Leatherface: A Tale of Old Flanders

Whereupon Mark, in his usual good-tempered, indolent way also bade his father good-night, and followed his brother out of the room.

III

The scene which met don Ramon's eyes when he entered the tavern of the "Three Weavers" – which was situate, be it remembered, almost opposite the house of the High-Bailiff of Ghent-was, alas! not an unusual one these days.

For five years now-ever since the arrival of the Duke of Alva in the Low Countries as Lieutenant-Governor and Captain-General of the Forces-the Netherlander had protested with all the strength and the insistence at their command against the quartering of Spanish troops upon the inhabitants of their free cities. The practice was a flagrant violation of all the promises made to them by the King himself, and an outrage against their charters and liberties which the King had sworn to respect. But it also was a form of petty tyranny which commended itself specially to Alva, and to the Spanish ministers and councillors of State who liked above all to humiliate these Dutch and Flemish free men and cow them into complete submission and silent acquiescence by every means which their cruel and tortuous minds could invent.

Don Ramon knew quite well that he could offer no greater insult to the High-Bailiff of Ghent and to his sons-or, for the matter of that, to the whole city-than to allow his soldiery to behave in a scandalous and ribald manner in one of the well-accredited and well-conducted taverns of the town. And to him this knowledge gave but additional zest to what otherwise would have been a tame adventure-two women to bully and eight men to do it was not nearly as exciting as he could wish. But that fool Laurence van Rycke had to be punished-and incidentally don Ramon hoped that Mark would feel that the punishment was meted out to him more than to his brother.

On the whole don Ramon de Linea felt, as he entered the tap-room of the "Three Weavers," that the presence of the two van Ryckes was all that he needed to make his enjoyment complete.

That the Spanish provost and the six men under his command were already drunk there was no doubt: some of them were sitting at a long trestle table, sprawling across it, lolling up against one another, some singing scraps of bibulous songs, others throwing coarse, obscene jests across the table. Two men seemed to be on guard at the door, whilst one and all were clamouring for more wine.

"Curse you, you…" the provost was shouting at the top of his voice when don Ramon entered the tap-room, "why don't you bring another bottle of wine?"

Two women were standing at the further end of the long low room, close to the hearth: they stood hand in hand as if in an endeavour to inculcate moral strength to one another. The eldest of the two women might have been twenty-five years of age, the other some few years younger: their white faces and round, dilated eyes showed the deathly fear which held them both in its grip. Obviously the girls would have fled out of the tap-room long before this, and equally obviously the two men had been posted at the door in order to cut off their retreat.

At sight of their captain, the men staggered to their feet; the provost passed the word of command, fearful lest the ribald attitude of his men brought severe censure-and worse-upon himself. He stood up, as steadily, as uprightly as he could; but don Ramon took little notice of him; he called peremptorily to the two girls-who more frightened than ever now, still clung desperately to one another.

"Here, wench!" he said roughly, "I want wine, the best you have, and a private room in which to sit."

"At your service, señor!" murmured the elder of the two girls almost inaudibly.

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Katrine, so please your Magnificence."

"And yours?"

"Grete, at your service, Magnificence," whispered the girls one after the other, clinging one to the other, like two miserable atoms of humanity tossed about by the hard hand of Fate.

"At my service then, and quickly too," retorted don Ramon curtly, "go down into the cellar, Katrine, and get me a fresh bottle of Rhine wine-the best your heretical father hath left behind. And you, Grete, show me to another room, and when presently I order you to kiss me, see that you do not do it with such a sour mouth, or by Our Lady I'll remember that your father must hang on the morrow, and that you are nothing better than a pair of heretics too. Now then," he added harshly, "must I repeat the order?"

He had undone the buckle of his sword-belt, and was carrying his sheathed sword in his hand: he found it a splendid weapon for striking further terror into the hearts of the two girls, whose shrieks of pain and fear caused great hilarity amongst the soldiers. Don Ramon felt that if only Mark van Rycke could have been there, all the wounds which that young malapert had dared to inflict upon the pride of a Spanish grandee would forthwith be healed. Indeed, don Ramon enjoyed every incident of this exhilarating spectacle; for instance, when buxom Katrine had at last toddled down the steps into the cellar, the soldiers closed the trap-door upon her; whereupon the provost, who had become very hilarious, shouted lustily:

"What ho! what are you louts doing there? His Magnificence will be wanting the wine which he has ordered. If you lock the cellarer into her cellar, she'll come out presently as drunk as a Spanish lord."

