Lysbeth Part 30

The grey light of the summer morning began to grow on the surface of the great inland sea. Far behind them they beheld the sun's rays breaking upon the gilt crown that is set above the tower of St. Bavon's Church, soaring over the lost city of Haarlem and the doomed patriots who lay there presently to meet their death at the murderer's sword. They looked and shuddered. Had it not been for Adrian they would be prisoners now, and what that meant they knew. If they had been in any doubt, what they saw around must have enlightened them, for here and there upon the misty surface of the lake, or stranded in its shallows, were the half-burnt out hulls of ships, the remains of the conquered fleet of William the Silent; a poor record of the last desperate effort to relieve the starving city. Now and again, too, something limp and soft would c.u.mber their oars, the corpse of a drowned or slaughtered man still clad perchance in its armour.

At length they pa.s.sed out of these dismal remains of lost men, and Elsa could look about her without shuddering. Now they were in fleet water, and in among the islands whereon the lush summer growth of weeds and the beautiful marsh flowers grew as greenly and bloomed as bright as though no Spaniard had trampled their roots under foot during all those winter months of siege and death. These islets, scores and hundreds of them, appeared on every side, but between them all Martha steered an unerring path. As the sun rose she stood up in the boat, and shading her eyes with her hand to shut out its level rays, looked before her.

"There is the place," she said, pointing to a little bulrush-clad isle, from which a kind of natural causeway, not more than six feet wide, projected like a tongue among muddy shallows peopled by coots and water-hens with their red-beaked young.

Martin rose too. Then he looked back behind him and said; "I see the cap of a sail upon the skyline. It is Ramiro."

"Without doubt," answered Martha calmly. "Well, we have the half of an hour to work in. Pull, bow oar, pull, we will go round the island and beach her in the mud on the further side. They will be less likely to see us there, and I know a place whence we can push off in a hurry."

CHAPTER XXIX

ADRIAN COMES HOME AGAIN

They landed on the island, wading to it through the mud, which at this spot had a gravelly bottom; all of them except Elsa, who remained on the boat to keep watch. Following otter-paths through the thick rushes they came to the centre of the islet, some thirty yards away. Here, at a spot which Martha ascertained by a few hurried pacings, grew a dense tuft of reeds. In the midst of these reeds was a duck's nest with the young just hatching out, off which the old bird flew with terrified quackings.

Beneath this nest lay the treasure, if it were still there.

"At any rate the place has not been disturbed lately," said Foy. Then, even in his frantic haste, lifting the little fledglings-for he loved all things that had life, and did not wish to see them hurt-he deposited them where they might be found again by the mother.

"Nothing to dig with," muttered Martin, "not even a stone." Thereon Martha pushed her way to a willow bush that grew near, and with the smaller of the two axes, which she held in her hand, cut down the thickest of its stems and ran back with them. By the help of these sharpened stakes, and with their axes, they began to dig furiously, till at length the point of Foy's implement struck upon the head of a barrel.

"The stuff is still here, keep to it, friends," he said, and they worked on with a will till three of the five barrels were almost free from the mud.

"Best make sure of these," said Martin. "Help me, master," and between them one by one they rolled them to the water's edge, and with great efforts, Elsa aiding them, lifted them into the boat. As they approached with the third cask they found her staring white-faced over the tops of the feathery reeds.

"What is it, sweet?" asked Foy.

"The sail, the following sail," she answered.

They rested the barrel of gold upon the gunwale and looked back across the little island. Yes, there it came, sure enough, a tall, white sail not eight hundred yards away and bearing down straight upon the place. Martin rolled the barrel into position.

"I hoped that they would not find it," he said, "but Martha draws maps well, too well. Once, before she married, she painted pictures, and that is why."

"What is to be done?" asked Elsa.

"I don't know," he answered, and as he spoke Martha ran up, for she also had seen the boat. "You see," he went on, "if we try to escape they will catch us, for oars can't race a sail."

"Oh!" said Elsa, "must we be taken after all?"

"I hope not, girl," said Martha, "but it is as G.o.d wills. Listen, Martin," and she whispered in his ear.

"Good," he said, "if it can be done, but you must watch your chance. Come, now, there is no time to lose. And you, lady, come also, for you can help to roll the last two barrels."

Then they ran back to the hole, whence Foy and Adrian, with great toil, had just dragged the last of the tubs. For they, too, had seen the sail, and knew that time was short.

"Heer, Adrian," said Martin, "you have the cross-bow and the bolts, and you used to be the best shot of all three of us; will you help me to hold the causeway?"

