Part 17

"It is so," said Lamme, "nevertheless I have remained faithful. For my sad heart is heavy with but a single recollection."

"Even as your belly is heavy with countless platter-fuls!" said Ulenspiegel.

"When I am unhappy I have to eat," Lamme replied.

"Your unhappiness knows no end?" demanded Ulenspiegel.

"Alas, no!" said Lamme.

And helping himself to another trout:

"Look," he cried, "look how lovely and firm he is. This flesh is as pink as the flesh of my wife. But to-morrow we will leave Namur. I have a purseful of florins, and we will buy a donkey for each of us, and so we will go riding away to the land of Flanders!"

"You will be giving up a great deal," said Ulenspiegel.

"Never mind," said Lamme. "My heart draws me back to Damme. For it was there that my love loved me well. And it may be that she also has returned thither."

"We will set out to-morrow," said Ulenspiegel, "since such is your desire."

And in fact they set forth as Lamme had said, each on a donkey; and so they rode along side by side.

XIX

Nele all this time was living at Damme, sorrowful and alone, with Katheline, who still continued to call amorously for her cold devil who never came.

"Ah!" she would say, "you are rich, Hanske my pet; and you could easily give me back those seven hundred caroluses. Then Soetkin would live again and come to earth once more, and Claes in heaven would laugh for joy. Easily could you do this, and you would! Put out the fire! My soul wants to get out!"

And with her finger she would point without ceasing to the place on her head where the flaming tow had burned her.

Katheline was very impoverished, but the neighbours helped her by sending in beans and bread and meat, according as they were able. The commune also gave her a certain amount of money, and Nele did sewing for the wealthy bourgeois, and went to their houses to mend their linen, earning in this way a florin or two every week. But Katheline kept on with her eternal "Make a hole! Let out my soul! She is knocking to be let out! And he will give me back the seven hundred caroluses!"

And Nele wept to hear her.

XX

In the meantime Ulenspiegel and Lamme continued their wanderings. Under the protection of their passports, they entered one day into a little tavern built against the rocks of the Sambre, the which rocks are covered with trees here and there, and on the sign of the tavern was written mine host's name--MARLAIRE. When they had drunk many a flask of wine--wine of the Meuse, rather like Burgundy--and when they had eaten a large plate of fish, they fell talking to the innkeeper, who was a keen Papist but as talkative as he was pious because of the wine he had been drinking. And he kept on winking his eye maliciously. Ulenspiegel had a suspicion that all this winking portended something mysterious, and he made the fellow drink yet more, with the result that he fell to dancing and shouting with laughter, till at last he sat himself down at the table again, and, "Good Catholics," says he, "I drink to you."

"And to you we drink also," answered Lamme and Ulenspiegel.

"And I drink to the extinction of all heresy and rebellion."

"We will join you in that toast," answered Lamme and Ulenspiegel, who kept on filling up the goblets which mine host could never suffer to remain full.

"You are good fellows," said the innkeeper. "Let me drink to the health of your noble Generosities. For you must know that I derive some profit from all the wine that is drunk here. But where are your passports?"

"Here they are," replied Ulenspiegel.

"With the Duke's signature and all," said the innkeeper. "Here's a health to the Duke."

"To the Duke," echoed Lamme and Ulenspiegel. And mine host went on talking:

"Answer me now, do you know what it is that they catch rats and mice in? Why in rat-traps to be sure, and mouse-traps. Who is the mouse then? The great heretic of Orange--and orange he is in very truth, like the flames of hell! But God is on our side. They will come. Ho ho! A toast! Pour out the wine; I bake and burn with thirst. Come, drink, my masters. Fine little Protestant evangelists.... I said little. Fine valiant little fellows they are, and brave soldiers, sturdy as oaks.... I drink to them! Are you not going with them to the camp of the great heretic? I have certain passports signed by him.... You will see."

"We are going to the camp," answered Ulenspiegel.

"Yes, they will do their work well. And one fine night, if the opportunity presents itself"--and here the innkeeper whistled, and made a gesture as of one man cutting another's throat--"cold steel, I tell you. It's that that shall prevent the black bird of Nassau from singing any more. Come, drink again."

