“This is a challenge,” he said.
John de Witt’s brows were contracted.
“Yea, I think so.”
“We have been fooled!” cried M. de Montbas bitterly; “fooled by this docile, sickly boy!” He rose and dashed the letter on to the table. “Where is your policy of concession now? What of this good citizen you were making out of a tyrant’s son?”
“I have been deceived,” answered the Grand Pensionary sternly. “As ye say, fooled!” His eyes expressed an anger that Florent would not have believed them capable of, so utterly did it contradict their usual look of stately kindliness. “Who would have thought that there were such guile and deception in this young man!”
“I have warned you,” said M. de Montbas. “He was over quiet; and never could I imagine that one of his House would be content with a subservient position.”
“My eyes are opened now!” De Witt rose. “Perhaps it is better that he and I should meet without disguise. Since he hath rejected my friendship it is well that I should know it.”
He drew a quick breath, and for a moment it seemed as if the old hatred fought against so long, carefully concealed and never acted upon, was asserting itself,—the hatred of the stern republican for princely insolence and tyranny; the hatred of the son of Jacob de Witt, the innocent prisoner of Loevenstein, for the son of the man who had flung him there.
M. de Montbas saw the expression, and read it by the light of his own bitter dislike to William of Orange.