The First Sir Percy Baroness Orczy (fb2 epub reader .TXT) 📖

could be no doubt. The jongejuffrouw had been pacified with soft words and vague promises, but the rascal would hang. Any man there would have bet his shirt on the issue. You had only to look at his lordship. A more determined, more terrifying look it were impossible to meet. Even Jan looked a little scared. When his Magnificence looked like that it boded no good to anyone. All the rancour, the gall, that had accumulated in his heart against everything that pertained to the United Provinces and to their Stadtholder would effectively smother the slightest stirring of conscience or pity. Perhaps, when the jongejuffrouw knelt at his feet, he had thought of his mother, who, equally distraught and equally humiliated, had knelt in vain at the Stadtholder’s feet, pleading for the life of her sons. Oh, yes, all that had made the Lord of Stoutenburg terribly hard and callous.

But the men were sorry for the blind vagabond, for all that. He had had nothing to do with the feuds between the Stadtholder and the sons of Olden Barneveldt. He had done nothing, seemingly, save to win the love of the beautiful lady whom his Magnificence had marked for his own. He was brave, too. You could not help admiring him as he stood between you and your comrades, his head thrown back, a splendid type of virility and manhood. Half-seas over he may have been. His misfortunes were, in truth, enough to make any man take a drink; but you could not help but see that there was an air of spirituality about the forehead and the sensitive nostrils which redeemed the face from any suggestion of sensuality. And now and again a quaint smile would play round the corners of his mouth, and the whole wan face would light up as if with a sudden whimsical thought.

Then all at once he threw back his head and yawned.

Such a droll fellow! Yawning on the brink of eternity! It was, in truth, a pity he should hang!

III

Yes, the blind man yawned, loudly and long, like one who is ready for bed. And the harmless sound completed Stoutenburg’s exasperation. He once more gave the harsh word of command:

“Take the varlet out and hang him!”

Obviously this time it would be irrevocable. There was no one here to plead, and there was Jan, stolid and grim as was his wont, already at attention under the lintel⁠—a veritable tower of strength in support of his chief’s decisions.

Jan was not in the habit of arguing with his lordship. This, or any other order, was as one to him. As for the blind vagabond⁠—well, Jan was as eager as his Magnificence to get the noose around the rascal’s throat. There were plenty of old scores to settle between them⁠—the humiliation of three months ago, which had sent Stoutenburg, disgraced and a fugitive, out of the land, had hit Jan severely, too.

And that never-to-be-forgotten discomfiture was entirely due to this miserable caitiff, who, indeed would get naught but his deserts.

The task, in truth, was a congenial one to Jan. A blind man was easy enough to deal with, and this one offered but little resistance. He had been half-asleep, it seems, and only woke to find himself on the brink of eternity. Even so, his good-humour did not forsake him.

“Odd’s fish!” he exclaimed when, roughly shaken from his somnolence, he found himself in the hands of the soldiery. “I had forgotten this hanging business. You might have left a man to finish his dreams in peace.”

He appeared dazed, and his speech was thick. He had been drinking heavily all the evening, and, save for an odd moment or so of lucid interval, he had been hopelessly fuddled all along. And he was merry in his cups; laughter came readily to his lips; he was full of quips and sallies, too, which kept the men in rare good-humour. In truth, the fellow would joke and sing apparently until the hangman’s rope smothered all laughter in his throat.

But he had an unquenchable thirst; entreated the men to bring him a jug of wine.

“Spanish wine,” he pleaded. “I dote on Spanish wine, but had so little of it to drink in my day. That villainous rascal Pythagoras⁠—some of you must have known the potbellied loon⁠—would always seize all there was to get. He and Socrates. Two scurvy runagates who should hang ’stead o’ me. Give me a mug of wine, for mercy’s sake!”

The men had none to give, and the matter was referred to Jan.

“Not another drop!” Jan declared with unanswerable finality. “The knave is quite drunk enough as it is.”

“Ah!” the blind man protested with ludicrous vehemence. “But there thou’rt wrong, worthy Jan. No man is ever⁠—is ever drunk enough. He may be top-heavy, he may be as drunk as a lord, or as fuddled as David’s sow. He may be fuzzy, fou, or merely sottish; but sufficiently drunk? No!”

A shout of laughter from the men greeted this solemn pronouncement. Jan shrugged his shoulders impatiently.

“Well, that is as may be!” he rejoined gruffly. “But not another drop to drink wilt thou get from me.”

“Oh, Jan,” the poor man protested, with a pitiable note of appeal, “my good Jan, think on it! I am about to hang! Wouldst refuse the last request of a dying man?”

“Thou’rt about to hang,” Jan assented, unmoved. “Therefore, ’twere a pity to waste good liquor on thee.”

“I’ll pay thee well, my good Jan,” Diogenes put in, with a knowing wink of his sightless eyes.

“Pay me?” Jan retorted, with a grim laugh. “ ’Tis not much there’s left in thy pockets, I’m thinking.”

“No,” the blind man agreed, nodding gravely. “These good men here did, in truth⁠—empty my pockets effectually awhile ago. ’Twas not with coin I meant to repay thee, good Jan⁠—”

“With what, then?”

“Information, Jan!” the blind man replied, sinking his voice to a hoarse whisper. “Information for the like of which his Lordship of Stoutenburg would give