"You're a gay fellow," said Ulenspiegel, "in spite of being married."

The innkeeper said:

"I am neither married nor have I ever been. The secrets of Princes are safe with me. Drink! But if I had a wife she would steal my secrets from under my pillow to get me hanged and herself made widow before the time. Long live God! They will come.... But where are the new passports? On my heart of a Christian. Drink! They are there, there I tell you. One hundred paces along the road near by Marche-les-Dames. Do you see them? Drink again!"

"Drink?" said Ulenspiegel. "Yes, I drink and drink and drink. To the King, to the Duke, to the Protestant preachers, and to Vent d'acier--Wind of Lead. And I drink to thee and to me, to the wine and the bottle that holds it. But why? It is you that have stopped drinking!"

And at each new toast Ulenspiegel filled up the glass of the innkeeper, who emptied it straightway.

Ulenspiegel looked at him for some time, then rose and said to Lamme: "Come, Lamme, it is time for us to be off. He is asleep." But when they were outside, "He has no wife," Ulenspiegel continued. "We are safe. The night is at hand. Did you hear what the rascal said? And do you rightly understand who these three preachers are? Do you realize that they are to come along the bank of the Meuse from Marche-les-Dames, and that it will be our part to await them on the road? And then for Vent d'acier--Wind of Lead--to start his whistling?"

"Yes," said Lamme.

"It is for us to save the Prince's life," said Ulenspiegel.

"Yes," said Lamme.

"Wait," said Ulenspiegel. "You take my arquebus, and go and hide in the undergrowth among the rocks. Load it with two shots, and shoot when you hear me caw and crow."

"I will," said Lamme.

And so saying he disappeared into the undergrowth. And Ulenspiegel could hear quite clearly the click of the gun as Lamme loaded it.

"Do you see them coming?" he asked presently.

"I see them," answered Lamme. "There are three of them, marching together like soldiers, and one of them is much taller than the others."

Ulenspiegel sat himself down by the side of the road, with his legs stretched out in front of him, muttering his prayers on a rosary, just like beggars do. And he held his hat between his knees. And when the three evangelists passed in front of him, he held out his hat as though asking for alms; but they gave him nothing. Then Ulenspiegel got up and addressed them most piteously:

"Kind sirs," he said, "do not refuse a patard to a poor quarryman who has recently had an accident and broken his back by falling down a mine. The people in this part of the world are hard of heart, and they have not been willing to give me anything to relieve my distress. Alas! Give me but a patard, and I will say many prayers for you. And God will keep you happy, all your lives long, kind friends!"

"My son," said one of the evangelists, "there can be no happiness for us in this world so long as the Pope and the Inquisition remain in power."

Ulenspiegel heaved another sigh:

"Alas! What are you saying, my lords? Do not speak so loud, if it please you. But give me a patard."

"My son," replied one of the evangelists, he that was the smallest of the three, and of a very warlike countenance, "we poor martyrs carry no patards save only just enough to keep us going on our journey."

At this Ulenspiegel threw himself on to his knees in front of them.

"Give me your blessing then," he said.

The three evangelists laid their hands upon the head of Ulenspiegel, albeit with little signs of devotion.

Now Ulenspiegel noticed that although they were lean of figure, these men all had very fat stomachs, so he rose from his knees, and then pretended to stumble, knocking against the body of the tall evangelist as he did so. At that a merry tinkle of coin was distinctly audible. Thereupon Ulenspiegel raised himself to his full height and drew his dagger.

"My good man," he said, "it is cold and I am but poorly clad; but methinks you have too much about you. Give me some of your wool, that I may get a cloak made for me. I am a Beggarman. Long live the Beggarmen!" The tall evangelist made answer:

"You cock of a Beggarman, you carry your crest proudly forsooth, and we are going to cut it off for you!"

"Cut it off then," cried Ulenspiegel, giving ground, "but let me warn you that trusty Wind of Lead is going to sing for you or ever he sings for the Prince my master! Beggar I am! Long live the Beggarmen!"