Now Adrian knew that Martin said this, not because he was a good shot with the cross-bow, but because he did not trust him, and wished to have him close to his hand, but he answered: "With all my heart, as well as I am able."

"Very good," said Martin. "Now let the rest of you get those two casks into the boat, leaving the Jufvrouw hidden in the reeds to watch by it, while you, Foy and Martha, come back to help us. Lady, if they sail round the island, call and let us know."

So Martin and Adrian went down to the end of the little gravelly tongue and crouched among the tall meadow-sweet and gra.s.ses, while the others, working furiously, rolled the two barrels to the water-edge and shipped them, throwing rushes over them that they might not catch the eye of the Spaniards.

The sailing boat drew on. In the stern-sheets of it sat Ramiro, an open paper, which he was studying, upon his knee, and still slung about his body the great sword Silence.

"Before I am half an hour older," reflected Martin, for even now he did not like to trust his thoughts to Adrian, "either I will have that sword back again, or I shall be a dead man. But the odds are great, eleven of them, all tough fellows, and we but three and two women."

Just then Ramiro's voice reached them across the stillness of the water.

"Down with the sail," he cried cheerily, "for without a doubt that is the place-there are the six islets in a line, there in front the other island shaped like a herring, and there the little promontory marked 'landing place.' How well this artist draws to be sure!"

The rest of his remarks were lost in the creaking of the blocks as the sail came down.

"Shallow water ahead, Senor," said a man in the bows sounding with a boat hook.

"Good," answered Ramiro, throwing out the little anchor, "we will wade ash.o.r.e."

As he spoke the Spanish soldier with the boat-hook suddenly pitched head first into the water, a quarrel from Adrian's crossbow through his heart.

"Ah!" said Ramiro, "so they are here before us. Well, there can't be many of them. Now then, prepare to land."

Another quarrel whistled through the air and stuck in the mast, doing no hurt. After this no more bolts came, for in his eagerness Adrian had broken the mechanism of the bow by over-winding it, so that it became useless. They leaped into the water, Ramiro with them, and charged for the land, when of a sudden, almost at the tip of the little promontory, from among the reeds rose the gigantic shape of Red Martin, clad in his tattered jerkin and bearing in his hand a heavy axe, while behind him appeared Foy and Adrian.

"Why, by the Saints!" cried Ramiro, "there's my weather-c.o.c.k son again, fighting against us this time. Well, Weather-c.o.c.k, this is your last veer," then he began to wade towards the promontory. "Charge," he cried, but not a man would advance within reach of that axe. They stood here and there in the water looking at it doubtfully, for although they were brave enough, there was none of them but knew of the strength and deeds of the red Frisian giant, and half-starved as he was, feared to meet him face to face. Moreover, he had a position of advantage, of that there could be no doubt.

"Can I help you to land, friends?" said Martin, mocking them. "No, it is no use looking right or left, the mud there is very deep."

"An arquebus, shoot him with an arquebus!" shouted the men in front; but there was no such weapon in the boat, for the Spaniards, who had left in a hurry, and without expecting to meet Red Martin, had nothing but their swords and knives.

Ramiro considered a moment, for he saw that to attempt to storm this little landing-place would cost many lives, even if it were possible. Then he gave an order, "Back aboard." The men obeyed with alacrity. "Out oars and up anchor!" he cried.

"He is clever," said Foy; "he knows that our boat must be somewhere, and he is going to seek for it."

Martin nodded, and for the first time looked afraid. Then, as soon as Ramiro had begun to row round the islet, leaving Martha to watch that he did not return and rush the landing-stage, they crossed through the reeds to the other side and climbed into their boat. Scarcely were they there, when Ramiro and his men appeared, and a shout announced that they were discovered.

On crept the Spaniards as near as they dared, that is to within a dozen fathoms of them, and anch.o.r.ed, for they were afraid to run their own heavy sailing cutter upon the mud lest they might be unable to get her off again. Also, for evident reasons, being without firearms and knowing the character of the defenders, they feared to make a direct attack. The position was curious and threatened to be prolonged. At last Ramiro rose and addressed them across the water.

