The First of the English 5 – Gunter · Verses Across
Literature · Romance
The First of the English 5Book 1 · Chapter 5
18
Literature · Romance
The First of the English 5
Book 1 · Chapter 5
GunterEnglish
“THE LION’S JAWS GAPE FOR ME!”
“Bravo!” cries the Fleming, “Bravo! But first she must love you.”
“I’ll make her love me,” exclaims Chester, looking at the ruby ring upon his finger that seems to him not the red light of danger, but the beacon of Cupid.
“Well, I’m glad you are so confident. I wish I were equally so.” the painter sighs; then goes on energetically: “But now to business. You cannot linger over your love-making. Queen Elizabeth must be warned of the plots against her life, and of Ridolfi, the Italian banker in London.”
“Oh, we’ll take good care of him,” says Guy, savagely. “I must join my ship this evening and sail for England, and to do this I must get the words of to-night so I can pass the gates of the town after sunset.”
“Why not leave at once?”
“Because,” answers the Englishman, “you have not yet given me the translation of those letters. That will take you some time.”
“No, it won’t.”
“Why not?”
“Because I shall not make the translation; I shall simply give you the key to the cipher, then they can be interpreted in England, and any other letters of this correspondence that may come into your hands will be equally readable by Queen Elizabeth and her ministers. It will save you many dangerous visits here.” With this the artist sits down and writes in a few minutes the explanation of the cipher.
Then saying: “Place that with the letters,” he gives it to Guy, smiles at him, and murmurs: “Now I should think you would be in a hurry to leave, with that price upon your head.”
“I’m not going until to-night,” answers Chester, almost surlily. “The evening tide will serve as well for my vessel—it will not delay me much. Besides—” here he catches sight of the painter’s face in quizzical smile, and cries out: “Gadzooks, man! you don’t think I’m going to leave Antwerp without seeing her again.” He waves his hand toward the divine beauty of the face upon the canvas lighted up by the morning sun, and shining upon him not only with heavenly, but with earthly, love—at least so this audacious young man imagines.
“Ah! going to ask papa for the young lady?” jeers the painter.
“Not yet, though I have a letter of introduction to him,” remarks Guy, piqued into producing the billet given to him by Doña Hermoine the evening before, the one addressed to Alva, Viceroy of Spain.
“And you haven’t opened it?” queries Oliver, examining the missive.
“Certainly not; it is sealed.”
“Ah! my boy,” rejoins the painter, “you have too difficult a game to play to be over scrupulous. You must know how you stand with this lady before you attempt to see her again.” Then he horrifies Guy, for he says: “You have powerful rivals; General Niorcarmesis looked upon not altogether unfavorably by the lady’s father, in whose confidence that officer stands very high.”
“A rival?” falters Guy.
“A rival? A host of rivals! Do you pay your beautiful inamorata so poor a compliment as to think she has charmed no other man than you? Every one is bowing down to the beauty and the wit of the Countess Hermoine de Alva—generals and nobles.” Then he continues commandingly: “You must open this letter. The game you are playing forces you to use every card. It is apparently not a confidential communication, and must apply to you, for she told you to deliver it with your own hand.”
While he is speaking, and before Guy can interpose, Oliver has rapidly lighted a taper, passed the letter over it with the deft hand of one accustomed to such business, and is presenting it, seal removed, open to the inspection of the Englishman.
“Read it you must,” he says. “Your life might be the forfeit of too strained an honor. Read it! Some day you may be compelled from the exigencies of the case to deliver this to Alva. In your position you should know what it contains. Read it, or I have no further communication with you.”
“Why not?” mutters Guy, who, though desperately anxious to see the handwriting of his sweetheart, still holds out.
“Because,” says the painter, solemnly, “this is a game in which both you and I have put up our lives as the stake; and I play everything in my hand. You must do the same, for my sake as well as yours. If I communicate with you, if I am seen in your company, and you are arrested, perhaps I fall with you. Besides, we owe it to our countries to use every weapon that God throws into our hands. READ!”
While saying this he has opened the delicately scented billet, which has only been held together by its seal, and is suspending it before the eyes of the Englishman, which become radiant with hope as they read this short but pithy note in the very prettiest of feminine handwriting:
“Dear Papa:
“Please make the bearer of this, Captain Guido, of Romero’s foot, my rescuer from the Beggars of the Sea (though he is too modest to give me any other name) a Colonel as soon as possible, and then give him a chance to make himself a General, and oblige, your loving
Hermoine.”
Rapture and pride are too great in the Englishman for him to avoid showing this note to his friend and mentor.
