worth two in the bush."
"A good aunt needs no bush. I mean--oh, I don't know what I mean; but,
of course, I ask nothing better than to secure you."
"No; you mean you think you'll _get_ nothing better. Ha, ha! I agree
with you. But Tibe and I didn't come here to be played with. You're
giving us a very good lunch, but I have his future and mine to think of.
I admit, I'm in want of an engagement as a traveling companion to ladies
in Holland; but you aren't the only person to whom it occurs to put ads
in Dutch papers. If you'd searched the columns of _Het Nieus van den
Dag_ you might have seen mine. I have not been without answers, and I
don't know that I should care to be an aunt, anyway. It makes one seem
so _old_. What I came to say was that, unless you can offer me an
immediate engagement----"
"Oh, I can and do. I beg of you to be my aunt from this moment."
"Tibe to travel with me and have every comfort?"
"Yes, yes, and luxury."
"A pint of warm milk every morning, half a pound of best beef or chicken
with vegetables at noon, two new-laid eggs at----"
"Certainly. He has but to choose--he seems to know his own mind pretty
well."
"I don't think it a subject for joking. That duck was close to the edge
of the table. We'd better talk _business_. Your letter said a hundred
gulden a week to a suitable aunt, and a two months' engagement certain.
Well, it's not enough. I should want at least three hundred dollars
extra, down in advance (I can't do it in gulden in my head) for _your_
sake."
"For my sake?"
"Don't you see, to do you credit as a relative, I must have things, nice
things, plenty of nice things? Tartan blouses, and if not Tams,
cairngorms. Yes, a cairngorm brooch would be realistic. I saw a beauty
yesterday--only two hundred gulden. No aunt of yours can go for a trip
on the waterways of Holland unless she's well fitted out."
"I've been admiring the dress you are wearing. It's wonderfully trim."
"Thanks. But it happens to be about a hundred years old, and is the only
one I have left. As for my hat, and boots--but Tibe and I have suffered
some undeserved vicissitudes of late."
"I'm sorry to hear that. Of course you must have three hundred dollars
to begin with."
"By the way, am I Mrs. or Miss?"
"You must know best as to----"
"I mean me in the part of your aunt."
"Oh, you're neither Miss nor Mrs."
"_Really!_"
"I mean, you're married, but you have a title."
"That will come more expensive. A person of title should have a diamond
guard for her wedding-ring. You _feel_ that, don't you?"
"Now you speak of it, I do."
"Would you like her to wear a cap for indoors?"
"Sounds as if she were a parlormaid----"
"Not at all. I'm sure a proper Scotch aunt would wear a cap."
"Mine's a proper Scotch aunt, and she doesn't. She's about forty, but
she looks twenty-five. Nobody would believe she was anybody's aunt."
"But you want everybody to believe I'm yours?"
"Oh, have a cap by all means."
"It should be real lace."
"Buy it."
"And another to change with."
"Buy that too. Get a dozen if you like."
"Thanks, I will. I believe you just said the engagement dates from
to-day?"
"Rather. I was going to tell you, I must have an aunt by this evening.
She arrives from Scotland, you know."
"With her dog. _That's_ easy."
"I hope the girls like dogs."
"They do if they're nice girls."
"They're enchanting girls, one English, one American. I adore both:
that's why I'm a desperate man where an aunt's concerned. To produce an
aunt is my one hope of enjoying their society on the motor-boat trip I
wrote you about. I wouldn't do this thing if I weren't desperate, and
even desperate as I am, I wouldn't do it if I couldn't have got an
all-right kind of aunt, an aunt that--that----"
"That an unimpeachable American Consul could vouch for. I assure you,
Nephew, you ought to think of a woman like me as of--of a ram caught in
the bushes."
"I'm willing to think of you in that way, if it's not offensive. The
Consul didn't go into particulars----"
"That was unnecessary."
"Perhaps. Everything's settled, then. I'll count you out five hundred
dollars in gulden. Buy what you choose--so long as it's aunt-like. I'll
meet your train at--we'll say seven, the Beurs Station."
"I understand. I'll be there with Tibe and our luggage. But you haven't
told me your name yet. I _signed_ my letter to you, Mary Milton. _You_
cautiously----"
"Ronald L. Starr is your nephew's name. Lady MacNairne is my aunt's."
I came very near choking myself with a cherry-stone. Long before this
I'd been sure of his name, but I hadn't expected to hear Lady
MacNairne's.
