Part 72

"You've--heard nothing?" she stammered.

"Poor Rudolph," he began; but at the sound of such a beginning she put out her hands as if to ward off a ghost, and her face was so death-like I was frightened lest she was going to faint. Then, suddenly, it changed, and lit up. I never saw her so beautiful as she was at that moment. She gave a cry of joy, and the next instant our handsome brown skipper had pushed pass Mr. van Buren at the door, and had both her hands in his.

He was dripping with water. Even his hair was so wet that I saw for the first time it was curly.

"Oh, I'm so glad, so glad!" faltered Nell. "Robert said 'poor Rudolph!' and I thought----"

"I was only going to say poor Rudolph had had a bad night of it," broke in Mr. van Buren; but I don't think either of them heard.

"Were you anxious about me? Did you care?" asked Jonkheer Brederode.

That seemed to call Nell back to herself. "I was anxious about 'Lorelei,'" she said. "You've brought her back all right?"

"Yes, and 'Waterspin,'" he answered, with the joy gone out of his voice. "We had rough weather to fight against, but we've come to no harm." He turned to me wistfully. "Had you a thought to spare for the skipper once or twice to-day, Miss Rivers?"

I was so grieved for him that, before I knew what I was saying, I exclaimed----

"Why, I've thought of nothing else!"

I put out my hand to him, and he shook it as if he never meant to let it go.

"How good you are," he said warmly.

And I didn't dare look at Mr. van Buren, for the idea came to me that maybe he would not now believe what I had told him a little while ago.

* * * * * *

This morning I scolded Nell before our chaperon for her coldness to Jonkheer Brederode, when he had done so much for her.

"How could you," I asked, "when the poor fellow seemed so pleased to think you cared? It was cruel."

"I didn't want him to think I cared," Nell answered.

"Dear girl, you were quite right," said Lady MacNairne. Then she laughed. "He hoped to make our Phil jealous, I suppose, for his real thought seems to have been for her, doesn't it?"

Neither of us answered. I quite fancied last night that she had been wrong about those surmises of hers; but now, when she put it in this way, I wasn't so sure, after all.

XXIV

Nell has been very strange for the last few days, but singularly lovable to everybody except Jonkheer Brederode; and to him she has never been the same for ten consecutive minutes. Perhaps it is a mercy if Lady MacNairne is right, and he was never in love with her, though it would be sad if he thought of me in that way. I should be sorry to have any one as unhappy as I now am. It's a good thing for me that we were traveling, for if we were at home I should hardly be able to go through it without letting Nell or others suspect the change. As it is, there is always something new to keep my thoughts away from myself and other people, of whom it may be still more unwise to think.

Nell avoided Jonkheer Brederode as much as she could the morning after the storm. She said that, as he took no interest in her, it could not matter what she did so far as he was concerned. She was quite meek and subdued when she answered any question of his, until they differed about something. It was about Urk, a little island she had discovered on the map, exactly in the middle of the Zuider Zee.

When she heard that "Lorelei-Mascotte's" motor had been injured slightly, and we could not go on, she suggested that while we were waiting we might take steamer to the island, stop all night, and come back to Enkhuisen next day. By that time Hendrik, our chauffeur, would have repaired the damage.

"Urk isn't worth seeing," said our skipper.

Nell asked if he had ever been there.

"No," he replied; but he had heard that it was a dull little hole, and it would be far better to stop at Enkhuisen till next morning, when we could get away, if the weather changed, to Stavoren.

"There's nothing to do in Enkhuisen," said Nell.

"No," said he; "but there'll be less in Urk. I strongly advise you not to go."