Chapter 4
The Murderers
The young man with his hat slouched over his eyes, still
leaning on the arm of the officer, and still wiping from
time to time his brow with his handkerchief, was watching in
a corner of the Buytenhof, in the shade of the overhanging
weather-board of a closed shop, the doings of the infuriated
mob, a spectacle which seemed to draw near its catastrophe.
"Indeed," said he to the officer, "indeed, I think you were
right, Van Deken; the order which the deputies have signed
is truly the death-warrant of Master Cornelius. Do you hear
these people? They certainly bear a sad grudge to the two De
Witts."
"In truth," replied the officer, "I never heard such
shouts."
"They seem to have found out the cell of the man. Look,
look! is not that the window of the cell where Cornelius was
locked up?"
A man had seized with both hands and was shaking the iron
bars of the window in the room which Cornelius had left only
ten minutes before.
"Halloa, halloa!" the man called out, "he is gone."
"How is that? gone?" asked those of the mob who had not been
able to get into the prison, crowded as it was with the mass
of intruders.
"Gone, gone," repeated the man in a rage, "the bird has
flown."
"What does this man say?" asked his Highness, growing quite
pale.
"Oh, Monseigneur, he says a thing which would be very
fortunate if it should turn out true!"
"Certainly it would be fortunate if it were true," said the
young man; "unfortunately it cannot be true."
"However, look!" said the officer.
And indeed, some more faces, furious and contorted with
rage, showed themselves at the windows, crying, --
"Escaped, gone, they have helped them off!"
And the people in the street repeated, with fearful
imprecations, --
"Escaped gone! After them, and catch them!"
"Monseigneur, it seems that Mynheer Cornelius has really
escaped," said the officer.
"Yes, from prison, perhaps, but not from the town; you will
see, Van Deken, that the poor fellow will find the gate
closed against him which he hoped to find open."
"Has an order been given to close the town gates,
Monseigneur?"
"No, -- at least I do not think so; who could have given
such an order?"
"Indeed, but what makes your Highness suppose?"
"There are fatalities," Monseigneur replied, in an offhand
manner; "and the greatest men have sometimes fallen victims
to such fatalities."
At these words the officer felt his blood run cold, as
somehow or other he was convinced that the prisoner was
lost.
At this moment the roar of the multitude broke forth like
thunder, for it was now quite certain that Cornelius de Witt
was no longer in the prison.
Cornelius and John, after driving along the pond, had taken
the main street, which leads to the Tol-Hek, giving
directions to the coachman to slacken his pace, in order not
to excite any suspicion.
But when, on having proceeded half-way down that street, the
man felt that he had left the prison and death behind, and
before him there was life and liberty, he neglected every
precaution, and set his horses off at a gallop.
All at once he stopped.
"What is the matter?" asked John, putting his head out of
the coach window.
"Oh, my masters!" cried the coachman, "it is ---- "
Terror choked the voice of the honest fellow.
"Well, say what you have to say!" urged the Grand
Pensionary.
"The gate is closed, that's what it is."
"How is this? It is not usual to close the gate by day."
"Just look!"
John de Witt leaned out of the window, and indeed saw that
the man was right.
"Never mind, but drive on," said John, "I have with me the
order for the commutation of the punishment, the gate-keeper
will let us through."
The carriage moved along, but it was evident that the driver
was no longer urging his horses with the same degree of
confidence.
Moreover, as John de Witt put his head out of the carriage
window, he was seen and recognized by a brewer, who, being
behind his companions, was just shutting his door in all
haste to join them at the Buytenhof. He uttered a cry of
surprise, and ran after two other men before him, whom he
overtook about a hundred yards farther on, and told them
what he had seen. The three men then stopped, looking after
the carriage, being however not yet quite sure as to whom it
contained.
The carriage in the meanwhile arrived at the Tol-Hek.
"Open!" cried the coachman.