"Forty, and looks twenty-five."
Yes, that was a fair description of Lady MacNairne, as far as it went;
but much more might be said by her admirers, of whom I openly declared
myself one, before a good-sized audience at a country house in Scotland,
not quite a year ago.
It was merely a little flirtation, to pass the time, on both our parts.
A woman of forty who is a beauty and a flirt has no time to waste, and
Lady MacNairne is not wasteful. She was the handsomest woman at Kinloch
Towers, my cousin Dave Norman's place, and a Dutchman was a novelty to
her; so we amused ourselves for ten days, and I should have kept the
pleasantest memory of the episode if Sir Alec had not taken it into his
head to be jealous.
Poor Fleda MacNairne was whisked away before the breaking-up of the
house-party, and that is the last I have seen of her, but not the last
I've heard. Once in a while I get a letter, amusing, erratic, like
herself; and in such communications she doesn't scruple to chronicle
other flirtations which have followed hard on mine. Only a short time
before the making of this plot in a Rotterdam garden, a letter from her
gave startling news: consequently I am now in possession of knowledge
apparently denied to the nephew.
A few minutes more and the pair in the next arbor separated, the woman
departing to purchase the fittings of aunthood, the man remaining to
pay the bill. But before he had time to beckon the waiter I got up and
walked into his lair.
"Mr. Starr," I said, "I'm going to stop your game."
"The devil you are! And who are you?" answered he, first staring, then
flushing.
"My name's Rudolph Brederode," said I.
"You're a d--d eavesdropper," said he.
"You are the same kind of a fool, for thinking because your neighbor
spoke Dutch he couldn't know English. I sat still and let you go on,
because I don't mean to allow any of the persons concerned to be imposed
upon by you."
He glared at me across the table as if he could have killed me, and I
glared back at him; yet all the while I was conscious of a sneaking
kindness for the fellow, he looked so stricken--rather like an endearing
scamp of an Eton boy who has got into a horrid scrape, and is being
hauled over the coals by the Head.
"What business is it of yours?" he wanted to know.
"Lady MacNairne's a friend of mine."
"Indeed! But what of that? She's my aunt."
"And Robert van Buren is another friend, an intimate one. He has told me
about his cousin's motor-boat. He doesn't approve of the tour, as it is.
When he hears from me----"
"Oh, hang it all, why do you want to be such a spoilsport?" demanded the
poor wretch in torture. "Did _you_ never fall in love with a girl, and
feel you'd do anything to get her?"
This sudden change, this throwing himself upon my mercy, took me
somewhat aback. In threatening to tear the mote from his eye, what about
a certain obstruction in mine?
He was quick to see his advantage and follow it up.
"You say you heard everything. Then you must see why I thought of this
plan. I hoped at first Aunt Fleda might be prevailed on to come. When I
lost that hope I just couldn't give up the trip. I had to get an aunt to
chaperon those blessed girls, or it was good-by to them, for me. What
harm am I doing? The woman's respectable; the Consul has written me a
letter about her. If you know Aunt Fay--that's my name for her--you know
she would call this the best kind of a lark. I'll confess to her some
day. I'd have my head cut off sooner than injure Miss Rivers or Miss Van
Buren. Afterwards, when we've got to be great friends, they shall hear
the whole story, I promise; but of course, you can ruin me if you tell
them, or let your friend tell them, at this stage. _Do_ you think it's
fair to take advantage of what you overheard by accident, and spoil the
chance of my life? Oh, _say_ now, what can I do to make you keep still?"
"Well, I'm--_hanged_!" was all I could answer. And a good deal to my own
surprise, I heard myself suddenly burst into sardonic laughter.
Then he laughed, too, and we roared together. If any one noticed us,
they must have thought us friends of a lifetime; yet five minutes ago we
had been like dogs ready to fly at each other's throats, and there was
no earthly reason why we should not be of the same mind still.
"You _are_ going to let me alone, aren't you?" he continued to plead,
when he was calmer. "You are going to do unto me as you'd be done by,
and give my true love a chance to run smooth? If you refuse, I could
wish that fearful Flower back that I might set him at you."
My lips twitched. "I'm not sure," said I, "whether you ought to be in a
gaol or in the school-room."
"I ought to be on a motor-boat tour with the two most charming girls in
the world; and if I'm not to be there, I might as well be in my grave.
