The First of the English 4 – Gunter · Verses Across
Literature · Romance
The First of the English 4Book 1 · The Patriot Painter
18
Literature · Romance
The First of the English 4
Book 1 · The Patriot Painter
GunterEnglish
The sun is well up in the heavens when Guy opens his eyes. In contrast to the night before, the gale has died away and the sun is shining brightly as if to mock the farmers and peasants of the surrounding fields and polders, whose cattle are still drowning or starving, for the flood gives no signs of receding. A little of this Chester can see as he makes hasty toilet; looking from his window he gets a glimpse of the river, which is still at its height, and upon whose bosom still float the carcasses of drowned sheep, cattle, hogs, and even human beings.
But the city seems now to pay little heed to this. The gale has gone down, ships are preparing to sail out of the Schelde for the Indies and the Mediterranean; the merchants have removed their wares to places of safety; mediæval commerce stops no more its battle of trade and bargain, for the disasters of humanity—than that of to-day.
The hum of traffic comes floating up to Guy from the neighboring Shoemarket and Egg streets. All the guilds of Antwerp are at work this day, and seemingly happy, save that of the Butchers, which has lost many fat beeves that have been pastured on the great meadows running out to the big Kowenstyn dyke.
As it is late in the morning most of those who have occupied the surrounding cots during the night have departed on their way. Consequently Guy, having, after the manner of sailors, slept ready to go on deck, slips on doublet and cloak uninterrupted save by the snores of a toper who is still in drunken slumber.
Then going down to the wash-room of the house, upon the lower floor, the Englishman makes hasty ablution, succeeding by the bribe of a stiver in obtaining an unused towel for the purpose.
This being done, and feeling very bright, vivacious and cheery, notwithstanding he catches glimpses of the placard in the wine room offering a reward for his head, Chester passes out and makes his way rapidly through the dirty alleys of the lower portion of the town to Wool street. Remembering his unsuccessful inquiries at the Bodé Volcker mansion, the Englishman has concluded that he will see if he can obtain further information from the French blood-letter and barber about the arrival of his lodger. For speed is vital to the business that has brought Guy into the clutches of his enemies, and every moment that he stays in the town of Antwerp adds to his danger of recognition and arrest; too many Flemish traders from Zeeland and the islands of Holland journey to this great commercial city, some of these know the “First of the English” quite well by sight, and a few of them, for three thousand carolus guilders would sell anything upon earth, including themselves.
Arriving at the barber’s pole of Jacques Touraine, Chester receives a pleasant surprise. The voluble little Frenchman darts out to meet him, crying: “He is anxious for you; I told him you had asked for him!”
“He—who?” gasps Guy.
“Why, my lodger, the painter, Antony Oliver. He came in from Brussels this morning. He is as eager to see you as you are to see him.”
But the last of this speech is lost upon the Englishman, who has darted up two flights of stairs to the top of the house, where, under the tiled gables, amid the swallows’ nests, is the lodging room and atelier of Antonius Oliver (familiarly called Antony), geographical map maker, herald and pursevant, and at times assistant secretary to Alva, Viceroy of the Netherlands. This gentleman’s salary is not great; his position, while partially confidential, is not very exalted; though it often brings him into direct contact with the great Duke himself. For Oliver has striven, with all his might and main to gain the confidence of his master.
He is a native of Mons, near the French border of the Netherlands, and is partly of Flemish and partly of Gallic extraction. At present he is apparently washing the dust of travel from his face, as he makes his appearance minus his cloak and doublet, towel in hand, and answers the Englishman’s smart knock on his door.
“Ah!” he cries, his face full of sunny smile, “I am delighted to see you, my friend, my Guido!”
“And so am I, Antony, my boy,” answers Chester, with hearty outstretched hand. For a few weeks of supreme mutual danger have made these two men as good comrades as years of ordinary friendship.
“So glad to see you,” goes on the Fleming, “and yet sorry.” He whispers: “You know of the reward for you?”
