve pieces. I said farewell to her cheerfully; but you, Georg, you—”

“I shall take her out of the city, and then—you won’t blame me for it—then I shall make my way through to the Beggars.”

“The Beggars! That’s a different matter, that’s right. You’ll be in your proper place there! Cheer up, Junker, and go forth boldly? Give me your hand, and if you meet my boy—he commands a ship of his own.—Dear me, I remember something. You can wait a moment longer. Come here, Trautchen. The woollen stockings I knit for him are up in the painted chest. Make haste and fetch them. He may need them on the water in the damp autumn weather. You’ll take them with you?”

“Willingly, most willingly; and now let me thank you for all your kindness. You have been like an own mother to me.” Georg clasped the widow’s hand, and neither attempted to conceal how dear each had become to the other and how hard it was to part. Trautchen had given Barbara the stockings, and many tears fell upon them, while the widow was bidding the Junker farewell. When she noticed they were actually wet, she waved them in the air and handed them to the young man.

The night was dark but still, even sultry. The travellers were received at the Hohenort Gate by Captain Van Duivenvoorde, preceded by an old sergeant, carrying a lantern, who opened the gate. The captain embraced his brave, beloved comrade, Dornburg; a few farewell words and god-speeds echoed softly from the fortification walls, and the trio stepped forth into the open country.

For a time they walked silently through the darkness. Wilhelm knew the way and strode in front of Henrica; the Junker kept close at her side.

All was still, except from time to time they heard a word of command from the walls, the striking of a clock, or the barking of a dog.

Henrica had recognized Georg by the light of the lantern, and when Wilhelm stopped to ascertain whether there was any water in the ditch over which he intended to guide his companions, she said, under her breath:

“I did not expect your escort, Junker.”

“I know it, but I, too, desired to leave the city.”

“And wish to avail yourself of our knowledge of the watchword. Then stay with us.”

“Until I know you are safe, Fraulein.”

“The walls of Leyden already lie between you and the peril from which you fly.”

“I don’t understand you.”

“So much the better.”

Wilhelm turned and, in a muffled voice, requested his companions to keep silence. They now walked noiselessly on, until just outside the camp they reached the broad road around which they had made a circuit. A Spanish sentinel challenged them.

“Lepanto!” was the answer, and they passed on through the camp unmolested. A coach drawn by four horses, a mere box hung between two tiny fore-wheels and a pair of gigantic hind-wheels, drove slowly past them. It was conveying Magdalena Moons, the daughter of an aristocratic Holland family, distinguished among the magistracy, back to the Hague from a visit to her lover and future husband, Valdez. No one noticed Henrica, for there were plenty of women in the camp. Several poorly-clad ones sat before the tents, mending the soldiers’ clothes. Some gaily-bedizened wenches were drinking wine and throwing dice with their male companions in front of an officer’s tent. A brighter light glowed from behind the general’s quarters, where, under a sort of shed, several confessionals and an altar had been erected. Upon this altar candles were burning, and over it hung a silver lamp; a dark, motionless stream pressed towards it; Castilian soldiers, among whom individuals could be recognized only when the candle-light flashed upon a helmet or coat of mail.

The loud singing of carousing German mercenaries, the neighing and stamping of the horses, and the laughter of the officers and girls, drowned the low chanting of the priests and the murmur of the penitents, but the shrill sounding of the bell calling to mass from time to time pierced, with its swift vibrations, through the noise of the camp. Just outside the village the watch-word was again used, and they reached the first house unmolested.

“Here we are,” said Wilhelm, with a sigh of relief. “Profit by the darkness, Junker, and keep on till you have the Spaniards behind you.”

“No, my friend; you will remain here. I wish to share your danger. I shall return with you to Leyden and from thence try to reach Delft; meantime I’ll keep watch and give you warning, if necessary.”

“Let us bid each other farewell now, Georg; hours may pass before I return.”

“I have time, a horrible amount of time. I’ll wait. There goes the door.”

The Junker grasped his sword, but soon removed his hand from the hilt, for it was Belotti, who came out and greeted the signorina.

Henrica followed him into the house and there talked with him in a low tone, until Georg called her, saying:

“Fraulein Van Hoogstraten, may I ask for a word of farewell?”