Do ask people about me. Ask my aunt. I'm not a villain. I'm one of the
nicest fellows you ever met, and I've no bad intentions. I've got too
much money to be an adventurer. Why, look here! I'm supposed to be quite
a good match. Either of the girls can have me and my millions. Both are
at the feet of either. At present I've no choice. Don't drive me to
drink. I should hate to die of Schnapps; and there's nothing else liquid
I could well die of in Holland."
As he talked, I had been thinking hard and fast. I should have to spare
him. I saw that. But--I saw something else too.
"I'll keep your ridiculous secret, Mr. Starr, on one condition," I
said.
"You've only to name it."
"Invite me to go with you on the trip."
"My _dear_ fellow, for heaven's sake don't ask me the one thing I can't
do. It's cruelty to animals. It isn't _my_ trip. I'm a guest. Perhaps
you don't understand----"
"Yes, I do. Van Buren told me. He mentioned that you hadn't been able to
get a skipper to take the motor-boat through the canals."
"That's true. But we shan't be delayed. We have our choice between two
chaps with fair references; not ideal men, perhaps; but you don't need
an admiral to get you through a herring-pond----"
"Each canal is different from every other. You must have a first-rate
man, who knows every inch of the way, whatever route you choose, or
you'll get into serious trouble. Now, as you've been praising yourself,
I'll follow your example. You couldn't find a skipper who knows more
about 'botoring' and Dutch waterways than I do, and I volunteer for the
job. I go if you go; there's the offer."
"Are you serious?" All his nonsense was suddenly forgotten.
"Absolutely."
"Why do you want to go? You must have a reason."
"I have. It's much the same as yours."
"I'm blowed! Then you've met--Them."
"I've seen them. Apparently that's about all you've done."
"You mean, if I won't get you on board as skipper you'll give me away?"
I was silent. I did not now mean anything of the kind, for it would be
impossible to betray the engaging wretch. But I was willing that he
should think my silence gave consent.
"They would know you weren't a common hired skipper. How could I explain
you?"
"Why, say you've a Dutch friend who has--_kindly_ offered to go, as you
can't find any one else who's competent for the job. You'd better not
mention your friend's name at first, if you can avoid it. As the ladies
have been anxious about the skipper, and asked van Buren to get one,
they'll probably be thankful it's all right, and only too glad to accept
a friend of yours in the place."
"Poor, deceived angels! What's to prevent your snatching one of them
from under my very nose?"
"You must run the risk of that. Besides, you needn't worry about it till
you make up your mind which angel you want."
"I should naturally want whichever one you did. We are made like that."
"If you don't agree, and they go 'botoring' without you, you can't get
either."
"That's true. Most disagreeable things are. And there's just a chance,
if you get dangerous, that Tibe might polish you off. I saw the way he
looked at you. Well, needs must when somebody drives. It's a bargain
then. I'll tell the girls what a kind, generous Dutch friend I have.
We'll be villains together."
IX
We settled that Starr should see Miss Van Buren and Miss Rivers and tell
them that skipper, chauffeur, and chaperon all being provided, there was
nothing to prevent the tour beginning to-morrow. Having done this,
without bringing in his obliging friend's name, he was to meet me at the
Rowing Club at three o'clock with a detailed report of all that had
happened up to date.
Never was time slower in passing. Each minute seemed as long as the
dying speech of a tragedian who fancies himself in a death scene. I
wanted to use some of these minutes in writing to Robert, but it would
be premature to tell him that I was going to look after his cousin and
her sister on the trip, as the ladies might abandon it, rather than put
up with my society.
When ten minutes past three came, and no Starr, I was certain that they
would not have me. I could hardly have been gloomier if I'd been waiting
for a surgical operation. But another five minutes brought my
confederate, and the first sight of his face sent my spirits up with a
bound.
"It's all right," he said. "They've come back from Scheveningen. I saw
them at their hotel, and they're more beautiful than ever. They were
prostrate with grief at hearing I hadn't been able to get hold of a
skipper; consequently they were too excited to ask your name when I gave
them the cheering news that a Dutch friend had come to the rescue. They
simply swallowed you whole, and clamored for the next course, so I added
the--er--glad tidings of my aunt's arrival this evening, and poured the
last drop of joy in their cup by saying we could start to-morrow.
They're going to bring most of their things on board after tea this
afternoon, about five. Oh, by the way, just as I was leaving, Miss Van
Buren did call after me, 'Is your friend nice?'"