"Gentlemen and lady of the enemy," he said, "for I think that I see my little captive of the Red Mill among you, let us take counsel together. We have both of us made this expedition for a purpose, have we not-namely, to secure certain filthy lucre which, after all, would be of slight value to dead men? Now, as you, or some of you, know, I am a man opposed to violence; I wish to hurry the end of none, nor even to inflict suffering, if it can be avoided. But there is money in the question, to secure which I have already gone through a great deal of inconvenience and anxiety, and, to be brief, that money I must have, while you, on the other hand are doubtless anxious to escape hence with your lives. So I make you an offer. Let one of our party come under safe conduct on board your boat and search it, just to see if anything lies beneath those rushes for instance. Then, if it is found empty, we will withdraw to a distance and let you go, or the same if full, that is, upon its contents being unladen into the mud."

"Are those all your terms?" asked Foy.

"Not quite all, worthy Heer van Goorl. Among you I observe a young gentleman whom doubtless you have managed to carry off against his will, to wit, my beloved son, Adrian. In his own interests, for he will scarcely be a welcome guest in Leyden, I ask that, before you depart, you should place this n.o.ble cavalier ash.o.r.e in a position where we can see him. Now, what is your answer?"

"That you may go back to h.e.l.l to look for it," replied Martin rudely, while Foy added: "What other answer do you expect from folk who have escaped out of your clutches in Haarlem?"

As he said the words, at a nod from Martin, Martha, who by now had crept up to them, under cover of his great form and of surrounding reeds, let go the stern of the boat and vanished.

"Plain words from plain, uncultivated people, not unnaturally irritated by the course of political events with which, although Fortune has mixed me up in them, I have nothing whatever to do," answered Ramiro. "But once more I beg of you to consider. It is probable that you have no food upon your boat, whereas we have plenty. Also, in due course, darkness will fall, which must give us a certain advantage; moreover, I have reason to hope for a.s.sistance. Therefore, in a waiting game like this the cards are with me, and as I think your poor prisoner, Adrian, will tell you, I know how to play a hand at cards."

About eight yards from the cutter, in a thick patch of water-lilies, just at this moment an otter rose to take air-an old dog-otter, for it was grey-headed. One of the Spaniards in the boat caught sight of the ring it made, and picking up a stone from the ballast threw it at it idly. The otter vanished.

"We have been seeking each other a long while, but have never come to blows yet, although, being a brave man, I know you would wish it," said Red Martin modestly. "Senor Ramiro, will you do me the honour to overlook my humble birth and come ash.o.r.e with me for a few minutes, man against man. The odds would be in your favour, for you have armour and I have nothing but a worn bull's hide, also you have my good sword Silence and I only a wood-man's axe. Still I will risk it, and, what is more, trusting to your good faith, we are willing to wager the treasure of Hendrik Brant upon the issue."

So soon as they understood this challenge a roar of laughter went up from the Spaniards in the boat, in which Ramiro himself joined heartily. The idea of anyone voluntarily entering upon a single combat with the terrible Frisian giant, who for months had been a name of fear among the thousands that beleaguered Haarlem, struck them as really ludicrous.

But of a sudden they ceased laughing, and one and all stared with a strange anxiety at the bottom of their boat, much as terrier dogs stare at the earth beneath which they hear invisible vermin on the move. Then a great shouting arose among them, and they looked eagerly over the gunwales; yes, and began to stab at the water with their swords. But all the while through the tumult and voices came a steady, regular sound as of a person knocking heavily on the further side of a thick door.

"Mother of Heaven!" screamed someone in the cutter, "we are scuttled," and they began to tear at the false bottom of their boat, while others stabbed still more furiously at the surface of the Mere.

Now, rising one by one to the face of that quiet water, could be seen bubbles, and the line of them ran from the cutter towards the rowing boat. Presently, within six feet of it, axe in hand, rose the strange and dreadful figure of a naked, skeleton-like woman covered with mud and green weeds, and bleeding from great wounds in the back and sides.

There it stood, shaking an axe at the terror-stricken Spaniards, and screaming in short gasps, "Paid back! paid back, Ramiro! Now sink and drown, you dog, or come, visit Red Martin on the sh.o.r.e."

"Well done, Martha," roared Martin, as he dragged her dying into the boat. While he spoke, lo! the cutter began to fill and sink.

"There is but one chance for it," cried Ramiro, "overboard and at them. It is not deep," and springing into the water, which reached to his neck, he began to wade towards the sh.o.r.e.

"Push off," cried Foy, and they thrust and pulled. But the gold was heavy, and their boat had settled far into the mud. Do what they might, she would not stir. Then uttering some strange Frisian oath, Martin sprang over her stern, and putting out all his mighty strength thrust at it to loose her. Still she would not move. The Spaniards came up, now the water reached only to their thighs, and their bright swords flashed in the sunlight.