"Open!" echoed the gatekeeper, from the threshold of his
lodge; "it's all very well to say 'Open!' but what am I to
do it with?"
"With the key, to be sure!" said the coachman.
"With the key! Oh, yes! but if you have not got it?"
"How is that? Have not you got the key?" asked the coachman.
"No, I haven't."
"What has become of it?"
"Well, they have taken it from me."
"Who?"
"Some one, I dare say, who had a mind that no one should
leave the town."
"My good man," said the Grand Pensionary, putting out his
head from the window, and risking all for gaining all; "my
good man, it is for me, John de Witt, and for my brother
Cornelius, who I am taking away into exile."
"Oh, Mynheer de Witt! I am indeed very much grieved," said
the gatekeeper, rushing towards the carriage; "but, upon my
sacred word, the key has been taken from me."
"When?"
"This morning."
"By whom?"
"By a pale and thin young man, of about twenty-two."
"And wherefore did you give it up to him?"
"Because he showed me an order, signed and sealed."
"By whom?"
"By the gentlemen of the Town-hall."
"Well, then," said Cornelius calmly, "our doom seems to be
fixed."
"Do you know whether the same precaution has been taken at
the other gates?"
"I do not."
"Now then," said John to the coachman, "God commands man to
do all that is in his power to preserve his life; go, and
drive to another gate."
And whilst the servant was turning round the vehicle the
Grand Pensionary said to the gatekeeper, --
"Take our thanks for your good intentions; the will must
count for the deed; you had the will to save us, and that,
in the eyes of the Lord, is as if you had succeeded in doing
so."
"Alas!" said the gatekeeper, "do you see down there?"
"Drive at a gallop through that group," John called out to
the coachman, "and take the street on the left; it is our
only chance."
The group which John alluded to had, for its nucleus, those
three men whom we left looking after the carriage, and who,
in the meanwhile, had been joined by seven or eight others.
These new-comers evidently meant mischief with regard to the
carriage.
When they saw the horses galloping down upon them, they
placed themselves across the street, brandishing cudgels in
their hands, and calling out, --
"Stop! stop!"
The coachman, on his side, lashed his horses into increased
speed, until the coach and the men encountered.
The brothers De Witt, enclosed within the body of the
carriage, were not able to see anything; but they felt a
severe shock, occasioned by the rearing of the horses. The
whole vehicle for a moment shook and stopped; but
immediately after, passing over something round and elastic,
which seemed to be the body of a prostrate man set off again
amidst a volley of the fiercest oaths.
"Alas!" said Cornelius, "I am afraid we have hurt some one."
"Gallop! gallop!" called John.
But, notwithstanding this order, the coachman suddenly came
to a stop.
"Now, then, what is the matter again?" asked John.
"Look there!" said the coachman.
John looked. The whole mass of the populace from the
Buytenhof appeared at the extremity of the street along
which the carriage was to proceed, and its stream moved
roaring and rapid, as if lashed on by a hurricane.
"Stop and get off," said John to the coachman; "it is
useless to go any farther; we are lost!"
"Here they are! here they are!" five hundred voices were
crying at the same time.
"Yes, here they are, the traitors, the murderers, the
assassins!" answered the men who were running after the
carriage to the people who were coming to meet it. The
former carried in their arms the bruised body of one of
their companions, who, trying to seize the reins of the
horses, had been trodden down by them.
This was the object over which the two brothers had felt
their carriage pass.
The coachman stopped, but, however strongly his master urged
him, he refused to get off and save himself.
In an instant the carriage was hemmed in between those who
followed and those who met it. It rose above the mass of
moving heads like a floating island. But in another instant
it came to a dead stop. A blacksmith had with his hammer
struck down one of the horses, which fell in the traces.
At this moment, the shutter of a window opened, and
disclosed the sallow face and the dark eyes of the young
man, who with intense interest watched the scene which was
preparing. Behind him appeared the head of the officer,
almost as pale as himself.