“Farewell, Herr von Dornburg!” she answered distantly, but advanced a step towards him.

Georg had also approached, and now held out his hand. She hesitated a moment, then placed hers in it, and said so softly, that only he could hear:

“Do you love Maria?”

“So I am to confess?”

“Don’t refuse my last request, as you did the first. If you can be generous, answer me fearlessly. I’ll not betray your secret to any one. Do you love Frau Van der Werff?”

“Yes, Fraulein.”

Henrica drew a long breath, then continued: “And now you are rushing out into the world to forget her?”

“No, Fraulein.”

“Then tell me why you have fled from Leyden?”

“To find an end that becomes a soldier.”

Henrica advanced close to his side, exclaiming so scornfully, that it cut Georg to the heart:

“So it has grasped you too! It seizes all: Knights, maidens, wives and widows; not one is spared. Never ending sorrow! Farewell, Georg! We can laugh at or pity each other, just as we choose. A heart pierced with seven swords: what an exquisite picture! Let us wear blood-red knots of ribbon, instead of green and blue ones. Give me your hand once more, now farewell.”

Henrica beckoned to the musician and both followed Belotti up the steep, narrow stairs. Wilhelm remained behind in a little room, adjoining a second one, where a beautiful boy, about three years old, was being tended by an Italian woman. In a third chamber, which like all the other rooms in the farm-house, was so low that a tall man could scarcely stand erect, Henrica’s sister lay on a wide bedstead, over which a screen, supported by four columns, spread like a canopy. Links dimly lighted the long narrow room. The reddish-yellow rays of their broad flames were darkened by the canopy, and scarcely revealed the invalid’s face.

Henrica had given the Italian woman and the child in the second room but a hasty greeting, and now impetuously pressed forward into the third, rushed to the bed, threw herself on her knees, clasped her arms passionately around her sister, and covered her face with owing kisses.

She said nothing but “Anna,” and the sick woman and no other word than “Henrica.” Minutes elapsed, then the young girl started up, seized one of the torches and cast its light on her regained sister’s face. How pale, how emaciated it looked! But it was still beautiful, still the same as before. Strangely-blended emotions of joy and grief took possession of Henrica’s soul. Her cold hard feelings grew warm and melted, and in this hour the comfort of tears, of which she had been so long deprived, once more became hers.

Gradually the flood tide of emotion began to ebb, and the confusion of loving exclamations and incoherent words gained some order and separated into question and answer. When Anna learned that the musician had accompanied her sister, she wished to see him, and when he entered, held out both hands, exclaiming:

“Meister, Meister, in what a condition you find me again! Henrica, this is the best of men; the only unselfish friend I have found on earth.”

The succeeding hours were full of sorrowful agitation.

Belotti and the old Italian woman often undertook to speak for the invalid, and gradually the image of a basely-destroyed life, that had been worthy of a better fate, appeared before Henrica and Wilhelm. Fear, anxiety and torturing doubt had from the first saddened Anna’s existence with the unprincipled adventurer and gambler, who had succeeded in beguiling her young, experienced heart. A short period of intoxication was followed by an unexampled awakening. She was clasping her first child to her breast, when the unprecedented outrage occurred—Don Luis demanded that she should move with him into the house of a notorious Marchesa, in whose ill-famed gambling-rooms he had spent his evenings and nights for months. She indignantly refused, but he coldly and threateningly persisted in having his will. Then the Hoogstraten blood asserted itself, and without a word of farewell she fled with her child to Lugano. There the boy was received by his mother’s former waiting-maid, while she herself went to Rome, not as an adventuress, but with a fixed, praiseworthy object in view. She intended to fully perfect her musical talents in the new schools of Palestrina and Nanini, and thus obtain the ability, by means of her art, to support her child independently of his father and hers. She risked much, but very definite hopes hovered before her eyes, for a distinguished prelate and lover of music, to whom she had letters of introduction from Brussels, and who knew her voice, had promised that after her return from her musical studies he would give her the place of singing-mistress to a young girl of noble birth, who had been educated in a convent at Milan. She was under his guardianship, and the worthy man took care to provide Anna, before her departure, with letters to his friends in the eternal city.