The three evangelists were astounded and cried out to each other: "How does he know? We are betrayed! Kill him! Long live the Mass!" And each man drew forth from beneath his hose a sharp dagger. But Ulenspiegel, without waiting for them to attack him, gave ground towards the bushes where Lamme was hidden, and when he judged that the three evangelists were within range of the arquebus, he cried out: "Crows, black crows, the Wind of Lead is going to whistle. I sing your bitter end!"

Then he cawed like a crow. And a shot rang out from the bushes, and the tall evangelist fell prone on the earth. The next moment followed a second shot, which accounted in the same way for the second.

And from among the bushes Ulenspiegel saw the jolly face of Lamme, and his arm raised as he hastily reloaded his arquebus. And from the midst of the dark shrubbery a puff of blue smoke mounted into the air.

There now remained but one evangelist, and he was in a furious rage, and tried to cut at Ulenspiegel with all his might. But Ulenspiegel cried:

"Wind of Steel or Wind of Lead, which matters it? Either way you shall quit this world for another, you shameless murderer!"

And he attacked the foe and defended himself most bravely. So they stood on the roadway, inflexible, face to face, giving and parrying blows. Now Ulenspiegel was covered with blood, for his opponent was an experienced fencer, and had wounded him on the hands and on the legs. But Ulenspiegel attacked and defended himself like a lion. Still the blood which began to flow from his head blinded him, and he retreated continually, trying to wipe away the blood with his left hand but every moment feeling weaker. And he would most certainly have been killed had not Lamme brought down the third evangelist with another shot from his arquebus.

And Ulenspiegel saw him fall, and heard him vomit forth blasphemies and blood, and the white froth of death. And once again the blue smoke drifted up above the dark shrubbery, in the midst of which Lamme displayed yet again his jolly face.

"Have you finished him off?" he asked.

"Yes, my son," replied Ulenspiegel, "but come...."

Lamme, then, coming out of his hiding-place, saw Ulenspiegel all covered with blood. He ran like a stag, in spite of his fat belly, and came to Ulenspiegel where he sat by the three dead men.

"He is wounded!" Lamme cried. "My gentle friend is wounded by the rascally murderer." And then, with a vicious kick at the jaw of the evangelist who lay nearest to him: "You cannot answer me, Ulenspiegel? Are you going to die, my son? Where is the ointment! Ha! I remember now. It is at the bottom of his satchel under the sausages. Can't you hear me speak, Ulenspiegel? Alas! there is no warm water here to wash your wound, and no way of getting any. The water of the Sambre will have to do instead. But speak to me, my friend. You are not so badly hurt after all, surely. A little water--there, it's cold, isn't it? But he is waking up. It's I, your friend; and your enemies are all dead! Oh, where is some linen? Some linen to bind up his wounds. There isn't any. What am I to do? Ah! my shirt, that must serve."

Presently Ulenspiegel opened his eyes and raised himself from the ground with his teeth all chattering because of the cold.

"And here you are standing up already!" Lamme exclaimed.

"It is a balm of much virtue," said Ulenspiegel.

"Balm of valiance," answered Lamme.

And then, taking the bodies of the evangelists one by one, he cast them into a hole in the rocks, leaving their weapons and their clothes upon them. But he took their cloaks.

And all around in the sky the crows were beginning to caw to each other, in anticipation of the feast. And the Sambre flowed by like a river of steel under the grey sky.

And the snow fell, washing the blood away.

Yet they felt ill at ease, and Lamme said:

"I had rather kill a chicken than a man."

And they mounted again upon their donkeys. And when they arrived at the gates of Huy, the blood was still trickling from the head of Ulenspiegel, so they dismounted and pretended to have a quarrel, and to use their daggers on one another, with the utmost ferocity as it seemed. But when they had finished their duel, they remounted their donkeys and came into the town, showing their passports at the city gates.

The women, seeing Ulenspiegel wounded and bleeding while Lamme rode his donkey as though he had been the victor, threw many a glance of tender commiseration upon Ulenspiegel, and pointed their fingers at Lamme, saying: "That is the rascal who wounded his friend."

Lamme all this time was anxiously scrutinizing the crowd, hoping to discover his wife among them; but all was in vain, and he was sad at heart.

XXI

"Where are you going now?" said Lamme.

"To Maestricht," answered Ulenspiegel.

