"The loss will be all your worship's," responded Dirk unmoved, "as the glory would also be, could you but take the city by surprise. I am not asking for glory. I do not wish my part in it to become generally known. All I ask is the gold!" Valdez and Borgia consulted together for a moment in low tones, and the result of their consultation seemed to be the hasty decision that they must capitulate.
"Very well!" declared the general, "I will write as thou hast said, but mark my words! Thou hadst better keep out of my way, Dirk Willumhoog, when this transaction is completed!"
"And now, gentlemen, just one thing more," added Dirk when the writing was finished and in his possession. "As an earnest of your good faith, I require a thousand florins to be paid me at once!" More splutterings from Borgia and explosions from Valdez ensued, but this was evidently mere bluster, for after a due amount of bickering and bargaining, a clinking of coins was heard, and money was counted out slowly and reluctantly.
"There!" said Valdez, "Thou hast now every jot thou didst demand. Out with thy secret, and be quick about it, for we have not all night to spend!"
"This, then, is my story," answered Dirk. "I have discovered—never mind how!—a passageway through a certain part of the wall of Leyden. Not a soul knows of its existence save myself, and none could ever find it unassisted, for I myself stumbled upon it quite by chance. There is room for but one to pass through at a time, and the passage is dangerous. But it would be an easy matter to introduce a regiment of soldiers through it in the night, and in the morning the town would be yours for the inhabitants are all too weak from starvation to make much resistance."
"But where is this secret passage?" demanded Valdez.
"That will I not divulge till I lead the first soldier through it," replied Willumhoog shrewdly. "When does your worship think would be the best and earliest opportunity to effect the entrance?"
Again Valdez and Borgia consulted together.
"To-day is the thirtieth of September," replied the general. "On the night of October third we will have all in readiness, and thou shalt fulfill thy promise. At the same time Colonel Borgia shall make an assault upon the wall on the opposite side of the city, and thus draw off the attention from our place of ingress." With a few more remarks relative to the payment of the money, and a hasty and anything but cordial leave-taking, the two Spaniards tramped out, mounted their horses and rode away. The lights in the room below were extinguished, the door was shut, and darkness and silence reigned throughout the farmhouse. But up in their prison room, the two children clasped each other and shuddered with horror at the dark crime that was soon to be committed.