That is what it means! Oh, God, my God! You are lost! You intend to negotiate with Valdez!" "And suppose I do ?" asked the burgomaster, with an angry gesture.
Maria looked him sternly in the eye, and exclaimed in a loud, resolute tone: "Then it will be my turn to say: Go to Delft; we need different men here." The burgomaster turned pale and bent his eyes on the floor, while she fearlessly confronted him with a steady glance.
The light fell full upon her glowing face, and when Peter again raised his eyes, it seemed as if the same Maria stood before him, who as a bride had vowed to share trouble and peril with him, remain steadfast in the struggle for liberty to the end; he felt that his "child" Maria had grown to his own height and above him, recognized for the first time in the proud woman before him his companion in conflict, his high-hearted helper in distress and danger.

An overmastering yearning, mightier than any emotion ever experienced before, surged through his soul, impelled him towards her, and found utterance in the words: "Maria, Maria, my wife, my guardian angel! We have written to Valdez, but there is still time,--nothing binds me yet, and with you, with you I will stand firm to the end." Then, in the midst of these days of woe, she threw herself on his breast, crying aloud in the abundance of this new, unexpected, unutterable happiness: "With you, one with you--forever, unto death, in conflict and in love!".