"All right, provost," retorted one of the men, "we'll let her out presently. His Magnificence won't have to wait for long. But we can levy a toll on her-do you understand? – whenever the wench is ready to come out of prison."

"Oh! I understand!" quoth the provost with a laugh.

And don Ramon laughed too. He was enjoying himself even more than he had hoped. He saw the other girl-Grete-turn almost grey with terror, and he felt that he was punishing Mark van Rycke for every insolent word which he had uttered at the Town Hall and Laurence for every threatening gesture. He gave Grete a sharp prodding with the hilt of his sword:

"Now then, you Flemish slut," he said harshly, "show me to your best parlour, and don't stand there gaping."

Perforce she had to show him the way out of the publictapperij to the private room reserved for noble guests.

"Send one of your men to fetch the wench away in about half an hour, provost," called don Ramon loudly over his shoulder, "I shall have got tired of her by then."

Loud laughter greeted this sally and a general clapping of mugs against the table. Grete more dead than alive nearly fell over the threshold.

IV

The private room was on the opposite side of the narrow tiled hall and was dimly lighted by a small iron lamp that hung from a beam of the ceiling above. The door was half open and Grete pushed it open still further and then stood aside to allow the señor captain to pass.

"Will your Magnificence be pleased to walk in," she whispered.

Great tears were in her eyes; don Ramon paused under the lintel of the door, and with a rough gesture pinched her cheek and ear.

"Not ugly for a Flemish heifer," he said with a laugh. "Come along, girl! Let's see if your heretical father hath taught you how to pay due respect to your superiors."

"My humblest respect I do offer your Magnificence," said Grete, who was bravely trying to suppress her tears.

"Come! that's better," he retorted, as he pushed the girl into the room and swaggered in behind her, closing the door after him. "Now, Grete," he added, as he threw himself into a chair and stretched his legs out before him, "come and sit on my knee, and if I like the way you kiss me, why, my girl, there's no knowing what I might not do to please you. Come here, Grete!" he reiterated more peremptorily, for the girl had retreated to a dark corner of the room and was cowering there just like a frightened dog.

"Come here, Grete," he called loudly for the third time. But Grete was much too frightened to move.

With a savage oath don Ramon jumped to his feet, and kicked the chair on which he had been sitting so that it flew with a loud clatter half way across the room. Grete fell on her knees.

"Good Lord deliver me!" she murmured.

Don Ramon seized her by her two hands that were clasped together in prayer, he dragged her up from her knees, and toward the table which stood in the centre of the small, square room. Then he let her fall backwards against the table, and laughed because she continued to pray to God to help her.

"As if God would take any notice of heretics and rebels and Netherlanders generally," he said with a sneer. "Stand up, girl, and go back to my men. I have had enough of you already. Ye gods! what a vile crowd these Netherlanders are! Go back into the tap-room, do you hear, girl? and see that you and your ugly sister entertain my men as you should. For if you don't, and I hear of any psalm-singing or simpering nonsense I'll hand you over to the Inquisition as avowed heretics to-morrow."

But truly Grete was by now almost paralysed with fear; she was no brave heroine of romance who could stand up before a tyrant and browbeat him by the very force of her character and personality, she was but a mere wreckage of humanity whom any rough hand could send hopelessly adrift upon the sea of life. Her one refuge was her tears, her only armour of defence her own utter helplessness.

But this helplessness which would appeal to the most elementary sense of chivalry, had not the power to stir a single kind instinct in don Ramon de Linea. It must be admitted that it would not have appealed to a single Spaniard these days. They were all bred in the one school which taught them from infancy an utter contempt for this subject race and a deadly hatred against the heretics and rebels of the Low Countries. They were taught to look upon these people as little better than cattle, without any truth, honesty or loyalty in them, as being false and treacherous, murderous and dishonest. Don Ramon, who at this moment was behaving as scurrilously as any man, not absolutely born in the gutter, could possibly do, was only following the traditions of his race, of his country and its tyrannical government.

