They had not seen each other since; in spite of his constant promises it did not seem as if Philip would ever set foot in the Netherlands again, and William would have as soon walked into fire as have gone to Spain.
Yet the presence of the King was ever with him, an intangible foe, an all-pervading enemy.
The Prince did not know which of his servants, nay, which of his friends, was secretly in the pay or service of Philip.
But William also had been trained at the Court of Charles V; he had his spies in the Escorial, his agents in Madrid, and he was better informed as to the King's doings than the Regent herself, who was but a puppet in that vast game of triple intrigue and interwoven duplicity, that confusion of lies and counter-lies and manifold deceptions which the Court of Spain called statecraft.
William's thoughts went back to the same point again and again—the point that was indeed the centre of his problem—
"If the King forces the edicts against heretics—what to do?"
The final issue of slaughter, torture, emigration, and woe unutterable he saw with vision unconfused; he foresaw, too, the ruin of all the great Flemish nobles who refused to be Philip's executioners.
All Stadtholders, all magistrates, all officials who refused to enforce the King's orders would be dismissed from their offices, probably imprisoned, certainly disgraced; their estates would, of a necessity, share the inevitable ruin of the country; their fortunes would be lost in the general bankruptcy.
So much was obvious; it was obvious also that the only way to escape this ruin would be to submit to Philip, to support his policy, to fulfil his decrees, to obey him in everything with implicit loyalty.
And what was Philip going to demand?—that these noblemen, of as proud a birth as his own, become inquisitors, executioners, the despoilers of their native land or the land whose charters and liberties they had sworn to protect?
Impatient with his own thoughts and with circumstances William left the library and returned to his cabinet, where two secretaries were working by the light of lamps of red Florentine copper.
William had scarcely entered when Lamoral Egmont was ushered into his presence; the Prince took his friend by the hand and, greeting him pleasantly, led him into the outer chamber, already lit by tall candles in polished brass sticks shining like pale gold.