"Cut them down!" yelled Ramiro. "At them for your lives' sake."

The boat trembled, but she would not stir.

"Too heavy in the bows," screamed Martha, and struggling to her feet, with one wild scream she launched herself straight at the throat of the nearest Spaniard. She gripped him with her long arms, and down they went together. Once they rose, then fell again, and through a cloud of mud might be seen struggling upon the bottom of the Mere till presently they lay still, both of them.

The lightened boat lifted, and in answer to Martin's mighty efforts glided forward through the clinging mud. Again he thrust, and she was clear.

"Climb in, Martin, climb in," shouted Foy as he stabbed at a Spaniard.

"By heaven! no," roared Ramiro splashing towards him with the face of a devil.

For a second Martin stood still. Then he bent, and the sword-cut fell harmless upon his leather jerkin. Now very suddenly his great arms shot out; yes, he seized Ramiro by the thighs and lifted, and there was seen the sight of a man thrown into the air as though he were a ball tossed by a child at play, to fall headlong upon the casks of treasure in the skiff prow where he lay still.

Martin sprang forward and gripped the tiller with his outstretched hand as it glided away from him.

"Row, master, row," he cried, and Foy rowed madly until they were clear of the last Spaniard, clear by ten yards. Even Elsa s.n.a.t.c.hed a rollock, and with it struck a soldier on the hand who tried to stay them, forcing him to loose his grip; a deed of valour she boasted of with pride all her life through. Then they dragged Martin into the boat.

"Now, you Spanish dogs," the great man roared back at them as he shook the water from his flaming hair and beard, "go dig for Brant's treasure and live on ducks' eggs here till Don Frederic sends to fetch you."

The island had melted away into a mist of other islands. No living thing was to be seen save the wild creatures and birds of the great lake, and no sound was to be heard except their calling and the voices of the wind and water. They were alone-alone and safe, and there at a distance towards the skyline rose the church towers of Leyden, for which they headed.

"Jufvrouw," said Martin presently, "there is another flagon of wine in that locker, and we should be glad of a pull at it."

Elsa, who was steering the boat, rose and found the wine and a horn mug, which she filled and handed first to Foy.

"Here's a health," said Foy as he drank, "to the memory of Mother Martha, who saved us all. Well, she died as she would have wished to die, taking a Spaniard for company, and her story will live on."

"Amen," said Martin. Then a thought struck him, and, leaving his oars for a minute, for he rowed two as against Foy's and Adrian's one, he went forward to where Ramiro lay stricken senseless on the kegs of specie and jewels in the bows, and took from him the great sword Silence. But he strapped the Spaniard's legs together with his belt.

"That crack on the head keeps him quiet enough," he said in explanation, "but he might come to and give trouble, or try to swim for it, since such cats have many lives. Ah! Senor Ramiro, I told you I would have my sword back before I was half an hour older, or go where I shouldn't want one." Then he touched the spring in the hilt and examined the cavity. "Why," he said, "here's my legacy left in it safe and sound. No wonder my good angel made me mad to get that sword again."

"No wonder," echoed Foy, "especially as you got Ramiro with it," and he glanced at Adrian, who was labouring at the bow oar, looking, now that the excitement of the fight had gone by, most downcast and wretched. Well he might, seeing the welcome that, as he feared, awaited him in Leyden.

For a while they rowed on in silence. All that they had gone through during the last four and twenty hours and the seven preceding months of war and privation, had broken their nerve. Even now, although they had escaped the danger and won back the buried gold, capturing the arch-villain who had brought them so much death and misery, and their home, which, for the present moment at any rate, was a strong place of refuge, lay before them, still they could not be at ease. Where so many had died, where the risks had been so fearful, it seemed almost incredible that they four should be living and hale, though weary, with a prospect of continuing to live for many years.

That the girl whom he loved so dearly, and whom he had so nearly lost, should be sitting before him safe and sound, ready to become his wife whensoever he might wish it, seemed to Foy also a thing too good to be true. Too good to be true was it, moreover, that his brother, the wayward, pa.s.sionate, weak, poetical-minded Adrian, made by nature to be the tool of others, and bear the burden of their evil doing, should have been dragged before it was over late, out of the net of the fowler, have repented of his sins and follies, and, at the risk of his own life, shown that he was still a man, no longer the base slave of pa.s.sion and self-love. For Foy always loved his brother, and knowing him better than any others knew him, had found it hard to believe that however black things might look against him, he was at heart a villain.