I laughed. "What did you answer?"
"I thought one more fib among so many couldn't matter, so I said you
were. Heaven forgive me. By-the-by, are you really Dutch, or is that
another--figure of speech?"
"I always think and speak of myself as wholly Dutch," I replied. "But my
mother is English. By-the-by, I must telegraph her; and I must write my
man to bring me some clothes the first thing to-morrow morning. Then
you'd better send for the chauffeur you've engaged; and we'll go
together to interview him on the boat before the ladies come. I
think--er--it won't be best for me to meet them till to-morrow. Are you
sure your chauffeur's a good man?"
"Not at all," said Starr, airily. "I merely know that he's a very young
youth, who makes you feel like a grandfather at twenty-seven; who
wriggles and turns pink if you speak to him suddenly, and when he wants
his handkerchief to mop his perpetually moist forehead, pulls yards of
cotton waste out of his pocket, by mistake. I've only his word for
it--which I couldn't understand, as it was in Dutch--that he has the
slightest knowledge of any motor. But he showed me written references,
and seemed so proud of what they set forth, I thought they must be all
right, though I couldn't read them."
"You're a queer fellow!" I exclaimed.
"Well, you see, I'm an artist--neither motorist nor botorist. By the
way, what are you, beyond being van Buren's friend?"
"A Jack of several trades," said I. "I know a bit about horses, botors,
motors; I fancy I'm a judge of dogs (I congratulate you on Tibe), also
of chauffeurs, so come along and we'll put yours through his paces."
It now appeared that Starr had the youth on board. So I sent my two
telegrams, and we started to walk to the boat. On the way Starr told me
more than I had heard from Robert about his first dealings with
"Lorelei," and we discussed details of the trip. The ladies have no
choice, it appears, except that they will feel ill-used if allowed to
miss anything. As for Starr, he confessed blissful ignorance of Holland.
"I want to go where cows wear coats, and women wear gold helmets, and
dogs have revolving kennels," he said. "And I want to paint everything I
see."
"Cows wear coats at Gouda. I expect you read that in Carlyle's 'Sartor
Resartus.' Women wear gold helmets in Friesland. Dogs have revolving
kennels in Zeeland," I told him. "And if you want to paint everything
you see, we shall be gone a long time."
"All the better," said Starr.
I agreed.
"It would be useful if _you_ could plan out a trip," he went on. "It
would help to account for you, you know, and make you popular."
I caught at this idea. There are a good many places that I should like
to show Miss Van Buren, and visit with her. "I should have preferred her
seeing my country on our wedding-trip," I said to myself. "This is the
next best, though, and we can have the honeymoon in Italy." But aloud I
remarked that I would map out something and submit it to my passengers
in the morning.
My mother laughs, telling me that I must always go in for any new fad,
whatever it may be, and that she expects some day to see several makes
of airship tethered on the lawn at Liliendaal, or tied to our chimneys
at The Hague in winter. There's something in her jibe, perhaps; but it
would be a queer thing, indeed, if a son of the water-country didn't
turn to "botoring," provided he had any soul for sport. We Hollanders
made practical use of motor-boats while the people of dry lands still
poked ridicule at them in comic illustrated papers; therefore this will
be by no means my first experience. I had that three years ago with a
racer, and again with a barge which I fitted up with a twenty
horse-power motor, and used for a whole summer, after which, in a
generous mood, I gave her as a wedding-gift to my chauffeur, whose
bride's greatest ambition was for barge-life. Since that time I've
always meant to get something good in the botoring line, but haven't
made up my mind what it ought to be.
I did myself no more than justice in telling Starr that I was as
desirable a man as he could find for skipper; and I shook hands with
myself for every hour of botoring I had done. Thanks to past experience
I can now do chauffeur's work, if necessary, as well as skipper's.
We found the "very young youth" on deck, industriously polishing
brass-work, and his complexion bore out Starr's description as I
questioned him about his former situations. It seems there was only one,
and with a small boat; but the motor was the same as this.
The arrangement of "Lorelei's" deck aft pleases me particularly, for it
might have been designed to suit my purpose. That purpose is to have as
much of Miss Van Buren's society as possible during this trip.
