"Mascotte" and "Waterspin" were at rest, and I could avail myself of Alb"s absence to find out if I liked. I was not at all sure that I did like. Nevertheless, something urged me to go, and before I quite knew how or why I had come there, I stood beside the pretty white figure.
Nell looked up at me, radiant with emotion.
"Oh, Mr. Starr, you were just the one I wanted to see," she exclaimed.
"I was _willing_ you to come."
"Well, I came," I said, smiling. "I"m glad you want me."
"I want to ask you what to do. I sent him away. You know, we must stop on board till Lady MacNairne"s better, so--there"s no hurry, and--he had to change. At first he _wouldn"t_ go without an answer. But I told him I _must_ have ten minutes to make up my mind. He"s explained everything.
He was never to blame. It was all Freule Menela"s fault--and mine.
Please say what you think. You know him so well; you"re old friends.
There"s no one else I can talk to, and--I feel somehow--I have for a long time--almost as if you were a kind of--adopted brother."
Brother again! Blow after blow; let them fall now, one upon another. I had feared this, yet would not expect it. But I suppose I must unwittingly have been born a brother.
"That"s right," said I. "Go on--little sister." The words were getting quite familiar now.
"He says that he has never stopped loving me--dreadfully--desperately--from the very first. But I was _so_ sure it was only a fancy, and--and that when I was so bad to him, and Phyllis so kind, he began to care for her instead. Just now, when you said I must pretend to be engaged to him, I was thinking how horrid it would be for him to feel, "Oh, if it were only Phyllis!" Didn"t you suppose he was in love with Phyllis?"
"Never," I heard myself a.s.suring her; "never."
"I"m _so_ glad. You"re sure, then, that he knows his own mind, that he isn"t asking me to go on being really engaged to him just to save my feelings after that scene with Sir Alec MacNairne?"
"I"m _dead_ sure," I said.
"You perfect dear! I _do_ like you. Oh, wasn"t it too funny--I can say it, now we"re brother and sister--he thought I might be in love with _you_."
"Owl!" I remarked.
"And all the time I was so horribly afraid he might suspect I cared that I would hardly speak a word to him. Besides, I didn"t suppose he could be bothered listening to anything _I_ might have to say. And I felt quite _sorry_ for him when Phyllis was engaged to Robert. Dear Phil, I"ve been horrid to her, too. You see, she was trying to persuade herself to take Rudolph without loving him, and I just _hated_ her for it."
"Oh, that was what you meant, then!" I exclaimed.
"What I meant?"
"It doesn"t matter. Well, make your mind easy, sweet sister. Alb adores you--has adored you since the first moment he set eyes on you, and will till he closes them in death. That"s my conviction as his lifetime friend. And my advice is, go on being engaged to him until you marry him."
"Mariner, what an old trump you are!" broke in Brederode. And there he was behind me, neat as a pin, in his own suit of clothes, and radiant in his new suit of happiness.
"I give her to you, Alb," said I. And then I strolled away again, humming to the air of the Dead March, in Saul, or something equivalent, those haunting words--
_Giving agreeable girls away---- One for you, and one for you, but never, never one for me!_
x.x.xVII
I felt, when I waked up on the morning of b.u.t.ter-market-day at Middelburg, as if I had not slept at all, but had listened throughout the night to the sweet, the incredibly sweet chimes that floated like perfume in the air. Yet I suppose I must have slept, for the bells had sometimes stopped playing their one melodious tune, to tinkle in my dreams, "One for you, and one for you, but never, _never_ one for me?"
The hotel is a nice hotel, and there is a garden. After breakfast, I was so tired of brotherliness, of beaming at happy couples, and hearing plans about weddings, that instead of going forth to see the famous Thursday Middelburg sights, at which the world comes from afar to gaze, I slipped away and hid in the garden.
Phyllis and Robert were out together. Rudolph and Nell were out together. Both parties conscientiously believed that they were out for sight-seeing; that their object was to behold matrons and maidens in white caps, quaint fichus, meek, straight bodices, and swelling skirts; to admire pretty faces, with tinkling gold ornaments at their temples; to stare at young arms, red under incredibly tight short sleeves, as they bore baskets of eggs or pats of b.u.t.ter to market. How well I knew the whole scene from photographs!--the bell-like figures of the women; the booths in the big market square; and the cool arcades of the b.u.t.ter-market. How well I knew, too, that neither Phyllis and Robert, nor Rudolph and Nell would see anything at all, or remember it, if by accident they did see aught save each other.
"This," I said to myself, "is the end. We may go back to Rotterdam together, if we like. But everything"s as much changed as if it were another party. And this, this is what I"ve slaved for--fibbed for--plotted for! "Giving agreeable girls away!" Faugh!" I felt as much injured as if I were a misunderstood saint, though, when one comes to look at it, perhaps I have not always played precisely the part of saint.
While I lolled gloomily on an extremely uncomfortable seat, not meant for lolling, I heard a faint rustling in the gra.s.s behind me, and Tibe appeared, to lay his head, in a matter-of-course way, upon my knee.
"Where"s your mistress?" I asked mechanically. "Have you changed, too, like all the rest, and left her alone?"
"Here I am," answered the L.C.P., as if the question had been addressed to her. "I thought you"d be in the garden, so I came to find you. Why don"t you go out and see things?"
"Why don"t you?" I echoed.
"Because I didn"t like to feel that you were all by yourself," she answered.
"You needn"t have troubled about me," I said. "n.o.body else does."
She laughed that quaint, quiet little laugh, which suits her. "That"s different. They"re engaged to each other--all the rest of them. I"m engaged--_by_ you."
"Don"t let that engagement keep you from amusing yourself," I said. "The bargain"s off now. I hired an aunt to further my interests. Every one else"s have been furthered except mine."
"That"s not my fault, is it?"
"I know it isn"t," I a.s.sured her. "Don"t think I"m finding fault with you. On the contrary, you"re really a marvelous being. But Oth.e.l.lo"s occupation"s gone."
"Yes," said she. "For both of us. I retire from aunthood, you retire from nephewhood, with mutual respect, Is that it?"
"I suppose so," I gloomily replied. "Yet I"m loth to part with you, somehow. You and Tibe are all I have left in the world. But now I must lose you both."
"You don"t need an aunt," she said.
"No, but I need some one; I don"t know exactly who. Robert has s.n.a.t.c.hed one of my loves, Rudolph the other. What am I to do?"
"Come to the house and into my sitting-room, and let"s talk it over,"
she suggested invitingly.
I obeyed.
There were flowers in her sitting-room. There always are. The scent of late roses was sad, yet soothing.
"Excuse me a minute. I"m going into the next room to make myself pretty before we begin our talk; but I won"t be long, and Tibe shall keep you company," said the L.C.P.
"You"re well enough as you are," I said.
But she went, smiling; and I hardly missed her, I was so busy with my own thoughts.