Her hasty flight from Rome had been caused by the news, that Don Luis had found and abducted his son. She could not lose her child, and when she did not find the boy in Milan, followed and at last discovered him in Naples. There d’Avila restored the child, after she had declared her willingness to make over to him the income she still received from her aunt. The long journey, so full of excitement and fatigue, exhausted her strength, and she returned to Milan feeble and broken in health.

Her patron had been anxious to keep the place of singing-mistress open for her, but she could only fulfil for a short time the duties to which the superior of the convent kindly summoned her, for her sickness was increasing and a terrible cough spoiled her voice. She now returned to Lugano, and there sought to compensate her poor honest friend by the sale of her ornaments, but the time soon came when the generous artist was forced to submit to be supported by the charity of a servant. Until the last six months she had not suffered actual want, but when her maid’s husband died, anxiety about the means of procuring daily bread arose, and now maternal love broke down Anna’s pride: she wrote to her father as a repentant daughter, bowed down by misfortune, but received no reply. At last, reduced to starvation with her child, she undertook the hardest possible task, and besought the man, of whom she could only think with contempt and loathing, not to let his son grow up like a beggar’s child. The letter, which contained this cry of distress, had reached Don Luis just before his death. No help was to come to her from him. But Belotti appeared, and now she was once more at home, her friend and sister were standing beside her bed, and Henrica encouraged her to hope for her father’s forgiveness.

It was past midnight, yet Georg still awaited his friend’s return. The noise and bustle of the camp began to die away and the lantern, which at first had but feebly lighted the spacious lower-room of the farmhouse, burned still more dimly. The German shared this apartment with agricultural implements, harnesses, and many kinds of grain and vegetables heaped in piles against the walls, but he lacked inclination to cast even a glance at his motley surroundings. There was nothing pleasant to him in the present or future. He felt humiliated, guilty, weary of life. His self-respect was trampled under foot, love and happiness were forfeited, there was naught before him save a colorless, charmless future, full of bitterness and mental anguish. Nothing seemed desirable save a speedy death. At times the fair image of his home rose before his memory—but it vanished as soon as he recalled the burgomaster’s dignified figure, his own miserable weakness and the repulse he had experienced. He was full of fierce indignation against himself, and longed with passionate impatience for the clash of swords and roar of cannon, the savage struggle man to man.

Time passed without his perceiving it, but a torturing desire for food began to torment the starving man. There were plenty of turnips piled against the wall, and he eat one after another, until he experienced the feeling of satiety he had so long lacked. Then he sat down on a kneading-trough and considered how he could best get to the Beggars. He did not know his way, but woe betide those who ventured to oppose him. His arm and sword were good, and there were Spaniards enough at hand whom he could make feel the weight of both. His impatience began to rise, and it seemed like a welcome diversion, when he heard steps approaching and a man’s figure entered the house. He had stationed himself by the wall with his sword between his folded arms, and now shouted a loud “halt” to the new-comer.

The latter instantly drew his sword, and when Georg imperiously demanded what he wanted, replied in a boyish voice, but a proud, resolute tone:

“I ask you that question! I am in my father’s house.”

“Indeed!” replied the German smiling, for he had now recognized the speaker’s figure by the dim light. “Put up your sword. If you are young Matanesse Van Wibisma, you have nothing to fear from me.”

“I am. But what are you doing on our premises at night, sword in hand?”

“I’m warming the wall to my own satisfaction, or, if you want to know the truth, mounting guard.”

“In our house?”

“Yes, Junker. There is some one up-stairs with your cousins, who wouldn’t like to be surprised by the Spaniards. Go up. I know from Captain Van Duivenvoorde what a gallant young fellow you are.”

“From Herr von Warmond?” asked Nicolas eagerly. “Tell me! what brings you here, and who are you?”

“One who is fighting for your liberty, a German, Georg von Dornburg.”

“Oh, wait here, I entreat you. I’ll come back directly. Do you know whether Fraulein Van Hoogstraten—”

“Up there,” replied Georg, pointing towards the ceiling.

Nicolas sprang up the stairs in two or three bounds, called his cousin, and hastily told her that her father had had a severe fall from his horse while hunting, and was lying dangerously ill. When Nicolas spoke of Anna he had at first burst into a furious passion, but afterwards voluntarily requested him to tell him about her, and attempted to leave his bed to accompany him. He succeeded in doing so, but fell back fainting. When his father came early the next morning, she might tell him that he, Nicolas, begged his forgiveness; he was about to do what he believed to be his duty.