“Yes, I’ve seen it,” answers Guy, shortly.
“Ah! at your inn?”
“No, in the guard-room of the Citadel.”
“Mon Dieu! You have been arrested and examined,” the painter gasps, anxiously.
“No, I went as cavalier to a great court lady!” laughs the English sailor. “For it I am to be promoted to a colonelship in Romero’s musketeers!”
“Impossible! Tell me your story!”
“I will,” says Guy, “it contains the business that brought me to Antwerp.”
“Yes,” answers the other, meditatively, “your business must be of the greatest importance to make you again take this risk.”
“It is for the same old reason—my Queen!” whispers Guy; “Is there no one about?”
“No; Achille, my apprentice, I have sent out on a long errand, as I expected your coming and wanted to have private converse.”
“What long errand?”
“I sent him out to buy wine, bread, provisions, cheese, beef, on credit. Achille is an active boy, if I had given him the money he would have been back in half an hour.” Then carefully barring the door and drawing a heavy curtain over it, Oliver says: “Tell me your story.”
“Then can you interpret these letters bearing, I think, upon the welfare, yes, the life, of my sovereign?” whispers the Englishman. And producing the packet wrapped in oiled silk which he had taken from the body of the drowned Italian the evening before, Guy tells the artist the curious story of the preceding night. His recital is punctuated by vivacious exclamations of surprise, deep interest, and several times by uproarious laughter from his Flemish listener.
As the Englishman finishes the painter takes up the conversation.
“Ah!” he exclaims, looking carefully at the documents, “you took these from the body of the secretary of Chiapin Vitelli.” Then he adds: “I am one of the few men who could read them. They are in the private cipher used by the secret correspondence bureau of my master, my benefactor, he who pays me my stipend, the man whose hand I kiss—he of Alva!” A strange light coming into his eyes as he speaks of his benefactor. “The reading is very simple when you know the key, which I have memorized and have in my head—I dare not keep it anywhere else.”
“Then give me the meaning of these letters!”
“Certainly,” says the artist. “You can amuse yourself with my sketches as I look over them.”
This he does hastily, while Guy passes the time examining a number of studies in charcoal upon canvas and panels, apparently the work of the young Fleming. At one side of the apartment is a marble slab used in grinding colors, upon it a number of brushes, a palette, and some little bladders of ground paint, such as were used by the artists of that day. Upon an easel stands an unfinished picture of a fair haired, blue eyed Flemish girl of great beauty, though it is of almost the peasant style. This has been sketched after the manner of the Venetian school upon what was known then as the red ground. At the back of the apartment is a large curtain, apparently concealing some more important work, as it is quite large, covering the whole rear of the garret floor of the house.
“Don’t peep behind,” says the painter, looking up as Guy’s footsteps approach the curtain. “I have a surprise for you there, I think,” and pausing in his reading, he looks up with a quizzical expression at the Englishman. “Something you will be interested in, I imagine; you could not see the face of the fair one of the barge!” For Guy, in his description of his evening’s adventure, has omitted, with the instinctive delicacy of the gentleman and the lover, any account of his interview at the house of the Countess de Mansfeld, with the lady he rescued.
“What do you mean?” asks Chester, eagerly. “Wait for a moment,” and a muttered exclamation of surprise calls Guy to the painter’s side, who has apparently become greatly excited over the cipher letters.
Here he stands, impatient, awaiting the outcome of the Fleming’s inspection of the documents.
A minute later Oliver looks up and remarks: “I can now tell you in rough form the contents of these letters.”
“What are they?” inquires Guy eagerly.
“These are two letters, written by Chiapin Vitelli, Alva’s confidential officer, and evidently given to his secretary—such is their value—to deliver in person to one Ridolfi, an Italian, who is a banker in London.”
“Ridolfi? Yes, I’ve heard of him. He has a great many dealings with Italy; he is a goldsmith as well as banker; his place is on Cheapside,” mutters Chester. “What about him?”
