As for the two varlets who had accompanied the noble lady, they were stretched out on a freshly made bed of straw in the weighing-room.
Patz and his wife seemed to have felt great sympathy for the jongejuffrouw, and Diogenes had reason to congratulate himself that she was moneyless, else she would have found it easy enough to bribe the over-willing pair into helping her to regain her home.
He dreamt of her all night; her voice rang in his ear right through the soughing of the wind which beat against the ill-fitting windows of the wheel-house. Alternately in his dream she reviled him, pleaded with him, heaped insults upon him, but he was securely bound and gagged and could not reply to her insults or repulse her pleadings. He made frantic efforts to tear the gag from his mouth, for he wished to tell her that he had not lost his heart to her and cared nothing for the misery which she felt.
CHAPTER XXVII
THENCE TO ROTTERDAM
He only caught sight of the jongejuffrouw later on in the morning when she came out of the molens and stepped into the sledge which stood waiting for her at the door.
The thaw had not been sufficiently heavy, nor had it lasted a sufficient number of hours to make a deep impression on the thick covering of snow which still lay over the roads. The best and quickest mode of travelling—at any rate for the next few hours—would still be by sledge, the intervening half-dozen leagues that lay between Houdekerk and Rotterdam could be easily covered in the day provided an early start was made and no long halts allowed for meals.
Diogenes had made arrangements for the start to be made by seven o'clock. A dull light of pale rosy grey hung over the snow-covered landscape, and far away on the horizon line that same rose-grey light was just assuming a more brilliant hue. He sent Mevrouw Patz up to the jongejuffrouw to acquaint her with the plans for the day, and to beg her to give these her approval.
Mevrouw Patz returned with the message that the jongejuffrouw was ready to start at any hour which Mynheer would command and was otherwise prepared to obey him in all things.