"Good heavens, Monseigneur, what is going on there?"
whispered the officer.
"Something very terrible, to a certainty," replied the
other.
"Don't you see, Monseigneur, they are dragging the Grand
Pensionary from the carriage, they strike him, they tear him
to pieces!"
"Indeed, these people must certainly be prompted by a most
violent indignation," said the young marl, with the same
impassible tone which he had preserved all along.
"And here is Cornelius, whom they now likewise drag out of
the carriage, -- Cornelius, who is already quite broken and
mangled by the torture. Only look, look!"
"Indeed, it is Cornelius, and no mistake."
The officer uttered a feeble cry, and turned his head away;
the brother of the Grand Pensionary, before having set foot
on the ground, whilst still on the bottom step of the
carriage, was struck down with an iron bar which broke his
skull. He rose once more, but immediately fell again.
Some fellows then seized him by the feet, and dragged him
into the crowd, into the middle of which one might have
followed his bloody track, and he was soon closed in among
the savage yells of malignant exultation.
The young man -- a thing which would have been thought
impossible -- grew even paler than before, and his eyes were
for a moment veiled behind the lids.
The officer saw this sign of compassion, and, wishing to
avail himself of this softened tone of his feelings,
continued, --
"Come, come, Monseigneur, for here they are also going to
murder the Grand Pensionary."
But the young man had already opened his eyes again.
"To be sure," he said. "These people are really implacable.
It does no one good to offend them."
"Monseigneur," said the officer, "may not one save this poor
man, who has been your Highness's instructor? If there be
any means, name it, and if I should perish in the attempt
---- "
William of Orange -- for he it was -- knit his brows in a
very forbidding manner, restrained the glance of gloomy
malice which glistened in his half-closed eye, and answered,
--
"Captain Van Deken, I request you to go and look after my
troops, that they may be armed for any emergency."
"But am I to leave your Highness here, alone, in the
presence of all these murderers?"
"Go, and don't you trouble yourself about me more than I do
myself," the Prince gruffly replied.
The officer started off with a speed which was much less
owing to his sense of military obedience than to his
pleasure at being relieved from the necessity of witnessing
the shocking spectacle of the murder of the other brother.
He had scarcely left the room, when John -- who, with an
almost superhuman effort, had reached the stone steps of a
house nearly opposite that where his former pupil concealed
himself -- began to stagger under the blows which were
inflicted on him from all sides, calling out, --
"My brother! where is my brother?"
One of the ruffians knocked off his hat with a blow of his
clenched fist.
Another showed to him his bloody hands; for this fellow had
ripped open Cornelius and disembowelled him, and was now
hastening to the spot in order not to lose the opportunity
of serving the Grand Pensionary in the same manner, whilst
they were dragging the dead body of Cornelius to the gibbet.
John uttered a cry of agony and grief, and put one of his
hands before his eyes.
"Oh, you close your eyes, do you?" said one of the soldiers
of the burgher guard; "well, I shall open them for you."
And saying this he stabbed him with his pike in the face,
and the blood spurted forth.
"My brother!" cried John de Witt, trying to see through the
stream of blood which blinded him, what had become of
Cornelius; "my brother, my brother!"
"Go and run after him!" bellowed another murderer, putting
his musket to his temples and pulling the trigger.
But the gun did not go off.
The fellow then turned his musket round, and, taking it by
the barrel with both hands, struck John de Witt down with
the butt-end. John staggered and fell down at his feet, but,
raising himself with a last effort, he once more called out,
--
"My brother!" with a voice so full of anguish that the young
man opposite closed the shutter.
There remained little more to see; a third murderer fired a
pistol with the muzzle to his face; and this time the shot
took effect, blowing out his brains. John de Witt fell to
rise no more.