"But stay, my son. I have heard that the army of the Duke is camped all round the city and that he himself is within. Our passports will be of no use to us there. Even if they satisfy the Spanish soldiers, we shall still be arrested in the city and put through an examination. And in the meantime they will become aware of the death of the evangelists and our days on this earth will be numbered."

To this Ulenspiegel made answer:

"The crows and the owls and the vultures will make short work of their repast. Already no doubt the dead bodies have become unrecognizable. As for our passports, there is no reason why they should not remain effective. But if the murder of the evangelists becomes known we should be arrested as you say. Nevertheless, whatever happens we shall have to go to Maestricht and pass through Landen on the way."

"We shall be captured," said Lamme.

"We shall get through," answered Ulenspiegel.

Conversing in this wise they came to the inn of La Pie, where they found a good supper awaiting them, and good quarters for the night, both for themselves and for the donkeys; and on the morrow they took the road again for Landen.

Not far from that town they came to a large farm. There Ulenspiegel whistled like a lark, and from the interior came the sound of a warlike cockcrow in answer. After that a jolly-looking farmer appeared at the door of the farmhouse, and greeted them as friends and good Beggarmen, and bade them welcome.

"Who is this man?" Lamme inquired.

"His name is Thomas Utenhove," said Ulenspiegel, "and he is a valiant Protestant. The man-servants and maid-servants that work on the farm are fellows with him in the cause of freedom of conscience."

Then Utenhove said:

"You are the envoys of the Prince? Come in then, eat and drink with me."

And the ham was crackling in the frying-pan, the sausages likewise, and the wine flowed and the glasses were filled again. And Lamme drank like dry sand, and ate his fill. And the boys and girls of the farm came one after another and thrust their noses into the half-open door to gaze on him as he worked away so hard. But the men were jealous, saying that they also would be able to eat and drink as bravely if they had the chance.

When all was finished, Thomas Utenhove said:

"One hundred of our peasants will be leaving us this week under pretext of going to work on the dikes at Bruges and thereabouts. They will be setting out in small bands of five or six at a time, and all by different routes. At Bruges they will find certain barges waiting for them to take them by sea to Emden."

"Will these men be provided with arms and with money?" inquired Ulenspiegel.

"Each man will carry ten florins and a heavy cutlass."

"God and the Prince will reward you," said Ulenspiegel.

"But tell me," said the farmer, "is Edzard, Count of Frise, still friendly to the Prince?"

"He feigns not to be," answered Ulenspiegel. "Nevertheless, he is giving harbourage all the time to the Prince's ships at Emden." And then he added: "We are on the way to Maestricht."

"You cannot go there," said the farmer. "The Duke's army is camped in front of the town and all round it."

With that he conducted his visitors up into the loft, whence they could see the standards of enemy cavalry and infantry moving about in the distance over the plain.

Ulenspiegel said:

"I have a plan to get through, if only they who have authority in this place would give me leave to get married. But for wife I should need a sweet and a gentle and comely lass who would be willing to marry me--if not for always, then for a week at least."

Lamme gasped with astonishment.

"Don't do it, my son," he cried. "She will only leave you, and then, all alone, you will burn with the fire of love; and the bed where now you sleep so sweetly will seem to you nothing better than a bed of prickly holly leaves, and gentle sleep will shun you for evermore."

"Still I must marry," replied Ulenspiegel. And then to Thomas Utenhove: "Come now, find me a wife; rich or poor, I don't care which! And I will take her to church, and our marriage shall be blessed by the priest. And he shall give us our marriage lines. Though, to be sure, we shall not hold them valid as being given by the hand of a Papist and an Inquisitor. Nevertheless they will be good enough for our purpose, and we will prepare ourselves, as is the custom, for our wedding trip."

"But what about the wife?"

"That's your look-out," answered Ulenspiegel. "But when you have found her I shall take two wagons and decorate them with wreaths of fir branches and holly and paper flowers, and in the wagons themselves I shall dispose the men whom you wish to be conveyed to the Prince of Orange."

"But your wife?" persisted Thomas Utenhove. "Where will you find her?"

