A Gentleman-at-Arms: Being Passages in the Life of Sir Christopher Rudd, Knight

by Herbert Strang

I saw myself now deeply engaged in a matter after my own heart. "'Tis Time's glory," saith Will Shakespeare, "to unmask falsehood and bring truth to light"; and here was I a fellow-worker with Time. I considered within myself what course I should take. I might at once make disclosure of my discovery; but Volmar was so slippery a fellow that I might easily trip unless I had some further evidence of his villainy to lay before the council. Without doubt he would have ready some plausible explanation, the which might recoil upon me, being a stranger and one not held in high esteem. I resolved therefore to bide my time and say nought until I had my evidence all compact—unless indeed Jan Verhoeff were in extremity of peril.

The young man was brought to trial at the time appointed. I was not present in court, deeming it best to hold aloof until I could employ my apparatus to good effect. The only testimony that I myself might have given, touching the charge made against Verhoeff, was that I had seen him steal to the walls by night with Volmar at his heels, and this could not have turned to his favour. The evidence against him was so slight and thin-spun, that in time of peace, and before a just tribunal, it would not have been held sufficient to hang a dog; but his present judges being the magistrates of the city, with the Burgomaster as president, and all men's minds being sore troubled about the city's welfare, the verdict was given against him, and he was sentenced to be hanged on the tenth day thereafter.

The news was brought to me in my room by the young man's mother, who was utterly broken with grief and shame. She had never a doubt of his innocency, and besought me with many tears and supplications to save him. I had much ado to refrain from giving her positive assurance that her son should not die; but I deemed it better for my purpose that she should suffer ten days of suspense and anguish than that we should come under any suspicion by reason of her serenity and ease of mind. I put her off, therefore, with unsubstantial words of comfort. But my policy was undone that same evening, for about the hour of supper there came to the house a female figure close enshrouded in hood and cloak; and asking speech with me, she was admitted to the chamber wherein I sat with the widow lady, and casting off her hood revealed the wan, sorrowful face of Mistress Jacqueline, the Burgomaster's daughter.

"Oh, sir," she cried, flinging herself upon her knees and clasping her hands piteously, "oh, sir, save my lover! My father condemned him, but he is, I know, the cat's-paw of wicked men. Sir, I beseech you, save my lover!"

I raised her up, and my resolution utterly melted away. I did for the sweetheart what I had refused to do for the mother, assuring her that Jan Verhoeff should not die, I myself would prevent it; but it was necessary, for the due punishment of those that conspired against him, that none should so much as guess at anything being adventured on his behalf. At this the women were mightily cheered, but the widow bore me a grudge in that I had before withheld this solace from her; and I cannot say but that I deserved it.

I had no certain plan for establishing the treason of Mynheer Volmar; but I was resolved to keep a close watch upon him, deeming it likely that in mere self-confidence he would take a false step. While with exceeding care I held myself in the background, I contrived to learn all that was requisite about his doings. On Sunday I made one of the throng of spectators that witnessed his discharge of a single shot upon the Spanish lines, the which, as the Captain of the Guard had told me, was the charm whereby the city was protected for that day. I observed that the shot was brought from the store by Volmar's own servant; Volmar himself loaded the culverin, trained it, and set the match to the touch-hole. The burghers, with their wives and children, looked on as at a mystery, and when the shot fell upon some loose earth near the trenches, casting up a cloud of dust, they nodded and smiled, and some clapped their hands; and then they all went forthwith to church, Volmar leading the way.

I was on the point of following them, thinking no little scorn of such mummery as I had just witnessed, when, on casting my eye over the parapet, I observed a Spaniard move slowly towards the spot where the ball had fallen. He stood for a brief space as if contemplating the effect wrought thereby, and then returned within the camp.

Now there was something in the Spaniard's mien that bred a certain doubt in my mind. He had moved slowly, in the manner of a loiterer; and if this was the true measure of his interest, why, I questioned within myself, had he issued from the trenches at all, to observe the spot where a ball had fallen harmlessly, as one had fallen many a Sunday before? His demeanour was not that of a man truly curious. I sought in my mind for some likely explanation of his strange action, and the more I thought upon it, the more puzzled and suspicious I became. But there was nothing to be done on the instant, so I spoke to the sentinel on the parapet, bidding him acquaint me if he saw any further movement among the Spaniards, and then I found the Captain of the Guard, whom I asked to issue the same command to the men that should keep watch in turn for the rest of the day.

At eventide, nothing having been reported to me, I resolved to go forth myself so soon as it became dark and examine the place where the shot had struck. It was an enterprise, I knew, that stood me in some danger, for I might be captured by the Spaniards, or by the burgher guard on my return, and this would bring me under suspicion, and was like to land me in the selfsame nobble as that wherein Jan Verhoeff already lay. I thought for a while of securing myself by acquainting the Captain of the Guard aforehand with my purpose, but seeing that I could have given him no reason for it save by making a clean breast of my suspicions, the which I was loth to do, I held my peace, resolving to take my risk.

Jan Verhoeff had disclosed to me, when I spoke with him in the bailey, the means whereby he had left the city. In the repairs that had been made hastily in the wall battered by the enemy, timber had been employed, and at one place there were two massy logs with a narrow space between, through which he had squeezed himself, and so come within a few spans of the moat. Thither I made my way by a roundabout course as soon as it was dark, and, choosing a moment when no sentinel was within hearing, I slipped into the moat, having left my boots at the foot of the wall, and swam across as quietly as an otter might have done.