Therefore when Grete wept he laughed, when she murmured the little prayers which her father had taught her, he felt nothing but irritation and unmeasured contempt. He tried to silence the girl by loud shouts and peremptory commands, when these were of no avail he threatened, to call for assistance from his sergeant. Still the girl made no attempt either to move or to stem the flood of tears. Then don Ramon called aloud: "Hallo there, sergeant!" and receiving no answer, he went to the door, in order to reiterate his call from there.

V

His hand was on the latch, when the door was suddenly opened from without; so violently that don Ramon was nearly thrown off his balance, and would probably have measured his length on the floor, but that he fell up against the table and remained there, leaning against it with one hand in order to steady himself, and turning a wrathful glance on the intruder.

"By the Mass!" he said peremptorily, "who is this malapert who…"

But the words died on his lips; the look of wrath in his eyes gave way to one of sudden terror. He stared straight out before him at the sombre figure which had just crossed the threshold. It was the tall figure of a man dressed in dark tightly-fitting clothes, wearing high boots to the top of his thighs, a hood over his head and a mask of untanned leather on his face. He was unarmed.

Don Ramon, already a prey to that superstitious fear of the unknown and of the mysterious which characterised even the boldest of his country and of his race, felt all his arrogance giving way in the presence of this extraordinary apparition, which by the dim and flickering light of the lamp appeared to him to be preternaturally tall and strangely menacing in its grim attitude of silence. Thus a moment or two went by. The stranger now turned and carefully closed and locked the door behind him. Key in hand he went up to the girl-Grete-who, no less terrified than her tormentor, was cowering in a corner of the room.

"Where is Katrine," he asked quickly; then, as the girl almost paralysed by fear seemed quite unable to speak, he added more peremptorily:

"Pull yourself together, wench; your life and Katrine's depend on your courage now. Where is she?"

"In … in … the cellar … I think," stammered Grete almost inaudibly and making a brave effort to conquer her terror.

"Can you reach her without crossing the tap-room?"

The girl nodded.

"Well, then, run to her at once. Don't stop to collect any of your belongings, except what money you have; then go … go at once… Have you a friend or relative in this city to whom you could go at this late hour?"

Again the girl nodded, and looked up more boldly this time: "My father's sister…" she whispered.

"Where does she live?"

"At the sign of the 'Merry Beggars' in Dendermonde."

"Then go to her at once-you and Katrine. You will be safe there for awhile. If any further danger threatens you or your kinsfolk, you shall be advised … in that case you would have to leave the country."

"I shouldn't be afraid," murmured the girl.

"That's good!" he concluded. "Come, Grete!"

He turned back to the door, unlocked it, and let the girl slip out of the room. Then he relocked the door.

VI

While this brief colloquy had been going on, don Ramon was making great efforts to recover his scattered wits and to steady his overstrung nerves. The superstitious fear which had gripped him by the throat, yielded at first to another equally terrifying thought: the hood and mask suggested an emissary of the Inquisition, one of those silent, nameless beings who seemed to have the power of omnipresence, who glided through closed doors and barred windows, appeared suddenly in tavern, church or street corner, and were invariably the precursors of arrest, torture-chamber and death. No man or woman-however high-born, however highly placed, however influential or however poor and humble, was immune from the watchful eye of the Inquisition; a thoughtless word, a careless jest-or the mere denunciation of an enemy-and the accusation of treason, heresy or rebellion was trumped up and gibbet or fire claimed yet another victim. Don Ramon-a Spanish grandee-could not of course be denounced as a heretic, but he knew that the eyes of de Vargas were upon him, that he might he thought importune or in the way now that other projects had been formed for donna Lenora-and he also knew that de Vargas would as ruthlessly sweep him out of the way as he would a troublesome fly.

Thus fear of real, concrete danger had succeeded that of the supernatural; but now that the stranger moved and spoke kindly with Grete-the daughter of an heretic-it was evident that he was no spy of the Inquisition: he was either an avowed enemy who chose this theatrical manner of accomplishing a petty vengeance, or in actual fact that extraordinary creature who professed to be the special protector of the Prince of Orange and whom popular superstition among the soldiery had nicknamed Leatherface.

