She was young enough herself to be the Countess's daughter, and that lady felt a great desire to take her in her arms and weep over her, but a certain reserve and majesty about Mary's very simplicity prevented her from even discovering her sympathy.
"It is very strange to me to think of my husband abroad in this great storm," said the Princess, looking up at the window. "I bless my God that I have the trust to believe that he is safe," she added quietly. "It was as if my heart was torn out when he left me, and since I have been in a kind of numbness."
"It is hard on women that they must always sit at home," remarked the Countess; she thought of her own lord lurking in the back streets of Amsterdam; she would rather have been with him than playing her part at The Hague.
The wind rose on a great shriek that seemed to rattle every board in the house.
Mary winced back from the window, and her face was white even in the candle glow.
"Let us go to prayers," she said faintly.
CHAPTER XV
THE SECOND SAILING
The next day the Prince of Orange re-entered Helvoetsluys attended by four maimed ships, the rest having been utterly scattered and dispersed by the fearful storm; he then, though giddy and scarce able to stand through seasickness, proceeded, with a serene composure, to go from ship to ship animating his discomfited followers, and refused to be put on shore, lest it should be taken as a sign that he was discouraged in his enterprise and intended to postpone his sailing till the spring.
For the next week the great ships of war with tattered sails and broken masts came creeping out of the ports and creeks where they had taken shelter to join the fleet at Helvoetsluys.