After he had to some extent conquered his shyness and irritation Dirk became aware that he was really enjoying his dinner at Montalvo’s quarters. There were three guests besides himself, two Spanish officers and a young Netherlander of his own class and age, Brant by name. He was the only son of a noted and very wealthy goldsmith at The Hague, who had sent him to study certain mysteries of the metal worker’s art under a Leyden jeweller famous for the exquisite beauty of his designs. The dinner and the service were both of them perfect in style, but better than either proved the conversation, which was of a character that Dirk had never heard at the tables of his own class and people. Not that there was anything even broad about it, as might perhaps have been expected. No, it was the talk of highly accomplished and travelled men of the world, who had seen much and been actors in many moving events; men who were not overtrammelled by prejudices, religious or other, and who were above all things desirous of making themselves agreeable and instructive to the stranger within their gates. The Heer Brant also, who had but just arrived in Leyden, showed himself an able and polished man, one that had been educated more thoroughly than was usual among his class, and who, at the table of his father, the opulent Burgomaster of The Hague, from his youth had associated with all classes and conditions of men. Indeed it was there that he made the acquaintance of Montalvo, who recognising him in the street had asked him to dinner. After the dishes were cleared, one of the Spanish officers rose and begged to be excused, pleading some military duty. When he had saluted his commandant and gone, Montalvo suggested that they should play a game of cards. This was an invitation which Dirk would have liked to decline, but when it came to the point he did not, for fear of seeming peculiar in the eyes of these brilliant men of the world. So they began to play, and as the game was simple very soon he picked up the points of it, and what is more, found them amusing. At first the stakes were not high, but they doubled themselves in some automatic fashion, till Dirk was astonished to find that he was gambling for considerable sums and winning them. Towards the last his luck changed a little, but when the game came to an end he found himself the richer by about three hundred and fifty florins. “What am I do to with this?” he asked colouring up, as with sighs, which in one instance were genuine enough, the losers pushed the money across to him. “Do with it?” laughed Montalvo, “did anybody ever hear such an innocent! Why, buy your lady-love, or somebody else’s lady-love, a present. No, I’ll tell you a better use than this, you give us to-morrow night at your lodging the best dinner that Leyden can produce, and a chance of winning some of this coin back again. Is it agreed?”