On this, every one of the miscreants, emboldened by his
fall, wanted to fire his gun at him, or strike him with
blows of the sledge-hammer, or stab him with a knife or
swords, every one wanted to draw a drop of blood from the
fallen hero, and tear off a shred from his garments.
And after having mangled, and torn, and completely stripped
the two brothers, the mob dragged their naked and bloody
bodies to an extemporised gibbet, where amateur executioners
hung them up by the feet.
Then came the most dastardly scoundrels of all, who not
having dared to strike the living flesh, cut the dead in
pieces, and then went about the town selling small slices of
the bodies of John and Cornelius at ten sous a piece.
We cannot take upon ourselves to say whether, through the
almost imperceptible chink of the shutter, the young man
witnessed the conclusion of this shocking scene; but at the
very moment when they were hanging the two martyrs on the
gibbet he passed through the terrible mob, which was too
much absorbed in the task, so grateful to its taste, to take
any notice of him, and thus he reached unobserved the
Tol-Hek, which was still closed.
"Ah! sir," said the gatekeeper, "do you bring me the key?"
"Yes, my man, here it is."
"It is most unfortunate that you did not bring me that key
only one quarter of an hour sooner," said the gatekeeper,
with a sigh.
"And why that?" asked the other.
"Because I might have opened the gate to Mynheers de Witt;
whereas, finding the gate locked, they were obliged to
retrace their steps."
"Gate! gate!" cried a voice which seemed to be that of a man
in a hurry.
The Prince, turning round, observed Captain Van Deken.
"Is that you, Captain?" he said. "You are not yet out of the
Hague? This is executing my orders very slowly."
"Monseigneur," replied the Captain, "this is the third gate
at which I have presented myself; the other two were
closed."
"Well, this good man will open this one for you; do it, my
friend."
The last words were addressed to the gatekeeper, who stood
quite thunderstruck on hearing Captain Van Deken addressing
by the title of Monseigneur this pale young man, to whom he
himself had spoken in such a familiar way.
As it were to make up for his fault, he hastened to open the
gate, which swung creaking on its hinges.
"Will Monseigneur avail himself of my horse?" asked the
Captain.
"I thank you, Captain, I shall use my own steed, which is
waiting for me close at hand."
And taking from his pocket a golden whistle, such as was
generally used at that time for summoning the servants, he
sounded it with a shrill and prolonged call, on which an
equerry on horseback speedily made his appearance, leading
another horse by the bridle.
William, without touching the stirrup, vaulted into the
saddle of the led horse, and, setting his spurs into its
flanks, started off for the Leyden road. Having reached it,
he turned round and beckoned to the Captain who was far
behind, to ride by his side.
"Do you know," he then said, without stopping, "that those
rascals have killed John de Witt as well as his brother?"
"Alas! Monseigneur," the Captain answered sadly, "I should
like it much better if these two difficulties were still in
your Highness's way of becoming de facto Stadtholder of
Holland."
"Certainly, it would have been better," said William, "if
what did happen had not happened. But it cannot be helped
now, and we have had nothing to do with it. Let us push on,
Captain, that we may arrive at Alphen before the message
which the States-General are sure to send to me to the
camp."
The Captain bowed, allowed the Prince to ride ahead and, for
the remainder of the journey, kept at the same respectful
distance as he had done before his Highness called him to
his side.
"How I should wish," William of Orange malignantly muttered
to himself, with a dark frown and setting the spurs to his
horse, "to see the figure which Louis will cut when he is
apprised of the manner in which his dear friends De Witt
have been served! Oh thou Sun! thou Sun! as truly as I am
called William the Silent, thou Sun, thou hadst best look to
thy rays!"
And the young Prince, the relentless rival of the Great
King, sped away upon his fiery steed, -- this future
Stadtholder who had been but the day before very uncertainly
established in his new power, but for whom the burghers of
the Hague had built a staircase with the bodies of John and
Cornelius, two princes as noble as he in the eyes of God and man.
