As soon as I could make myself free for a day I went out sailing again.
I now knew the way and the water and took no one with me this time. At
daybreak I left The Hague and was beyond the locks before eight
o'clock. I had not mentioned my encounter to Lucia, but nevertheless I
felt none of that secret sense of guilt of a married man, who feels
himself charmed by a strange woman.
To-day it was a warm summer's day with a light eastern breeze blowing.
The great yellow sheet of water looked as peaceful and friendly as it
had appeared wild and wicked the time before. The little waves sparkled
in the sun and with sweetly soothing murmurings splashed against the
little boat. The shores with their steeples and windmills lay rosy and
placid round about me in perfect dream splendor. I was six hours on my
way instead of three, as before, and they were hours full of light and
sunny bliss. My little city lay as sweetly pensive in the bright glow
of sunlight as a drifting isle of the blessed. The round, leafy,
blue-gray crowns of the trees with the little belfry peaking out above
them, appeared as if tranquilly floating above the sparkling silvery
sheet of water -
"Du bist Orplid, mein Land!