"A night attack," replied a muffled voice behind the mask. "Six hundred arquebusiers--they are but half a league away!--I would have been here sooner only the night is so infernally dark, I caught my foot in a rabbit-hole and nearly broke my ankle--I am as lame as a Jew’s horse ... but still in time," he added as he hastily helped the Prince to adjust his armour and straighten out his clothes. The camp was alive now with call to arms and rattle of steel, horses snorting and words of command flying to and fro. Don Ramon de Linea, a quarter of a league away, heard these signs of troops well on the alert and he knew that the surprise attack had failed. Six hundred arquebusiers--though they be picked men--were not sufficient for a formal attack on the Prince of Orange’s entire cavalry. Even mercenary and undisciplined troops will fight valiantly when their lives depend upon their valour. De Linea thought it best to give the order to return to camp. And the waves of living men which had been set in motion an hour ago, now swiftly and silently went back the way they came. Don Ramon when he came once more in the camp at St. Florian and in the presence of Alva’s captain-in-chief, had to report the failure of the night attack which had been so admirably planned. "The whole camp at Hermigny was astir," he said as he chawed the ends of his heavy moustache, for he was sorely disappointed. "I could not risk an attack under those conditions. Our only chance of winning was by surprise." "Who gave the alarm?" queried don Frederic de Toledo, who took no pains to smother the curses that rose to his lips. "The devil, I suppose," growled don Ramon de Linea savagely. And out at Hermigny--in Orange’s tent--the man who was called Leatherface was preparing to go as quietly and mysteriously as he had come. "They won’t be on you, Monseigneur," he said, "now that they know your troops are astir. But if I were you," he added grimly, "I would have every one of those sentinels shot at dawn. They were all of them fast asleep when I arrived." He gave the military salute and would have turned to go without another word but that the Prince caught him peremptorily by the arm: "In the meanwhile, Messire, how shall I thank you again?" he asked. "By guarding your precious life, Monseigneur," replied the man simply. "The cause of freedom in the Low Countries would never survive your loss." "Well!" retorted the Prince of Orange with a winning smile, "if that be so, then the cause of our freedom owes as much to you as it does to me. Is it the tenth time--or the twelfth--that you have saved my life?" "Since you will not let me fight with you..."