Thus he thought, and Elsa too had her thoughts, which may be guessed. They were silent all of them, till of a sudden, Elsa seated in the stern-sheets, saw Adrian suddenly let fall his oar, throw his arms wide, and pitch forward against the back of Martin. Yes, and in place of where he had sat appeared the dreadful countenance of Ramiro, stamped with a grin of hideous hate such as Satan might wear when souls escape him at the last. Ramiro recovered and sitting up, for to his feet he could not rise because of the sword strap, in his hand a thin, deadly-looking knife.

"Habet!" he said with a short laugh, "habes, Weather-c.o.c.k!" and he turned the knife against himself.

But Martin was on him, and in five more seconds he lay trussed like a fowl in the bottom of the boat.

"Shall I kill him?" said Martin to Foy, who with Elsa was bending over Adrian.

"No," answered Foy grimly, "let him take his trial in Leyden. Oh! what accursed fools were we not to search him!"

Ramiro's face turned a shade more ghastly.

"It is your hour," he said in a hoa.r.s.e voice, "you have won, thanks to that dog of a son of mine, who, I trust, may linger long before he dies, as die he must. Ah! well, this is what comes of breaking my oath to the Virgin and again lifting my hand against a woman." He looked at Elsa and shuddered, then went on: "It is your hour, make an end of me at once. I do not wish to appear thus before those boors."

"Gag him," said Foy to Martin, "lest our ears be poisoned," and Martin obeyed with good will. Then he flung him down, and there the man lay, his back supported by the kegs of treasure he had worked so hard and sinned so deeply to win, making, as he knew well, his last journey to death and to whatever may lie beyond that solemn gate.

They were pa.s.sing the island that, many years ago, had formed the turning post of the great sledge race in which his pa.s.senger had been the fair Leyden heiress, Lysbeth van Hout. Ramiro could see her now as she was that day; he could see also how that race, which he just failed to win, had been for him an augury of disaster. Had not the Hollander again beaten him at the post, and that Hollander-Lysbeth's own son by another father-helped to it by her son born of himself, who now lay there death-stricken by him that gave him life... . They would take him to Lysbeth, he knew it; she would be his judge, that woman against whom he had piled up injury after injury, whom, even when she seemed to be in his power, he had feared more than any living being... . And after he had met her eyes for the last time, then would come the end. What sort of an end would it be for the captain red-handed from the siege of Haarlem, for the man who had brought Dirk van Goorl to his death, for the father who had just planted a dagger between the shoulders of his son because, at the last, that son had chosen to be true to his own people, and to deliver them from a dreadful doom? ... Why did it come back to him, that horrible dream which had risen in his mind when, for the first time after many years, he met Lysbeth face to face there in the Gevangenhuis, that dream of the pitiful little man falling, falling through endless s.p.a.ce, and at the bottom of the gulf two great hands, hands hideous and suggestive, reaching through the shadows to receive him?

Like his son, Adrian, Ramiro was superst.i.tious; more, his intellect, his reading, which in youth had been considerable, his observation of men and women, all led him to the conclusion that death is a wall with many doors in it; that on this side of the wall we may not linger or sleep, but must pa.s.s each of us through his appointed portal straight to the domain prepared for us. If so, what would be his lot, and who would be waiting to greet him yonder? Oh! terrors may attend the wicked after death, but in the case of some they do not tarry until death; they leap forward to him whom it is decreed must die, forcing attention with their eager, craving hands, with their obscure and ominous voices... . About him the sweet breath of the summer afternoon, the skimming swallows, the meadows starred with flowers; within him every h.e.l.l at which the imagination can so much as hint.

Before he pa.s.sed the gates of Leyden, in those few short hours, Ramiro, to Elsa's eyes, had aged by twenty years.

Their little boat was heavy laden, the wind was against them, and they had a dying man and a prisoner aboard. So it came about that the day was closing before the soldiers challenged them from the watergate, asking who they were and whither they went. Foy stood up and said: "We are Foy van Goorl, Red Martin, Elsa Brant, a wounded man and a prisoner, escaped from Haarlem, and we go to the house of Lysbeth van Goorl in the Bree Straat."

Then they let them through the watergate, and there, on the further side, were many gathered who thanked G.o.d for their deliverance, and begged tidings of them.

"Come to the house in the Bree Straat and we will tell you from the balcony," answered Foy.

So they rowed from one cut and ca.n.a.l to another till at last they came to the private boat-house of the van Goorls, and entered it, and thus by the small door into the house.