“By Saint Denis!” cries Oliver, inspecting the missive, “I believe she does love you. If you have hit her heart you’re the first, and she has had half of Spain at her feet, I’m told.” Then, looking over the young man, he adds contemplatively: “It must be your peculiar blonde ferocity that has done it. If you had been a brunette Adonis, I wouldn’t have given a stiver for your chance. Dark eyed dandies about here are as plentiful as windmills.”
“With this in my hand can I fail to make the attempt to see her before I go?” says Guy stoutly, securing the missive with a lover’s care in the breast of his doublet.
“Apparently you will not, no matter what I say,” smiles the artist. Then he goes on earnestly and solemnly: “But let me give you a little advice. Under no circumstances; no matter how much she loves you; no matter if she swears to you she adores you better than all else in this world, do you tell her your secret.”
“You think she would betray me?”
“No! A thousand times no!”
“You think it might destroy her love for me?”
“Not if she loved you before. Hermoine de Alva once true, will be forever true.”
“Then why should I fear to tell her?”
“For this reason. She knows how much her father loves her. She has no fear of the human tiger; to her his claws are always velvet. By this note you can tell that Doña Hermoine thinks her word is law with the dictator of the Netherlands. So it is in little things!—a diamond necklace, a dozen new dresses, even the discarding of a suitor; for if she says no, that is the end of the gentleman with her father also. But in matters of State policy she has never run against him. She does not know that in affairs of government, in upholding his own laws, edicts and proclamations, Alva is ice and iron together. What I fear is that you may one day be persuaded to go with her and tell the dictator your story, and she will tell papa that she loves you, assured that he will spare you and pardon you and put you up on high for her sake; but for God’s sake don’t ever deceive yourself about Alva’s mercy. If you do, you are lost. Her tears, her prayers, will never save you. Remember that, my Guido, who are in love with the tiger’s cub!”
“Why should you call her that?” cries Guy savagely.
“I should not call her that,” returns the painter sadly. “She has been all condescension and kindness to me; she has permitted me to take her beautiful face and put it on my canvas, to give me a chance for fame and immortality.”
“Ah! she has granted you sittings here?”
“Yes, with her duenna present.”
“Then arrange an interview for me this afternoon here.”
“It would do you no good. She would not come without attendants. Do not think that Hermoine de Alva will forget any point of etiquette, even though she adores you—of which you seem to be very confident.”
“But I must arrange a meeting. I’ll kill two birds with one stone. She will know the words of the night. From her I can obtain them. She will come to me, I know,” says Guy very confidently. “You can gain admission to her as the under-secretary of Alva. Do so to-day. Give her this ring;” he takes the beautiful ruby from his finger and puts it into the painter’s hand.
“Mon Dieu! You have exchanged rings—did kisses go with them?” laughs Oliver; and as a flaming blush appears upon Guy’s face, he mutters: “Parbleu! I believe they have. Talk about Italian passion! It is as ice to you wonderful English.” Getting no answer from Chester he continues: “I can arrange an interview to-day, but it cannot be here. The duenna would stand in the path of any tête-à-tête between you. The only way I can think of private word for you with your love, you fortunate young man—you unfortunate young man—is at the house of the man I hope one day to call ‘papa.’”
“The burgomaster, Niklaas Bodé Volcker?” exclaims Guy.
“Yes. On the plea of rare bargains in silks that have been slightly damaged by the flood Doña Hermoine can bring her duenna into the town. At the merchant’s you can speak privately with Doña de Alva.”
“But the duenna—the infernal duenna?” growls Chester.
“The duenna will be made blind and harmless in the next room inspecting bargains. If we arrange to have Bodé Volcker’s stock low enough, the Countess de Pariza is good for an hour of rapture and bargains. Besides, they will probably be coming in to-day to learn the talk of the town, about the great drinking bout between”—here the painter flushes with indignation—“between the man who disgraces his genius and his art, by intemperance, and the Six Drunkards of Brussels. You have seen it placarded on the walls of the inns and wine houses, bearing the name of the greatest artist the Netherlands has yet produced, the Raphael of the North, the man whose disciple I was, the man whose altar piece in the great Church of Our Dear Lady would have made him renowned forever had it not been burnt by the Iconoclasts four years ago, when they threw down all the images of the church, and destroyed innumerable masterpieces of art, in blind rage at the Inquisition. I and another old pupil of Floris’s saved that night one picture of his, a smaller one, ‘The Fall of the Angels;’ it is not his best work; in fact, it is very much beneath his genius, but it is the one thing of his that will go down to posterity, for now he has become a sot and a drunkard,” and Oliver sighs.
“Very well,” cries Guy, breaking in upon the artist’s indignant rhapsody, during which he has remembered he has not eaten since he has risen. “Now having finished our business, perhaps when Achille returns with the provisions you will give me a little breakfast, perchance a little pigeon pie, eh?” and he playfully pokes the painter in the ribs, for Antony’s remarks about Hermoine de Alva have made this audacious young man very jovially happy.
