There was a silence in which Dirk, having fetched the will of Hendrik Brant from a safe hiding place, where it had lain since it reached his hands some months before, opened the seals and read it aloud.
It proved to be a very short document, under the terms of which Dirk van Goorl and his heirs inherited all the property, real and personal, of Hendrik Brant, upon trust, (1) to make such ample provision for his daughter Elsa as might be needful or expedient; (2) to apply the remainder of the money “for the defence of our country, the freedom of religious Faith, and the destruction of the Spaniards in such fashion and at such time or times as God should reveal to them, which,” added the will, “assuredly He will do.”
Enclosed in this document was an inventory of the property that constituted the treasure. At the head came an almost endless list of jewels, all of them carefully scheduled. These were the first three items:
“Item: The necklace of great pearls that I exchanged with the Emperor Charles when he took a love for sapphires, enclosed in a watertight copper box.
“Item: A coronet and stomacher of rubies mounted in my own gold work, the best that ever I did, which three queens have coveted, and none was rich enough to buy.
“Item: The great emerald that my father left me, the biggest known, having magic signs of ancients engraved upon the back of it, and enclosed in a chased case of gold.”
Then came other long lists of precious stones, too numerous to mention, but of less individual value, and after them this entry:
“Item: Four casks filled with gold coin (I know not the exact weight or number).”
At the bottom of this schedule was written, “A very great treasure, the greatest of all the Netherlands, a fruit of three generations of honest trading and saving, converted by me for the most part into jewels, that it may be easier to move. This is the prayer of me, Hendrik Brant, who owns it for his life; that this gold may prove the earthly doom of any Spaniard who tries to steal it, and as I write it comes into my mind that God will grant this my petition. Amen. Amen. Amen! So say I, Hendrik Brant, who stand at the Gate of Death.”
All of this inventory Dirk read aloud, and when he had finished Lysbeth gasped with amazement.