“I thought so. But I can get you out of the gates now. Spanish troops no longer guard them. We have our civic guards on duty. Lieutenant Karloo, at the main port, is a friend of mine. I’ll go with you.”
At the city gate Guy finds very little trouble when vouched for by Bodé Volcker, as the Spanish garrison has been so reduced in Antwerp by drafts on it for the war in Holland that it is now only enough to properly man and guard the Citadel itself. The Fortress dominates the town and could prevent any rebellion or uprising, but the policing of the place is left entirely to the burghers themselves.
This also makes it easier, Guy thinks delightedly, to pass the gold through the gates and load it on his ship; there not being that discipline among the civic guards as prevails among the veteran soldiers of Alva. So it is with a light heart that Chester once more sails down the Schelde for the landing-place at Sandvliet, cogitating: “Now I’ve handled the daughter’s dower, I’m ready for Miss Hermoine herself!”
CHAPTER XX.
“PAPA’S COMING! I’LL—I’LL DO IT!”
“It is fully ten o’clock—but better late than never,” thinks Guy—as he springs on the landing, flies up the stairway, and traverses with hasty feet the little path at Sandvliet. “Egad! She’s not gone to bed yet, anyway,” he laughs, noting that the apartments in which Hermoine had received him before are brilliantly lighted. He sounds the bronze knocker at the door.
This is instantly opened by Alida, who is apparently waiting. She whispers hastily: “Her Excelentisima is expecting you.”
“She is alone?”
“Yes, Señor Coronel.”