"Here, I doubt not," answered Ulenspiegel. "And then I shall harness two of your own horses to one of the wagons, and our two donkeys to the other. In the first wagon will ride my wife and myself, together with my friend Lamme here, and the witnesses of our nuptials. In the second wagon will follow the musicians, the players upon the drum, the fife, and the shawm. And then, with all our joyous wedding-flags a-flying, and with music playing, and we ourselves singing and drinking each other's healths, we shall ride along at the trot by the high road that leads to the Galgen-veld--the Field of the Gallows--which for us indeed will be the Field of Liberty."

"I will do all in my power to help you," said Thomas Utenhove, "but the women and girls will want to follow their men-folk."

"We will go where God wills," said a pretty-looking girl who had thrust in her head at the half-opened door.

"You can have four wagons if need be," said Thomas Utenhove, "and by that means we should be able to convey as many as five-and-twenty men."

"The Duke will be nicely fooled," said Ulenspiegel.

"And the Prince's fleet will gain the service of some fine soldiers," added Thomas Utenhove.

Then he caused a bell to be rung to summon his footman and his servants, and when they were all assembled he said to them:

"All you that are from the land of Zeeland, women as well as men, listen now to me. Ulenspiegel, who is hither come from Flanders, has a plan to convey you through the enemy's lines, disguised as the followers in a wedding procession."

And thereat the men and women of Zeeland cried out with one accord:

"We are ready, even unto the death!"

And the men said one to another:

"What joy it will be to exchange this land of slavery for the freedom of the sea!"

And the women and girls said likewise:

"Let us follow our husbands and our lovers; we belong to Zeeland and there we shall find asile!"

Now Ulenspiegel had noticed a young and pretty maid, and he addressed her jokingly:

"I would you were my wife!"

But she blushed and answered him:

"I would have thee for my husband--but at the church only, remember!"

The women laughed and said among themselves:

"She is in love with Hans Utenhove, the master's son. He will go along with her, doubtless."

"You say truly," Hans replied.

And his father said:

"You have my permission."

Then all the men put on their best clothes, their doublets and hose of velvet, and the great opperst-kleed over all. As for the women, they wore black petticoats and pleated shoes. Round their necks they wore a white ruff, their bodices were embroidered in gold, scarlet, and blue; their skirts were of black wool with broad stripes of black velvet thereon, and their stockings were of black wool, and their shoes of velvet with silver buckles.

Thereupon Thomas Utenhove went to the church and put into the hands of the priest a couple of rycksdaelders, asking him at the same time to join in marriage Thylbert the son of Claes (that is Ulenspiegel) and Tannekin Pieters. And this the curé consented to do.

Ulenspiegel then went to church, followed by the wedding procession. And there, in the presence of the priest, Tannekin was made his wife.

And she looked so pretty and so sweet, so complaisant and so tender, that right willingly would he have eaten her up as she had been a ripe apple of love. And he told her so, not daring to do more for the respect he felt for her gentle loveliness. But she pouted her lips, and bade him leave her alone, for that Hans was watching him and would kill him without a doubt.

And a certain damsel was jealous, and said to Ulenspiegel:

"Seek elsewhere for a lover. Do you not see that she is afraid of her own man?"

Lamme clapped his hands together and cried:

"You cannot have them all, you rascal!"

So Ulenspiegel, making the best of his misfortune, returned to the farm with the wedding guests. And there he drank and sang and made merry, clinking many a glass with the damsel that was jealous. And at this Hans was glad, but not so Tannekin, nor yet the youth that was betrothed to the damsel.

At noon, while the sun shone down from a clear sky and a fresh breeze was blowing, the wedding carriages started off. They were decorated with flowers and every kind of greenery, with flags flying, and drums and fifes, bagpipes and shawms playing most joyfully.

Now it happened that in the camp of the Duke of Alba there was another fête in progress; and the sentries of the guard, having sounded the alarm, ran to the Duke, crying:

"The enemy is at hand. We have heard the noise of drums and fifes, and we have seen their banners in the distance. There is a strong force of cavalry that is hoping to draw you into some ambush. The main body, doubtless, is not far off."

The Duke at once sent to warn the colonels and captains, and himself ordered the army to be massed in battle array, and dispatched certain scouting parties on reconnaissance.