"I believe so, Magnificence. The señor captain was growing very anxious."
Once more the Duke is silent; his brows contract in an anxious frown. His active brain is busy in making a mental calculation as to how soon those reinforcements can arrive. "The men will have to walk to Dendermonde," he muses, "and cannot get there before nightfall.... the commandant may start at night ... but he may tarry till the morrow.... It will be the end of the day before he and his men are here ... and in the meanwhile..."
"At the Braepoort?" he queries curtly, "how many of the guard have been killed?"
"We had a hundred and twenty killed when I left, Magnificence, and over three hundred lay wounded on the bridge. We have suffered heavily," adds the man after a slight moment of hesitation--the hesitation of the bearer of evil tidings who dreads his listener's wrath.
Alva remains silent for a moment or two, then he says abruptly: "Dost know that I have half a mind to kill thee, for all the evil news which thou hast brought?"
Then he laughs loudly and long because the man, with a quick cry of terror has made a sudden dash for the open window, and is brought back by the lance of the provost on guard upon the balcony. The pleasure of striking terror into the hearts of people has not yet palled upon his Magnificence.
"If I had a whole mind to kill thee," he continues, "thou wouldst have no chance of escape. So cease thy trembling and ask the provost there to give thee water to cleanse thyself, food to put inside thy belly and clothing wherewith to hide thy nakedness. Then come back before me. I'll give thee a chance to save thy life by doing a service to thy King."
He makes a sign to one of the provosts, who seizes the man roughly by the shoulders and incontinently bundles him out of the room.
In the council chamber no one dares to speak. His Highness has become moody, and has sunk upon his high-backed chair where he remains inert and silent, wrapped in gloomy meditations, and when he is in one of those sullen moods no one dares to break in on his thoughts--no one except señor de Vargas, and he too is as preoccupied as his chief.
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