“I will read you the report of the disturbances in Zeeland and Goeree,” he said.
It was Florent Van Mander who entered with the papers. M. de Witt bade him stay, and he went quietly to the back of the room and waited, observing, with cruel precision, the two men before him.
He had heard a good deal of M. de Montbas, one of the staunchest republicans in the army of the United Provinces, and the man whom the Grand Pensionary always put forward in opposition to the Prince of Orange as candidate for the post of Captain General, a position that he now, at least nominally, held.
Florent saw a dark, gloomy-featured man, stooping in the shoulders and awkward in bearing, yet with a certain elegance of manner; a man who talked in a nervous and disjointed fashion, and fidgeted with the tassels on his military gloves.
His black-and-silver uniform, with the embroidered baldric and heavy sword, sat badly on him. Florent found him neither attractive nor calculated to inspire confidence, and wondered at the Grand Pensionary’s choice of a general. Glancing away, he studied M. de Witt himself.
Behind the desk where the Grand Pensionary sat hung a dark yet bright picture of fruit and flowers, and against this the brown hair and pale face of John de Witt were thrown into relief.
Pale certainly, even above his white, falling collar and black dress, but of a strength not to be mistaken and a power not to be ignored.
Florent listened to the conversation between these two with an expressionless face but inward interest, for they had begun to discuss the Prince of Orange.
“He is not at the Hague to-day,” M. de Witt was saying. “M. Van Ghent is in Guelders, and His Highness wrote to me requesting permission to try some hawks and hounds sent him by the King of England—for that purpose he hath gone to Breda.”
“What quarry does he hunt at Breda?” asked M. de Montbas, and it seemed to Florent that he spoke like a man afraid.