The Chauffeur and the Chaperon Part 34

"What?"

"Rouse her to jealousy."

I laughed bitterly. "Tell me to get her the moon."

"Flirt with Miss Rivers."

"My dear madam, you've proved to me that I'm a fool; but I'm neither cad nor hypocrite."

"Dear me, if _that's_ the way you're going to take it, you're lost. Our dear Ronny will s.n.a.t.c.h her from under your nose, although she isn't a bit in love with him, and _is_ with you, if you'd consent to shake her up a little."

"Starr is in love with them both."

"He was; or rather he was in love with being in love. But because you want Miss Van Buren, out of pure contrariness he thinks now that he wants her. Beware of her kindness. If you should be deluded by it into proposing, she'd send you about your business, and perhaps accept the other man because she was wretched, and didn't quite realize what was the matter."

"You're a gloomy prophetess," I said miserably.

"You won't take my advice?"

"No. I can't do that. I must do the best I can for myself in some other way."

"There isn't any other."

"I shall try."

"Well, promise me you won't propose for a fortnight, anyhow; or until I give you leave."

"We--all--always--do whatever you wish us to, extraordinary lady. I wonder why?"

"You must go on wondering. But in the meantime I will--"

"You will----"

"Try to save you--as you saved Tibe."

XX

The Mariner was restless when we landed at the strange town of Monnikendam, and had the air--or I imagined it--of expecting something.

As we walked through the wide Hoog Straat, he glanced absent-mindedly at the rows of beautiful seventeenth century houses, as if he feared to see Sir Alec MacNairne spring from behind some ornamented, ancient door, to accuse him as a perjured villain. Even the exquisite church tower, which has the semblance of holding aloft a carved goblet of old silver, did not appeal to him as it would if he had not been preoccupied. And instead of laughing at the crowds of children who clattered after us, waking the clean and quiet streets with the ring of sabots, he let them get upon his nerves. The girls were amused, however, and said that the little pestering voices babbling broken English without sense or sequence, were like the voices of the story in the "Arabian Nights"--haunting voices which tempted you to turn round, although you had been warned beforehand that, if you did, you would lose your human form and become a stone.

Tibe was the real attraction; a sadder and wiser Tibe than the Tibe of an hour ago, so sad and so wise that he did not even attempt to insist upon a friendship with three snow-white kids which joined the procession of his admirers.

Starr walked beside his aunt, as if to protect her in case of need; and once or twice when I tried to attract their attention to some notable facade or doorway, they were absorbed in conversation, and might as well have been in New York as in Monnikendam on the Zuider Zee.

When I had shown the party what I thought best worth seeing, I had to leave them to their own resources, and go alone to the boat. Hendrik could not navigate "Lorelei" and her square-shouldered companion through the series of locks by which the ca.n.a.l pours its soul into the heart of the Zuider Zee.

It took me half an hour to do it, and when I had brought the two craft to the last of the sea-locks, the four people and the one dog were waiting for me, the most persistent of the children hovering in the distance.

"It's a bigger town than Broek-in-Waterland, but not as interesting,"

said the Chaperon, looking back disparagingly in the direction of Monnikendam, "nor as clean. I saw five bits of paper in as many streets, and a woman we met didn't appear at all inclined to commit suicide because she'd desecrated the pavement by upsetting a pail of milk: whereas in Broek she'd have been hauled off to prison. Each house in Broek looked like a model in jewelry, and the whole effect was like a _presepio_ cut in pasteboard; but the Monnikendam houses are big enough for people to lie out straight in, when they go to bed, which seems quite commonplace. Except for that church tower, and a few doorways, and the wonderful costumes, and the shoe-shop where they sell nothing but sabots, I don't see why we bothered to stop at Monnikendam."

"I thought you were keen to visit the Dead Cities of the Zuider Zee,"

said I.

She stared at me as blankly as if she had not been prophesying my doom a little while ago.

"What's that got to do with Monnikendam?" she demanded.

"Only that Monnikendam _is_ one of the Dead Cities; your first," I explained; but she cried incredulously----

"Monnikendam a Dead City of the Zuider Zee? _Say_ it isn't true."

"I'm afraid it is."

"Oh, then I _am_ disappointed! I thought we should come to the Dead Cities along the sh.o.r.e of the sea. That we'd see gra.s.s-grown streets lined with empty houses fallen half to pieces, and that perhaps if the water were clear we could look down, down, and spy steeples and ruined castles glimmering at the bottom. Won't some be like that?"

"Not one," I said. "They won't be any deader than Monnikendam, which was once the playground of merchant princes. I thought it was dead enough."

"Not to please me," she answered, with the air of a Madame Defarge in blue spectacles.

The Mariner came up before we had got into open sea. For the moment the three ladies were occupied in watching Tibe, who had fallen asleep in his cape, and was running with all his feet in some wild dream, flickering in every muscle, and wrinkling his black mug into alarming grimaces.

"Look here," said Starr, cautiously, "do you think we can paint out the name of 'Lorelei' when we get to Volendam, or must we engage a man to do it? Of course, if we could, it would cause less remark, especially if we did the job in the evening or early morning."

"What! you took that idea of mine seriously?" I asked.

"Certainly. It was a brilliant one."

"I doubt if Miss Van Buren would consent," said I.

"She has, already."

"By Jove! What excuse did you make for asking her?"

"I didn't ask her. What I did was to put the notion into darling Auntie's head. I knew after that, the thing was as good as done. I remarked in my vaguest way that it was a wonder some catastrophe hadn't happened to Tibe or other less important members of the party, on board a boat named 'Lorelei.' I didn't exactly _say_ it was an unlucky name, but somehow or other she seemed to think so at the end of our conversation. Then she had a conversation with Miss Van Buren; and the consequence is that the sooner 'Lorelei's' name is changed to 'Mascotte'

the better the owner will be pleased; and no questions asked."

"By Jove!" said I, again. There's something uncanny about the Mariner's adopted relative. I would give a good deal to know what she's planning to do for me; for if she has decided that my name had better be painted on or off any heart of her acquaintance, I have little doubt it will be.

Once out of the sluice, we were immediately in the Zuider Zee, whose yellow waves rocked "Lorelei" as if she were a cradle, causing the barge to wallow heavily in our wake. Should the weather be rough at any time when we have seaports to visit, "Lorelei" and her consort will have to lie in harbor, and the party must be satisfied to do the journey on a commonplace pa.s.senger-boat. But on such a day as this there was no danger, no excuse for seasickness, although I half expected the ladies to ask if we were safe. Apparently, however, the doubt did not enter their heads. So far we have had neither accident nor stoppage of any kind, and they have ceased to think it possible that anything can happen to the motor.

Marken, with its tall-spired church, soon appeared to our eyes, the closely grouped little island-town seeming to float on the waves as San Giorgio Maggiore does at Venice, in the sunset hour.

In spite of my sneers at the island theater and its performers, eagerness betrayed itself in the manner of my pa.s.sengers, as we approached Marken, full petrol ahead.