The latter was by far the most likely, and as the stranger whoever he was, was unarmed, don Ramon felt that he had no longer any cause for fear. Though his sword-in its scabbard-was lying on the table, his dagger was in his belt. With a quick movement he unsheathed it, and at the precise moment when the masked man had his back to him in order to relock the door, don Ramon-dagger in hand-made a swift and sudden dash for him. But the stranger had felt rather than seen or heard the danger which threatened him. As quick as any feline creature he turned on his assailant and gripped his upraised hand by the wrist with such a vice-like grip that don Ramon uttered a cry of rage and pain: his fingers opened out nervelessly and the dagger fell with a clatter to the ground.

Then the two men closed with one another. It was a fight, each for the other's throat-a savage, primitive fight-man against man-with no weapon save sinewy hands, hatred and the primeval instinct to kill. The masked man was by far the more powerful and the more cool. Within a very few moments he had don Ramon down on his knees, his own strong hands gripping the other's throat. The Spaniard felt that he was doomed: he-of that race which was sending thousands of innocent and defenceless creatures to a hideous death-he, who had so often and so mercilessly lent a hand to outrage, to pillage and to murder, who but a few moments ago was condemning two helpless girls to insults and outrage worse than death, was in his turn a defenceless atom in the hands of a justiciary. The breath was being squeezed out of his body, his limbs felt inert and stiff, his mind became clouded over as by a crimson mist. He tried to call for help, but the cry died in his throat. And through the mist which gradually obscured his vision he could still see the silhouette of that closely-hooded head and a pair of eyes shining down on him through the holes of the leather mask.

"Let me go, miscreant," he gasped as for one moment the grip on his throat seemed to relax. "By heaven you shall suffer for this outrage."

"'Tis you will suffer," said the other coldly, "even as you would have made two helpless and innocent women suffer."

"They shall suffer yet!" cried don Ramon with a blasphemous oath, "they and their kith and kin-aye! and this accursed city which hath given you shelter! Assassin!"

"And it is because you are such an abominable cur," came a voice relentlessly from behind the leather mask, "because you would hunt two unfortunates down, them and their kith and kin and the city that gave them shelter, that you are too vile to live, and that I mean to kill you, like I would any pestilential beast that befouled God's earth. So make your peace with your Creator now, for you are about to meet Him face to face laden with the heavy burden of your infamies."

In don Ramon now only one instinct remained paramount-the instinct of a final effort for self-defence. When he fell, his knee came in contact with the dagger which he had dropped. It cost him a terrible effort, but nevertheless he succeeded in groping for it with his right hand and in seizing it: another moment of violent struggle for freedom, another convulsive movement and he had lifted the dagger. He struck with ferocious vigour at his powerful opponent and inflicted a gashing wound upon his left arm-the dagger penetrated to the bone, cutting flesh and muscle through from wrist to elbow.

But even as he struck he knew that it was too late; he had not even the strength to renew the effort. The next moment the vice-like grip tightened round his throat with merciless power. He could neither cry for help nor yet for mercy, nor were his struggles heard beyond these four narrow walls.

The soldiers whom he himself had bidden to be merry and to carouse, were singing and shouting at the top of their voice, and heard neither his struggles nor his cries. The dagger had long since slipped out of his hand, and at last he fell backwards striking his head against the leg of the table as he fell.

VII

In the tap-room the soldiers had soon got tired of waiting for Katrine. At first some of them amused themselves by reopening the trap-door, then sitting on the top step of the ladder that led to the cellar and thence shouting ribald oaths, coarse jests and blasphemies for the benefit of the unfortunate girl down below.

But after a time this entertainment also palled, and a council was held as to who should go down and fetch the girl. The cellar was vastly tempting in itself-with no one to guard it save a couple of wenches-and the captain more than half-inclined to be lenient toward a real bout of drunkenness. It was an opportunity not to be missed; strange that the idea had not occurred to seven thirsty men before.

