"It is the Count Adolphus of Nassau! Then out of his princely goodness he can vouch for me." So saying, he thrust back the hood of his habit, revealing the smooth keen face, the agate brown eyes, of Duprès, the Elector Augustus's skryer.
"Yes, it is he," said Adolphus, "who predicted a bloody death for all of us. And now you are in fear of death yourself," he added, with a smile; "it is strange that one who can read the future cannot foretell his own perils."
"Alas, noble seigneur," replied Duprès, with his usual mingled impudence and reverence, "the angels became capricious and would not give me any more good advice, and I, growing restless, must needs leave a good master and go on my travels which have brought me here—and will lead me no further than the stake unless one of your princely Graces have pity on me. I have seen," he added, with a slight convulsive shudder, "men burning who have beheld angels in the flames and died happy, calling on Christ. But I have always been profane, and am more like to see devils and die blaspheming my God."
"We would deliver no one to death for such an offence as yours," replied Montigny. "And since the Count Adolphus knows you, he will take you to the household of His Highness, where you will be sheltered."
The skryer bent and impulsively kissed the young knight's hand.
"Can he converse with angels?" demanded the Count, who had kept silence so long with difficulty. "If so he may bring them for me——"
"Alas, my magic table is lost," replied Duprès, "and the impression of the mystic seals—they went down on board ship, off Havre."
"But you can tell my fortune?" persisted Brederode.
"You will find that in the bottom of a wine cup, may God forgive you!" cried Hoogstraaten, dragging him on.
"Yes, best go home before more befall us," said Montigny, and the four parted—Brederode and his two friends back to the mansion of Egmont; and Adolphus, with the skryer humbly behind him, to the Nassau palace.