Page 167 of A Column of Fire

Titelmans raised his voice so that everyone could hear. ‘I’m here to see Albert Willemsen.’

Titelmans seemed unsure which one was Albert – he had only seen him for a few minutes at Lord Hubert’s Pasture – and for a moment Ebrima hoped they might all pretend he was not present. But the crowd was not sufficiently quick-witted, and indeed many of them stupidly turned and looked directly at Albert.

After a moment of fearful hesitation, Albert stepped forward. With a show of bravado he said: ‘What do you want with me?’

‘And your wife,’ said Titelmans, pointing. Unfortunately Betje was standing close to Albert and Titelmans’s guess was correct. Looking pale and scared, Betje stepped forward.

‘And the daughter.’

Drike was not standing with her parents, and Titelmans surely would not remember a fourteen-year-old girl. ‘The child is not here,’ Carlos lied bravely. Perhaps she might be saved, Ebrima thought hopefully.

But she did not want to be saved. A girlish voice piped up: ‘I am Drike Willemsen.’

Ebrima’s heart sank.

He could see her, by the window, in a white dress, talking to his stepson Matthus, with Carlos’s pet cat in her arms.

Carlos said: ‘She’s a mere child, dean. Surely—’

But Drike was not finished. ‘And I am a Protestant,’ she said defiantly. ‘For which I thank the Lord.’

From the guests came a murmur of mixed admiration and dismay.

‘Come here,’ said Titelmans.

She crossed the room with her head held high, and Ebrima thought: Oh, hell.

‘Take the three of them away,’ said Titelmans to his entourage.

Someone shouted: ‘Why don’t you leave us in peace?’

Titelmans looked angrily towards the source of the jeer, but he could not see who had spoken. However, Ebrima knew: he had recognized the voice of young Matthus.

Another man shouted: ‘Yeah, go back to Ronse!’

The other guests started to cheer their approval and shout their own catcalls. Titelmans’s men-at-arms escorted the Willemsen family out of the room. As Titelmans turned to follow, Matthus threw a bread roll. It hit Titelmans’s back. He pretended not to notice. Then a goblet flew through the air and hit the wall close to him, splashing his robe. The booing became louder and cruder. Titelmans barely retained his dignity as he hurried through the door before anything else could threaten him.

The crowd laughed and clapped his exit. But Ebrima knew there was nothing to smile about.

*

THE BURNING OFyoung Drike was scheduled for two weeks later.

It was announced in the cathedral. Titelmans said that Albert and Betje had recanted their Protestantism, asked God’s forgiveness, and begged to be received back into the bosom of the Church. He probably knew their confessions were insincere, but he had to let them off with a fine. However, to everyone’s horror, Drike had refused to renounce her religion.

Titelmans would not let anyone visit her in prison, but Albert bribed the guards and got in anyway. However, he was unable to change her mind. With the idealism of the very young, she insisted she was ready to die rather than betray her Lord.

Ebrima and Evi went to see Albert and Betje the day before the burning. They wanted to give support and comfort to their friends, but it was hopeless. Betje wept without stopping, and Albert could barely speak. Drike was their only child.

That day a stake was planted in the pavement in the city centre, overlooked by the cathedral, the elegant Great Market building, and the grand, unfinished city hall. A cartload of dry firewood was dumped next to the stake.

The execution was scheduled for sunrise, and a crowd gathered before dawn. The mood was grim, Ebrima noted. When hated criminals such as thieves and rapists were executed, the spectators mocked them and cheered their death agonies; but that was not going to happen today. Many in the crowd were Protestants, and feared this might one day happen to them. The Catholics, such as Carlos, were angered by the Protestants’ troublemaking, and fearful that the French wars of religion would spread to the Netherlands; but few of them believed it was right to burn a girl to death.

Drike was led out of the town hall by Egmont, the executioner, a big man dressed in a leather smock and carrying a blazing torch. She wore the white dress in which she had been arrested. Ebrima saw at once that Titelmans, in his arrogance, had made a mistake. She looked like a virgin, which she undoubtedly was; and she had the pale beauty of paintings of the Virgin Mary. The crowd gave a collective gasp on seeing her. Ebrima said to his wife, Evi: ‘This is going to be a martyrdom.’ He glanced at Matthus and saw that the boy had tears in his eyes.

One of the two west doors of the cathedral opened, and Titelmans appeared at the head of a little flock of priests like black crows.

Two men-at-arms tied Drike to the stake and piled the firewood around her feet.