Part 16

"Wouldn't it be better to eat it?" asked Phil.

"Can you cook? I should as soon expect to see a Burne-Jones lady run down the Golden Stair into a kitchen----"

"I can make delicious toast and tea-cakes and salad dressing--can't I, Nell?--and lots of other things."

"Pluperfect. I only wish I could. I shan't trouble your kitchen, Mr. Starr."

"But you can sing so beautifully, dear, and sketch, too; and your stories----"

"Don't dare speak of them!" I glared; and poor Phil, unselfishly anxious to show off my accomplishments to Lady MacNairne's nephew, was silent and abashed. I hoped that Mr. Starr hadn't heard.

He was delighted with our approval of the barge, and enlarged upon the good times before us. No one could know Holland properly without seeing her from the waterways, he said, and we would know her by-and-by as few foreigners did. She could not hide a secret from us that was worth finding out. He hadn't planned any regular tour for himself; he had meant to wander here and there, as the fancy seized him; but now the route was for us to decide. Whatever pleased us would please him. As for his painting, you could hardly go round a corner in Holland without stumbling on a scene for a picture, and he should come across them everywhere; he had no choice of direction. But in seven or eight weeks we could explore the waterways pretty thoroughly. Our skipper would be able to put us on the right track, and let us miss nothing. Had we, by-the-by, asked Mr. van Buren if he'd any skippers up his sleeve? Oh, well, it didn't matter that we'd forgotten. He himself had the names of several, besides some men he had already seen, and he would interview them all. It was certain that in a day or two at most, he could find exactly the right person for the place, and we might be sure that while we were away at Scheveningen he would not be idle in our common interests.

"After all, even you must admit that men are of some use," said Phil, when we were at the hotel again, waiting for Cousin Robert and his car. "Supposing you'd had to organize the tour alone, as we expected, could you have done it?"

"Of course," I replied, bravely.

"What! and engaged a chauffeur and a skipper? Who would have told you what to do? I'm sure we could never have started without your cousin Robert and Mr. Starr."

"What has Cousin Robert got to do with it?" I demanded.

Phil reflected. "Now I come to think of it, I don't know exactly. But he is so dependable; and there's so much of him."

"I hope there won't be too much," said I.

"I like tall men," remarked Phil, dreamily. Then she looked at her watch. "It's five minutes to four. He ought to be here soon."

"He'll come inside ten minutes," I prophesied.

But he came in three. I might have known he would be before his time, rather than after. And he arrived with a nice letter from his mother.

Neither Phyllis nor I had ever been in a motor-car until we got gingerly into that one. I had heard her say that she would never thus risk her life; but she made no mention of this resolution to Cousin Robert. If she had, it would have been useless; for without doubt she would in the end have had to go; and it saved time not to demur.

The car which stood throbbing at the door of the hotel was large and handsome, as if made to match my cousin, and it was painted flame color.

"I am just learning to drive," said Robert, who wore a motoring-cap which was particularly becoming. "I do not know much about automobiles yet; soon I shall buy one. It is rowing I like best, and skating in winter, though I have not time to amuse myself except at the end of weeks, for I am manager of my poor father's factory. But my fiancee likes the automobile, and to please her I am learning with my friend's car."

"That is good of you," said Phyllis.

"Yes, it is," he replied gravely. "Would you that I drive or the chauffeur? He has more experience."

I left the decision to Phil, as she is the timid one, but to my surprise she answered----

"Oh, you, of course."

Cousin Robert looked pleased. "Are you not afraid?" he inquired, beaming.

"Ye--es, I am afraid, for I've never been before. But I shall be less afraid with you than with him." And she glanced at a weedy youth who was pouring oil from a long-nosed tin into something obscure.

"Will you sit in front by my side?" he asked. And it was only after Phil had accepted the invitation that he remembered to hope I wouldn't mind the chauffeur being in the tonneau with me. "It must have been one of you," he added, "and you and I are cousins."

"Twice removed," I murmured; but he was helping Phil into the car, and did not hear.

It was a wild moment when we started. But it would have looked odd to cling to the chauffeur for protection, so I did nothing; and it calmed me to see how Phyllis bore herself. She didn't even grasp the arm of the seat; she merely gazed up into Cousin Robert's face with a sweetly feminine look, which said, "My one hope is in you, but I trust you utterly." It was enough to melt the heart of a stone giant, even when seen through goggles. I had an idea that this giant was not made of stone, and I wondered what the fiancee of my cousin twice removed was made of.