“Well, this is apparently a letter of a series, some of which must have been answered, in which Alva is arranging with Ridolfi, who is apparently the agent of the Duke of Norfolk, the man who would marry the Queen of Scots, now in Elizabeth’s hands, for the poisoning of the Queen of England!”
“The poisoning of my sovereign! Good God!” gasps Guy. A moment after, forcing himself to calmness, he continues: “Yes; rumors of this or of a similar plot have been brought to the notice of Lord Burleigh, Secretary of State. You know it is to investigate such matters that I am sent over here and disowned by my sovereign, who wishes at present to appear at peace with Alva, but who, in her time, will have her reckoning—and an English reckoning at that—with your Netherland tyrant!”
“I know that. That is why I aid you,” mutters the painter. “Elizabeth is the only hope of the Netherlands. We have been crushed and butchered at Jemmingen, the Prince of Orange is now in exile, a fugitive in Germany, France distracted with her own affairs, Coligny and Condé at swords points with the league, can give us but uncertain aid—England is our only hope. As such I have welcomed you as the ‘First of the English’ to come to aid the Flemings. You will not be the last—I know it! But”—here the light of patriotism comes into the painter’s face, “we must do our part. As such I have condemned myself to live under the most terrible suspense that can be put upon a man—a traitor in the very household, at the very writing table, of the Spanish Viceroy, so that I may give information of his movements to Louis of Nassau and William the Silent. Discovery means—you know what!”
Then he laughs a ghastly laugh and whispers: “What would Alva, who burns people alive slowly for eating meat on Friday; who beheads women for sheltering their own husbands; who permits his troops to burn, outrage, pillage and ravage defenseless burghers and peaceful citizens; what would he do with a discovered spy in his own retinue? Are there enough racks, thumb-screws and faggots for him?” he shudders; then adds determinedly: “But all for my country!”
“And I all for my own,” answers Guy. “A price set upon my head as a pirate, and all for my Queen. Elizabeth smiles on me at court, calls me her valiant freebooter, yet tells the ambassador of Philip of Spain that I am here on my own account, and disowns me; though she knows it is for her interests, to guard her life, to discover such damnable plots as these, that I take my life within my hand! Besides,” he goes on, his eyes beginning to blaze, “I don’t love the Spaniards.”
“Personally,” remarks the Flemish painter, “I have found some very pleasant gentlemen among them; though among those who flock here to Alva’s banner are scoundrels innumerable. But it is for my country that I live a life of suspense, each breath almost an apprehension.”
Looking at the painter, Guy sees that this is true. He is rather small of figure, though well-built and agile; but has dark soft eyes, singularly delicate, mobile lips for a man, and a high, intellectual forehead. As Chester gazes, he is sure Antony Oliver is a brave man. At the same instant he knows he is a man with such a terrible fate hanging over him that his nerves are unstrung by constant and never-ending apprehension.
However, he speaks to the point.
“I hate every Spaniard, gentleman or no gentleman, peasant or noble, because I have a brother in the prisons of the Inquisition at Hispaniola.”
“Poor fellow!” mutters the painter, with a little shudder. “In Hispaniola! That’s a long way off.”
“Not for an English sailor. Seven years ago Dick and I, full of youth and ardor, sailed with Captain Ned Lovell to the Spanish Main, and traded there with the Dons of Hispaniola, and as we were Catholics, lived quite comfortably in the town of Haytien, accumulating wealth. Then I, with my doubloons and pieces of eight, returned to merry England, leaving Dick to turn the rest of our merchandise into gold and follow after. A year passed. Then no Dick; but word was brought me by Hawkins coming back from his third voyage, that Dick had fallen in love with a Spanish girl; that his rivals, for revenge, had denounced him as an English heretic, and the—the Inquisition—.” The Englishman’s voice is broken, there are tears in his eyes, though they burn fiercely. “Then I was ready to hate the Spaniards and do Queen Elizabeth’s work,” mutters Guy, after a moment’s pause, “the work that gave me this miniature.”
