“Because I saw three pikes driven through his body.”
“That is sufficient,” mutters Alva in a dazed manner. “You can go, Gomez.”
“And three pikes through the body would kill even as tough a fighter as Guido Amati,” remarks Mondragon; but as the sergeant turns his back the commandant suddenly says: “What is the matter, Your Highness. You have had bad news from Haarlem?” [[246]]
“Oh no, the best. They are eating grass in the streets now. We’ve beaten Orange on the lake and dominate it. It is not Haarlem.” Then Alva suddenly commands: “Order my escort at once. Is Gomez able to take horse?”
“Yes, your Excellency.”
“Let him accompany them.”
And followed by thirty men armed with lance and arquebus, my lord of Alva clatters back to the dwelling of his daughter. On the way he calls to his side the bluff Gomez and questions him: “What kind of a looking man was this Guido Amati?”
“Tall, well built, short crisp dark hair, eyes very black and reckless, and a skin as swarthy as a washed-out Morisco.”
“He had the manners of a gentleman, of course,” remarks the Viceroy.
“As well as a soldier like myself could guess, your Highness, and the tongue of one. It was said he spoke Castilian as purely as a priest.”