He evaded Henrica’s questions, and merely hastily enquired about Anna’s health and the Leyden citizen, whom Georg had mentioned.

When he heard the name of the musician Wilhelm, he begged her to warn him to depart in good time, and if possible in his company, then bade her a hurried farewell and ran down-stairs.

Wilhelm soon followed. Henrica accompanied him to the stairs to see Georg once more, but as soon as she heard his voice, turned defiantly away and went back to her sister.

The musician found Junker von Dornburg engaged in an eager conversation with Nicolas.

“No, no, my boy,” said the German cordially, “my way cannot be yours.”

“I am seventeen years old.”

“That’s not it; you’ve just confronted me bravely, and you have a man’s strength of will—but life ought still to bear flowers for you, if such is God’s will—you are going forth to fight sword-in-hand to win a worthy destiny of peace and prosperity, for yourself and your native land, in freedom—but I, I—give me your hand and promise—”

“My hand? There it is; but I must refuse the promise. With or without you—I shall go to the Beggars!”

Georg gazed at the brave boy in delight, and asked gently:

“Is your mother living?”

“No.”

“Then come. We shall probably both find what we seek with the Beggars.”

Nicolas clasped the hand Georg offered, but Wilhelm approached the Junker, saying:

“I expected this from you, after what I saw at St. Peter’s church and Quatgelat’s tavern.”

“You first opened my eyes,” replied Nicolas. “Now come, we’ll go directly through the camp; they all know me.”

In the road the boy pressed close to Georg, and in answer to his remark that he would be in a hard position towards his father, replied:

“I know it, and it causes me such pain—such pain.—But I can’t help it. I won’t suffer the word ‘traitor’ to cling to our name.”

“Your cousin Matanesse, Herr von Riviere, is also devoted to the good cause.”

“But my father thinks differently. He has the courage to expect good deeds from the Spaniards. From the Spaniards! I’ve learned to know them during the last few months. A brave lad from Leyden, you knew him probably by his nickname, Lowing, which he really deserved, was captured by them in fair fight, and then—it makes me shudder even now when I think of it—they hung him up head downward, and tortured him to death. I was present, and not one word of theirs escaped my ears. Such ought to be the fate of all Holland, country and people, that was what they wanted. And remarks like these can be heard every day. No abuse of us is too bad for them, and the King thinks like his soldiers. Let some one else endure to be the slave of a master, who tortures and despises us! My holy religion is eternal and indestructible. Even if it is hateful to many of the Beggars, that shall not trouble me—if only they will help break the Spanish chains.” Amid such conversation they walked through the Castilian camp, where all lay buried in sleep. Then they reached that of the German troops, and here gay carousing was going on under many a tent. At the end of the encampment a sutler and his wife were collecting together the wares that remained unsold.

Wilhelm had walked silently behind the other two, for his heart was deeply stirred, joy and sorrow were striving for the mastery. He felt intoxicated with lofty, pure emotions, but suddenly checked his steps before the sutler’s stand and pointed to the pastry gradually disappearing in a chest.

Hunger had become a serious, nay only too serious and mighty power, in the city beyond, and it was not at all surprising that Wilhelm approached the venders, and with sparkling eyes bought their last ham and as much bread as they had left.

Nicolas laughed at the bundle he carried under his arm, but Georg said:

“You haven’t yet looked want in the face, Junker. This bread is a remedy for the most terrible disease.” At the Hohenort Gate Georg ordered Captain von Warmond to be waked, and introduced Nicolas to him as a future Beggar. The captain congratulated the boy and offered him money to supply himself in Delft with whatever he needed, and defray his expenses during the first few weeks; but Nicolas rejected his wealthy friend’s offer, for a purse filled with gold coins hung at his girdle. A jeweller in the Hague had given them to him yesterday in payment for Fraulein Van Hoogstraten’s emerald ring.

Nicolas showed the captain his treasure, and then exclaimed:

“Now forward, Junker von Dornburg, I know where we shall find them; and you, Captain Van Duivenvoorde, tell the burgomaster and Janus Dousa what has become of me.”