“Can you tell me,” he says suddenly, producing the likeness, on ivory set with diamonds, “the name and title of the lady whose face is here?”
“Oho!” chuckles the painter, a twinkle in his eye, “I had been expecting some such question ever since you told me about the lady of the barge. Did she give you this? Has she also been smitten by Cupid’s dart?”
“What do you mean?” growls the Englishman, blushes showing beneath his sun-burned skin.
“I mean,” laughs Antony, “that you are a man very deeply in love. In your tale of last night every time you mentioned the ‘divinity of the barge,’ the ‘fair unknown,’ the ‘graceful creature of the shadow,’ the ‘fairy-like form the gloom could not conceal,’ the ‘voice soft as an angel’s,’ your manner betrayed that even the darkness had not prevented your falling in love with the lady you rescued from our Sea Beggars; that though she had been your captive, you really were hers. Did she reciprocate enough to give you this?”
“No,” returns Guy, “I believe I’ve been in love with this picture ever since I captured it three years ago.”
This answer astounds the painter. He murmurs: “I never supposed you English a romantic race, but you prove to me that the Italians are as beggars to you islanders in impetuous passion. In love with a picture?”
“Yes, it came to me under peculiar circumstances,” answers the Englishman, a little sulkily perhaps, for the artist’s tone is somewhat bantering. “Towards the end of ’68 I was playing tennis in a London court. Elizabeth of England and her prime minister, Sir William Cecil, now Lord Burleigh, sent for me. The Queen’s exchequer was empty. Five Italian vessels bearing a loan from the bankers of Genoa to Alva, and loaded with eight hundred thousand crowns in silver, on their way to Antwerp—”
“Yes,” interjects the other with a chuckle, “I know—the money with which the Duke intended to pay his troops—”
“Had been driven into the harbor of Southampton by privateers commissioned by the Prince de Condé, who had been on the lookout to seize this treasure. The Spanish ambassador had appealed to the Queen for naval protection. Being at peace this must be accorded him, but Elizabeth’s exchequer was empty, and harassed by milliner’s bills and other feminine expenses, she had determined to have this silver for her own. Cecil had sent for me, as he knew I spoke Spanish, and thought I was the man for the business. They had already notified the Spanish ambassador to make arrangements for the transport of the treasure from Southampton to Dover by land, so that the Queen’s vessels could meet it there. But while he was making his preparations I received the following curious commission: I was to go down and offer ten thousand crowns to the French privateers not to leave their position outside of Southampton water, so the Genoese vessels dared not sail. Meanwhile the Queen investigated and found the money was loaned by Italian merchants. ‘If they can loan to Alva, they can loan to me,’ she thought. Under the private directions of the Queen of England I seized the eight hundred thousand crowns of silver.”
“And that nearly drove Alva crazy! I can see him now,” laughs the painter, “the morning he received the news twisting both his long pendants of beard in impotent rage. Since then he has hated your Queen and you who forced him to put this tenth penny tax on the Netherlands to pay his troops. But what has the theft of Elizabeth of England to do with your miniature, my marauder?”
“Only this,” answers Guy. “On board the Genoese vessel, when I made the seizure, the only spoil I took for myself was this likeness. Judging from the direction on the packet that contained it, that the lady whom it represented must be living in the Netherlands, I was very happy to accept Queen Elizabeth’s private commission to come over here and turn sea rover in her cause, knowing that I took my life in my hand, but also knowing it was my one chance of meeting in the flesh the face that I have loved from that day to this. If that’s romance, make the best of it! Who is she?”
“Ah!” says the painter, “In reply may I show you another picture?”
“Of whom? What do I care for pictures except this one? You artists are always thinking of art—I think of flesh and blood, which beats art.”
“Does it beat THIS?” laughs Oliver, and drawing away the curtain from the rear of the room he discloses an enormous altar piece, unfinished except the central figure, the Madonna, at which Guy looks and gasps, for it is the picture of the woman whose lips he had kissed the night before, whose miniature he now holds in his hand, gazing alternately from it to the magnificent altar piece figure, the Mother of God, on the canvas. It has apparently been a work of love. The Englishman grows red in the face, then deathly pale, and mutters: “You love her also!” scowling at his supposed artistic rival.