Consequently I saw with pleasure that the passengers in their
deck-chairs must group round the skipper at his wheel, as there is no
other comfortable place. There will be no notice up on board "Lorelei":
"Please do not speak to the man at the wheel." The more he is spoken
to--by the right person--the better he will like his job. What I have to
pray for is dry weather, that the ladies may spend their days on deck,
for just as much time as they spend below I shall consider that I am
wasting. Indeed, I regret the attractiveness of the cabins, for I fear
there may be a temptation to dawdle there, or lie among cushions on the
comfortable seat-bunks on a gray or chilly day. "I hope she's as much
interested in scenery as she apparently is in history," I said to myself
as Starr and I wandered over the boat, "for the skipper-job can be
combined with the business of lecturer and _cicerone_, if that proves a
bid for popularity."
Aft of the cabins is the motor-house; and hearing our voices through the
skylight, chauffeur Hendrik left the brass-work and came to stand by his
engine. I immediately determined to study this engine thoroughly, so
that if Hendrik's intelligence prove untrustworthy in an emergency, mine
may be prepared to assist it.
He soon saw that it was useless to "show off" before me, but he enjoyed
explaining the motor in broken English to Starr. The American artist
heard with a vague smile the difference between the ordinary four-cycle
engine of an automobile, and the two-cycle engine of this marine motor,
with its piston receiving an impulse at each down stroke; tried to
understand how the charge of vaporized petrol was drawn into the
crank-chamber, and there slightly compressed; how the gas afterwards
traveled along a by-pass into the firing chamber at the upper part of
the cylinder, to be further compressed by the up-stroke of the piston
and fired by the sparking plug, while the burnt gases escaped through a
port uncovered by the piston in its downward strokes, admission and
exhaust being thus controlled by the piston movement alone.
"Great heavens! I wronged this good youth," the patient listener cried,
when he found a chance to speak. "I thought him all pinkness, and
perspiration, and purple velvet slippers, but he can pull information by
the yard out of his brain, as he does cotton waste out of his pocket.
Unfortunately, it's waste too, as far as I'm concerned; for I don't know
any more about this motor now than I did when he began. The tap of my
intelligence always seems to be turned off the minute anything
technical or mechanical is mentioned. Some of those things he said
sounded more like the description of a lunatic asylum than anything
else, and the only impression left on my mind is one of dreadful gloom."
"Why?" I asked.
"Because it seems impossible that anything which has to do so much at
the same time as this engine does, can remember to do half of it. It
will certainly fail, and blow up with those we love on board. I never
thought of that until now, and shouldn't if Hendrik hadn't explained
things to me."
"We can't blow up unless the petrol gets on fire," said I, "and as the
tank's away at the bow of the boat and the petrol descends to the engine
by gravity and not pressure, you needn't have nightmare on that
subject."
"That's another horror I hadn't realized," groaned Starr. "I took things
for granted, and trusted other people to know them. A whole tank of
petrol at the bow! How much will there be in it?"
"Enough to last four days."
"One of the ladies is sure to set it on fire when she's curling her hair
with a spirit-lamp. Yet we can't forbid them to curl their hair on their
own boat. Perhaps they'd better sleep on the barge, after all. I meant
it to be for the men of the party."
"Nonsense," said I. "They're reasonable creatures. Besides, Miss Van
Buren's hair curls naturally."
"How can you know?"
"Well, I do." And before my eyes arose the picture of a bright goddess
of foam and spray.
"Hum! I begin to see which way the wind blows. I'm not sure she isn't
the one I myself----"
"We were talking about the motor," I cut in. "The water jacketing seems
thoroughly carried out; and when the party's assembled on deck, it will
hear no more noise than the buzzing of a big bee, as the exhaust is led
away below the water-line. It won't be bad in the cabins either, even
when they keep the sliding door open, for this screen of thick
sail-cloth will deaden what sound there is. And it was a smart idea to
utilize the power of the magneto to light up the whole boat with those
incandescent burners."
"Your mechanical information, on top of Hendrik's, is giving me a kind
of acute mental dyspepsia," sighed Starr. "I hate well-informed people;
they're so fond of telling you things you don't want to know. Still, I
realize that you're going to be useful in a way, so I suppose I must
make the best of you; and, anyhow, we shan't see much of each other,
except at meals."
"Shan't we? Why, are you going to spend most of your time on board your
barge, steering?"
"Not I. I've engaged a man. Didn't I tell you. A nice, handy man, not
too big for his boots, or rather, his carpet slippers. He'll cook,
sweep, dust, and make beds as well as keep the barge steady."