Now the provost declared that he would go down first, others could follow him in turn, but two must always remain in the tap-room in case the captain called, their comrades would supply them with wine from below. The provost descended-candle in hand-so did four of the men, but Katrine was no longer in the cellar. They hunted for her for awhile, and discovered a window, the shaft of which sloped upwards to a yard at the back of the house. The window was open and there was a ladder resting against the wall of the shaft.

The men swore a little, then went back to investigate the casks of wine. With what happened in the cellar after that this chronicle hath no concern, but those soldiers who remained up in the tap-room had a curious experience which their fuddled brains did not at first take in altogether. What happened was this: the door which gave on the passage was opened, and a man appeared under the lintel. He was dressed in sombre, tight-fitting doublet and hose, with high boots reaching well above his knees; he had a hood over his head and a mask on his face. The soldiers stared at him with wide-open, somewhat dimmed eyes.

The masked man only spoke a few words:

"Tell your provost," he said, "that señor captain don Ramon de Linea lies dead in the room yonder."

Then he disappeared, as quietly as he had come.

CHAPTER V

VENGEANCE

I

"Satan! Satan! Assassin!"

Donna Lenora had stood beside the dead body of her lover and kinsman wide-eyed and pale with rigid, set mouth and trembling knees while her father explained to her how don Ramon de Linea had been murdered in the tavern of the "Three Weavers" by an unknown man who wore a leather mask. She had listened to the whole garbled version of the sordid affair, never thinking to doubt a single one of her father's words: don Ramon de Linea, according to the account given to his daughter by Juan de Vargas, had-while in the execution of his duty-been attacked in a dark passage by a mysterious assassin, who had fled directly his nefarious work had been accomplished.

The murderer, however, was seen by the provost in command and by two of the soldiers, and was accurately described by them as wearing doublet and high-boots of a dark-brown colour, a hood over his head and a mask of untanned leather on his face. The man had rapidly disappeared in the darkness, evading all pursuit.

And donna Lenora-thus face to face for the first time in her sheltered life with crime, with horror and with grief-had, in the first moment of despairing misery, not even a prayer to God in her heart, for it was filled with bitter thoughts of resentment and of possible revenge.

She had loved her cousin don Ramon de Linea with all the ardour of her youth, of her warm temperament and of a heart thirsting for the self-sacrifice which women were so ready to offer these days on the altar of their Love. She had never thought him shallow or cruel: to her he had always been just the playmate of childhood's days, the handsome, masterful boy whom she had looked up to as the embodiment of all that was strong and noble and chivalrous, the first man who had ever whispered the magic word "love" in her ear.

Now an unknown enemy had killed him: not in fair fight, not in the open, on the field of honour, but-as her father said-in a tavern, in the dark, surreptitiously, treacherously; and donna Lenora in an agony of passionate resentment had at last broken the silence which had almost frightened her father and had suddenly called out with fierce intensity: "Satan! Satan! Assassin!" Her father had given her an account of the horrible incident, which was nothing but a tissue of falsehoods from beginning to end, and Lenora had listened and believed. How could she doubt her own father? She hardly knew him-and he was all she had in the world on whom to pour out the wealth of her affection and of her faith.

II

Truth to tell, de Vargas had received the news of don Ramon's death with unbounded satisfaction.

Lenora had obeyed him and had been this night publicly affianced to Mark van Rycke; but between her consent to the marriage and her willingness to become Alva's tool as a spy among her husband's people there was the immeasurable abyss of a woman's temperament and a woman's natural pity for the oppressed.

But the outrage to-night-the murder of the man whom she still loved despite paternal prohibitions-was bound to react on the girl's warm and passionate nature-and react in the manner which her father desired. He trusted to his own powers of lying, to place the case before his daughter in its most lurid light. He had at once spoken of "spies" and "assassins" and his words had been well chosen. Within a few moments after he had told Lenora the news, he felt that he could play like a skilled musician upon every string of her overwrought sensibilities. Her heart had already been very sore at being forced to part from her first lover; now that the parting had suddenly become irrevocable in this horrible way, all the pent up passion, fierce resentment and wrath which she had felt against her future husband and his people could by clever manipulation be easily merged into an equally fierce desire for revenge.