“No,” answers Antony, “I do not love the lady; though I love my picture. You need not be jealous my dear Englishman, the woman I love is a much more flesh-and-blood being—Juffer Wilhelmina, daughter of the ex-burgomaster Bodé Volcker. Her blonde picture is on that easel. I don’t hesitate to tell you my secret, as I have yours. But this,” he looks affectionately at the canvas, “is a work of love, love for my art. It is my one hope to leave a name in the world. If I can finish my altar piece before the time comes when the hand that is forever over me crushes me in its iron grasp, I hope to be remembered—not as the patriot, but as the artist!”
“And, by heaven! you will be,” cries Guy, who would certainly give this picture of the woman he loves the post of honor and the wreath of fame, “for you have painted not only a Madonna, but a goddess, fit to be the mother of God.” Here he crosses himself devoutly and looks lovingly at the picture again, which well merits his admiration, not only for the loveliness of its model, but for the originality of its effects and richness of its coloring.
Unlike the picture on the easel, this altar piece is sketched upon a pearl gray background, the only completed figure in it being the central Madonna, the likeness of Guy’s love.
The girl stands posed in virgin beauty; her white, blue-veined feet rest light as a fairy’s on a rainbow of softest sunlight; her form, outlined with all the beauty curves of woman, but full of maiden grace and lightness, draped by robe of softest clinging white, and decked with floating azure mantle. Above the ivory throat is the face of exquisite brunette beauty, those soft though shining eyes, those lips of coral red, those cheeks of changing lilies and roses that made Guy’s heart beat so madly before, and make it beat so madly now.
The whole, deified by the grand soul that shines out from the lovely face, backgrounded by and floating upon sun rays, and full of those wondrous effects of golden light and deep warm shadow peculiar to the school of the Venetian Tintoretto, makes Guy very eager; for it is the breathing, speaking portrait of the woman he loves, yet still is not equal to her.
For this is but one view of her mobile loveliness, and the night before she had given him a different effect, a varied expression, a new rapture, each time he had gazed upon her changing, vivacious, yet always noble beauty.
He cries impatiently to the painter: “You don’t answer my question. You only show me what makes me more hungry for her name. Tell me who she is?”
The answer that comes startles him, dismays him. “She is,” says Oliver, sighing his words, “the only thing upon this earth that Alva loves!”
“No, no, I’ll not believe,” gasps Chester.
“You must! She is the only thing he adores, the only being to whom the Viceroy of Spain ever gives the loving ‘thou’.”
“I can’t believe you,” cries the Englishman, clenching his hands in agony. “She is too pure to be the love of any one, least of all of that fiend.”
“She is not too pure,” says the painter slowly, “to be his daughter.”
“His DAUGHTER? Saints above us!”
“Yes, Hermoine de Alva is the Duke’s natural daughter. Her mother, the Countess di Perugia, an Italian lady, of great beauty, died four years ago. Since then the Duke has given Doña Hermoine his own name. She is the purest, sweetest, noblest flower that Spain has ever sent to the Netherlands. Her mind is as bright, her intellect as strong, as her father’s, but her heart is as tender as his is cruel. Still, she is the daughter of Alva, and as such, my Englishman, I fear your love is hopeless! Beware! Your brother loved a Spanish girl!”
To this Guy answers nothing. In a flash he feels the truth of the painter’s last crushing remark. But a moment after Anglo-Saxon pluck springs up again in him, and he mutters:
“By heaven! what a triumph to pluck the thing Alva loves most out of his hands; to make his own daughter that he prizes the most of anything on this earth the bride, the honored bride, of the man upon whose head he has placed three thousand carolus guilders reward—the sea pirate—‘The First of the English.’” and he bursts out into mocking, triumphant, but loving laughter.