It is a laughing remark, but the laugh dies away as Guy sees its extraordinary effect upon the Flemish painter. At the words “pigeon pie” Oliver’s face grows pale. He turns and says suspiciously: “What do you know about pigeon pie?”
“Only what I heard last evening from little Marvedie, son of Touraine the barber.”
“What did he say about pigeon pie?” asks the painter, whose manner begins to impress Guy, as he mutters; “Speak quick—our lives may depend upon it!”
“Only this,” says the Englishman, “that when you were here he had plenty of pigeon pie. He asked me if I liked pigeon pie, and then afterward—I think, yes, I am almost positive, he said perhaps he wouldn’t have so much pigeon pie now, as a man had taken away so many pigeons.”
“A man—taken away so many pigeons—from here!” falters Antony. Then he suddenly exclaims: “That explains why there were no letters from Louis of Nassau in my cote above—no pigeons bearing them. I thought it was curious; I was nervous. My God! I must know.”
Just then a rap coming upon the door he draws aside the curtain and opens it, confronting his apprentice Achille, a bright-eyed French youth, who says discontentedly: “I can’t get anything without the cash. Our great artist, Frans Floris, owes so much money that no other artists can buy anything for credit.”
“Very well, put down your basket. I’ll see if I can get you some money,” says Oliver meditatively. Then a sudden idea seems to come to him, he cries: “Achille, where is little Marvedie? Bring him up, and we’ll send out and get some pigeons, and have some pigeon pie for him,” affecting great lightness of manner, though with evident effort.
“All right. Marvedie is death on pigeon pie, and so am I,” says the youth, and flies downstairs.
“I must question him,” murmurs the painter. “If this is true, the sword suspended by the hair is about to fall.”
A moment later and the laughing voices of childhood are heard on the stairs, Achille and his little brother bound into the room, crying: “Pigeon pie! pigeon pie! Hurrah for Monsieur Oliver’s pigeon pie!”
“Yes, pigeon pie,” cries the painter, “pigeon pie. But what has become of my pigeons? Have you taken them, Achille?”
“No!”
“Were there any flying about the cote? Not those in the coop, but in the cote—around in the air flying?” The artist’s voice has become hoarse—his eyes terrible.
“Oh yes, a good many, for the last day or two,” answers the boy. Then noting his master’s manner, he screams out: “But I have not taken them, I swear to heaven, Monsieur Oliver, I have never taken any from the cote. On the word of an honest boy—do not discharge me!”
“No, he didn’t take any,” cries little Marvedie; “a big tall man with nasty black eyes took them away.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
“Did you see him? How do you know?”
“Oh, I remember him because he laughed and seemed very happy, and gave me two stivers to get him a bag to put them in.”
“Can you tell anything about him? Do you know his name, little Marvedie—little pigeon pie Marvedie?” gasps Antony, attempting a grimace, with a face that is like a death mask.
“No, but he was ugly and had nasty eyes, eyes that looked like the codfish they sell in the market.”
“How many pigeons did this man take away? Did you count them, little Marvedie—little pigeon pie Marvedie?” and the painter achieves a ghastly chuckle.
“Yes, there were six, with bunches on their beaks and eyes that looked back and front. The kind whose necks you wring when you give me pigeon pie,” says the little child.
“And where was your brother?” The painter’s voice is low and stern.
“Oh, I was out trying to sell one of your pictures,” says Achille. “At least I think I was. That’s what I’ve been trying to do ever since you went away, but they’re all here yet. The Duke’s tenth penny is ruining everybody. No body has any money to spare, at least not for works of art.”
“Very well,” sighs Antony, “here’s a florin. Yes, get the pigeons!” he laughs dismally. “We’ll have the pigeon pie.”
The two boys run away. The painter’s face is white as his own chalk, and he falters. “At last it has come. Some one has my secret.”
“What secret” mutters Guy, half guessing.
“The letters brought to me by carrier pigeons from Louis of Nassau, with whom I am in correspondence for the benefit of the Netherlands. Of course they are in cipher, they cannot be construed in a moment; but the hair has been cut, the sword is descending, I am no better than a dead man; worse than that—I am a tortured man! Oh, my God! think of the rack, the faggot, that await me!” and the Fleming’s eyes become bloodshot, his cheeks gray, and his lips blue.
“If we could discover the man who has your secret,” says the Englishman, prompt to action, well knowing that danger to Oliver now means danger to himself.
“Ah! but how? When Alva arrives the man will surely give him the information; it would be very valuable, warning of a traitor in the Duke’s own corresponding bureau. I—I had been anxious all the morning. When I—I arrived here I expected to find the pigeons with the letters tied to their tails from Louis. Now I know—the reason. Six! Six letters—each one of them enough to send me to the slow fire!” moans the painter, striking his hands together till his finger nails are blue.
