“Kiss a naughty girl and she will cuff you; cuff her, she will cry. Come then, sweet, cry upon my shoulder since I have cuffed you!”
Nele turned round. He opened his arms, and she threw herself into them.
“You won’t go away any more down there, will you Tyl?” she asked him.
But he did not answer, busy as he was in pressing with his the hand that trembled so pitifully, and in drying with his lips the hot tears that fell from the eyes of Nele, like heavy drops of rain in a storm.
XIX
These were the days when the noble city of Ghent refused to pay the tax which her son, the Emperor Charles, was demanding of her. The fact was it was impossible to pay, for already the city was drained of money by the act of Charles himself. But it seemed that the city was guilty of a great crime, and Charles resolved to go himself and exact punishment. For to be whipped by her own son is above all things painful to a mother.
Now, although he was his enemy, Francis Long-Nose was pleased to offer the Emperor a free passage through the land of France. Charles accepted the offer, and instead of being held as a prisoner, he was fêted and feasted in right royal fashion. For this is ever a sovereign bond of union between kings: each to aid the other against their own peoples.
Charles stayed a long time at Valenciennes, and still gave no sign of his wrath, so that Mother Ghent began to lay aside her fears, believing that the Emperor her son was going to forgive her, seeing that she had acted within her rights.
But at length Charles arrived under the walls of the city with 4000 horse, together with the Duke of Alba and the Prince of Orange. The poorer townsfolk and the small business men wished to prevent this filial entry into their city, and would have called to arms 80,000 men of the city and of the country round. But the merchants, the hoogh-poorters, opposed this suggestion, being afraid of the predominance of the people. Thus Ghent could easily have cut her son to pieces, him and his 4000 horse. But it seemed she loved him too dearly, and even the small tradesmen themselves were fast regaining their trust in him.