“Let him sign!” they yelled.
The councillors hesitated. The Ruard would not subscribe, to force him to refuse would be to deliver him over to the fury of the mob.
But William decided for them.
“I think I have some weight in this town now,” he said, with his immovable air of authority. He took the paper from the hand of the pastor and gave it to the town secretary. “Take this to M. de Witt, his signature is lacking.… You also,” he pointed his cane at the captain of the burghers, “accompany him with some of your men. I am sorry M. de Witt is too sick to be present. I shall be pleased to see his name to this resolution.”
CHAPTER V
CORNELIUS DE WITT
The agitated secretary, the triumphant captain, and a vast crowd of excited citizens whom the civic guard could scarce restrain, proceeded to the house of M. Cornelius de Witt.
All day the Ruard’s family had been in a state of acute alarm.
The late attack on the Pensionary, the popular feeling in Dordt, the burning of the pictures in the Stadhuis, the menacing aspect of the streets, all combined to render them grievously uneasy.