“Six! Six pigeons!” echoes Guy. Then he suddenly cries: “Do you know a man with dark, fishy eyes, such as the boy described, and a black mustache with one single, whitish gray lock in it?”
“My God!” cries the artist. “I do. He—you have told me who—Vasco de Guerra—my enemy! He has—has my letters!—What gave you the clue?”
“Only this, that Vasco de Guerra, at supper last night, gave to the Six Drunkards of Brussels, who have come here for the drinking bout with Floris, a pigeon pie containing six pigeons which he asserted he had shot with his cross-bow, but he spoke of the seventh, declaring for the head of the seventh he would receive such a reward that would enable him to give a great banquet to his comrades.”
With this Guy tells the astounded Oliver what he saw and heard at the carouse of the Six Drunkards of Brussels in the Painted Inn the night before.
“Yes, that’s proof enough, proof that he has my secret—he of all men, he who is sure to use it—this Vasco de Guerra is my enemy. He is a miserable scamp, disreputable enough to be cashiered from the Spanish army—think what that must be, when soldiers are permitted to beg, steal, murder, torture and ravage without one word of rebuke from their officers. What must a man be who is cast out from such troops as this? He is a drunken fortune hunter; he seeks the hand of Mina Bodé Volcker, who loves me. He has her maid, Wiarda Schwartz in his pay.”
“Aha!” returns Guy. “That is the reason she treated me so cavalierly when I asked for you last night.”
“Wiarda? Yes, miserable little paid soubrette. But we must think—we must act—and that quickly,” returns the painter, who seems to have regained composure, now that he knows his betrayer. “Vasco must guess the value of these letters, for he must have been upon my scent for weeks. He will try to decipher them himself, for he will not wish to trust the information to others who might obtain the reward for it. He can hardly act to-day. He doubtless keeps them on his person.”
“In that case we must kill him at once,” says Guy. “That’s what we’ve got to do. We must kill him for both our sakes. At all events, we must have the papers. Send for him, get him here, and I will do his business with a dirk. Then we can carry him out and toss him into the flood. He’ll float away to the ocean. There are plenty of drowned carcasses like his, so it will not be noticed.”
“No,” says the painter, “that might bring suspicion upon us. Perhaps I can suggest a better way,” and begins to think, racking his subtle Flemish brain as it has never been racked before. Ten seconds and he cries out, hope in voice, joy in his eyes: “At the drinking bout Floris is sure to win. Floris will drink every one of the Six Drunkards of Brussels under the table, insensible, inert, lifeless. In the confusion we can assist the insensible Vasco from the table, take him to a room apparently to revive him, and steal from him the letters he has stolen from me.”
“But if Vasco wins?”
“Impossible! I’ve seen Floris drink more wine at one sitting than any other human beast on earth, I think, can hold and live.”
“But we must be prepared in case he does not,” says the Englishman; then he adds slowly: “Perhaps I can aid you; I have here,” he produces from his breast a small glass flagon of Venetian manufacture, this is protected from breakage by golden filigree work and its stopper carefully sealed, in it is a colorless, limpid fluid.
“What is it? Poison?” asks the painter. “The poison of the Borgias?”
“No, the poison of the Antilles. This is the juice of the Manchineel tree, prepared by the Indians of the Carrabees, after some secret process of their own. You know the wonderful properties of the tree; to sleep under it even for the night is death. It is peculiarly volatile, therefore I keep it sealed. I have carried this with me in case I should be captured and given over to the rack, to make me sleep so that my tortured lips can tell no secrets of my Queen. If it should happen that the painter doesn’t drink Vasco de Guerra insensible and inert, a few drops of this in his flagon will make the Spanish spy sleep forever.”
“Then if Frans Floris doesn’t succeed—the poison of the Antilles,” mutters the painter. “It is his life or ours.” After a second’s thought he continues: “I must kill mine enemy Vasco anyway. Were he only made insensible, even did I recover the letters of Louis of Nassau, he would still suspect me. Some day he would get other proof. If I don’t kill him now I must fly at once, and William the Silent will have no spy at Alva’s elbow. For my country’s cause, I stay here. At the drinking bout Vasco de Guerra dies. The lion’s jaws gape for me. By heaven, they shall not close!”
“That’s well said,” returns Guy, briefly. “Put a dose of this into the Spanish spy.”
He presses the flagon of Manchineel poison into the painter’s hand, but suddenly looks doubtful, and asks anxiously this pertinent question: “How, by all the saints, will you get this into Vasco’s drinking cup and not into the flagons of the others?”
