Lysbeth, a Tale of the Dutch

by H. Rider Haggard

“You have learnt wisdom somewhere of late years, Martin, since you stopped drinking and fighting,” said Dirk drily, “and for my part before God I swear it.”

“And so do I.” “And I.” “And I.” “And I,” echoed the others, Martin, who spoke last, adding, “Yes, I swear that I will never speak of it; no, not even to my young master, Adrian, who lies sick abed upstairs.”

Adrian made a good, though not a very quick recovery. He had lost a great deal of blood, but the vessel closed without further complications, so that it remained only to renew his strength by rest and ample food. For ten days or so after the return of Foy and Martin, he was kept in bed and nursed by the women of the house. Elsa’s share in this treatment was to read to him from the Spanish romances which he admired. Very soon, however, he found that he admired Elsa herself even more than the romances, and would ask her to shut the book that he might talk to her. So long as his conversation was about himself, his dreams, plans and ambitions, she fell into it readily enough; but when he began to turn it upon herself, and to lard it with compliment and amorous innuendo, then she demurred, and fled to the romances for refuge.

Handsome as he might be, Adrian had no attractions for Elsa. About him there was something too exaggerated for her taste; moreover he was Spanish, Spanish in his beauty, Spanish in the cast of his mind, and all Spaniards were hateful to her. Deep down in her heart also lay a second reason for this repugnance; the man reminded her of another man who for months had been a nightmare to her soul, the Hague spy, Ramiro. This Ramiro she had observed closely. Though she had not seen him very often his terrible reputation was familiar to her. She knew also, for her father had told her as much, that it was he who was drawing the nets about him at The Hague, and who plotted day and night to rob him of his wealth.

At first sight there was no great resemblance between the pair. How could there be indeed between a man on the wrong side of middle age, one-eyed, grizzled, battered, and bearing about with him an atmosphere of iniquity, and a young gentleman, handsome, distinguished, and wayward, but assuredly no criminal? Yet the likeness existed. She had seen it first when Adrian was pointing out to her how, were he a general, he would dispose his forces for the capture of Leyden, and from that moment her nature rose in arms against him. Also it came out in other ways, in little tricks of voice and pomposities of manner which Elsa caught at unexpected moments, perhaps, as she told herself, because she had trained her mind to seek these similarities. Yet all the while she knew that the fancy was ridiculous, for what could these two men have in common with each other?

In those days, however, Elsa did not think much of Adrian, or of anybody except her beloved father, whose only child she was, and whom she adored with all the passion of her heart. She knew the terrible danger in which he stood, and guessed that she had been sent away that she should not share his perils. Now she had but one desire and one prayer—that he might escape in safety, and that she might return to him again. Once only a message came from him, sent through a woman she had never seen, the wife of a fisherman, who delivered it by word of mouth. This was the message:

“Give my love and blessing to my daughter Elsa, and tell her that so far I am unharmed. To Foy van Goorl say, I have heard the news. Well done, thou good and faithful servant! Let him remember what I told him, and be sure that he will not strive in vain, and that he shall not lack for his reward here or hereafter.”

That was all. Tidings reached them that the destruction of so many men by the blowing up of the Swallow, and by her sinking of the Government boat as she escaped, had caused much excitement and fury among the Spaniards. But, as those who had been blown up were free-lances, and as the boat was sunk while the Swallow was flying from them, nothing had been done in the matter. Indeed, nothing could be done, for it was not known who manned the Swallow, and, as Ramiro had foreseen, her crew were supposed to have been destroyed with her in the Haarlemer Meer.

Then, after a while, came other news that filled Elsa’s heart with a wild hope, for it was reported that Hendrik Brant had disappeared, and was believed to have escaped from The Hague. Nothing more was heard of him, however, which is scarcely strange, for the doomed man had gone down the path of rich heretics into the silent vaults of the Inquisition. The net had closed at last, and through the net fell the sword.

But if Elsa thought seldom of Adrian, except in gusts of spasmodic dislike, Adrian thought of Elsa, and little besides. So earnestly did he lash his romantic temperament, and so deeply did her beauty and charm appeal to him, that very soon he was truly in love with her. Nor did the fact that, as he believed, she was, potentially, the greatest heiress in the Netherlands, cool Adrian’s amorous devotion. What could suit him better in his condition, than to marry this rich and lovely lady?