Chapter XXX
While Walter was looking at Femke’s cap and revolving other plans of escape, the door opened and Kaatje, the girl from Holsma’s, walked in. Not recognizing her, Walter did not understand her when she said that Femke had sent her to ask how he was. He looked at the messenger searchingly; then he asked:
“Are you trying to make a fool of me?”
He had puzzled over recent events till everything seemed ghostly and unreal; and he was angry.
“My dear sir, Femke sent me.”
“What Femke? Somebody’s grandmother again.” He took a step forward; and his attitude was threatening.
“Are you that giant Miller’s sweetheart?” taking another step forward, while Kaatje fell back.
“Young man!”
Kaatje was already outside of the door, Walter close after her with his fists doubled up.
“Young man, what’s the matter with you?”
“What’s the matter with me? I’m tired of being made a fool of. You understand?”
She retreated backwards; he pursued. It may have looked comical; but that was the way his anger chose to express itself. In this manner the girl returned by the same way she came, which was the footpath across the meadow where the clothes were dried.
“Oh, heavens! If the doctor would only come.”
“What do you think of me?” Walter said, punctuating his words.
“Oh, Lord!”
“Do you think I’m drunk?”
“Oh, no, no. Not at all!”
“Or crazy?”
“No, no!—Where can the doctor be so long!”
Two very similar shouts put an end to the strained situation.
“Thank God, there he is!”
“Thank God, there it is!”
One cry came from Dr. Holsma’s coachman, who was driving up hurriedly; the other cry meant that two boys, who were fishing in the ditch for frogs, had caught Walter’s cap.
Walter accepted his lost property without question or complaint; while Kaatje, with tears in her eyes, ran up to Dr. Holsma to explain what was the matter.
“Is it really so bad?” asked that gentleman presently.
He approached Walter, who was shaking the mud from his cap, glad to think that he was concealing his embarrassment and fright.
“Well, my boy, it’s a good thing I met you here. I wanted to ask you if you wouldn’t like to take dinner with us this evening. Afterwards we will all go out for a little amusement, if you like.”
That was the tone Walter needed to hear. He burst into tears.
“Thank you, thank you! That will be nice for my mother, too.”
Holsma motioned to Kaatje, who had timidly retired to the background.
“Go to Juffrouw Pieterse and tell her that the young gentleman dines with us, and that he is going to spend the evening with us.”
“Yes,” cried Walter quickly, “and——”
The doctor looked at him anxiously. He was afraid that he saw symptoms of the alleged mental disorder; but Walter’s eye was calm and gave no ground for fear.
“M’neer, can’t she say too that I——”
“Out with it, my boy! What have you on your heart?”
“That I was with you—all day!”
Holsma reflected.
“Certainly,” he said, “all day.”
“From early this morning—from seven o’clock on.”
“From seven o’clock on,” the doctor repeated.
“And—I ate breakfast at your house.”
“Certainly, the young gentleman ate breakfast at our house. To be sure, he ate breakfast with us. Kaatje, you can ride in the carriage with us.”
As Holsma helped Walter in he gave the coachman directions to stop at Juffrouw Pieterse’s, where “the girl” was “to leave a message.” When he took a seat by his protégé, Walter pressed his hand and exclaimed: “Oh, what a good fortune it is that I found you!”
“Do you think so? It was only a—mere accident. Mrs. Claus is a——”
“A cousin?” interrupted Walter.
“Yes, and she’s a good woman,” said Holsma. “She is a cousin of ours, and I came to visit her. I do that every week, not as a physician, but as a kinsman. You can go to see her as much as you like: nothing will hurt you there.”
“M’neer!” exclaimed Walter suddenly—and he caught his breath—“I think so much of Femke!”
“So?” answered Holsma dryly. “I do too.”
The doctor was diagnosing Walter’s case; but he preferred to do it quietly. While speaking of indifferent things, he noted that Kaatje had been mistaken; that Walter was both excited and exhausted, but that his mind was unaffected. On the contrary, his mind was growing. His soul was expanding.
When Kaatje left the carriage, Walter felt that the time had come to give and receive explanations. Holsma was of a contrary opinion. He was friendly enough, but showed no inclination for heart-to-heart confidences. Walter’s confusing story was promptly interrupted.
“I’ve heard that you’re going to enter the world of business.”
“Yes, sir, the day after to-morrow.”
“Well, that isn’t bad, if you get into the right hands. You must work, though; and that’s good for boys like you.”
Fearing that Walter might imagine he was something more than the average boy, Holsma continued immediately:
“It’s a good thing for everybody, especially young people. They’re all alike; and all need to work. All boys must work; and girls, too. Everybody must work.”
Walter did not understand that the doctor was giving him a dose of medicine; but he saw that the time for explanations had not yet arrived. Still he would have felt better if he could have unburdened his mind of at least a part of those persistent memories of last night. His instinct of chivalry would have prevented him from mentioning the details of the Laps affair, which, after all, had only been an ineffective attack.
He began again; but the doctor interrupted him before he had hardly mentioned the fried potatoes.
“Yes, such things happen to everybody. That doesn’t amount to anything. The thing for young people to do—and for old people, too—is to work. It seems to be rather windy.”
That was true. If it had only been as windy yesterday.
“Do you like pictures?” asked Holsma, when they had left the carriage and were entering his home.
“Of course!”
“Good! Just go into that room. Look at everything as long as you please.”
The doctor pushed him into the room, then ran through the hall and up the stairs to prepare the family for Walter’s reception.
Walter found little pleasure in paintings. He had had no training in art. For him, a man with a dog and a hare was merely a man with a dog and a hare. He felt that a poem ought to have been written about it all; then it would have been intelligible. His glance fell on the portrait of a woman, or a queen, or a fairy, or a mayor’s daughter.
Instead of the North Holland cap she wore a diadem of sparkling stars, or rays of——
“Dinner is ready, and papa and mamma invite you to come out to the dining-room. Are you still sore after your fall?” It was little Sietske.
“I didn’t fall.”
“I mean from your fall on the table in the coffee-house. How comical! Well, if you are all right again, we’re going out this evening—papa, mamma, William, Hermann, you, I—all! We’re going to the theatre!”
Sietske had understood her orders.
“Going out?—to the theatre? But my mother——”
“Papa will attend to that. Don’t worry; he will arrange everything.”
Once out in the hall, Walter hesitated again. He motioned to Sietske and took her back into the room.
“Sietske, who is that?”
“That is a great-great-great-great-grandmother of ours.”
“But she looks like——”
“Like Femke! Of course. Like me, too. When Hermann puts on such a cap you can’t tell him from Femke. Come, now. We mustn’t keep mamma waiting.”
On entering the dining-room Walter was met by that quiet cordiality that the doctor had prescribed. When all were seated Sietske mentioned the picture again in apologizing to Walter for hurrying him away from it.
“Yes,” remarked the doctor quietly, “there is some resemblance; but Femke is not so pretty. No, not by a great deal.”
A cold douche!
Walter had never thought of Femke’s beauty. He really did not know whether the girl was pretty, or not.
“Will you take some sauce, Walter?”
She had called him brother, so solemnly, and with such a mien! Of course the lady in the portrait, with the sparkling diadem, would hold out her hand the same way. Walter made an awkward gesture with his hand.
“Salad?” asked Sietske.
“It will be crowded,” said Mevrouw Holsma. “Everyone will want to see the kings and princes. We haven’t asked our guest yet if he wants to go. We’re going to the theatre; would you like to go with us?”
Walter was charmed at the prospect. He had never been in a theatre, but had long wanted to see such a play as Leentje had described. He cared nothing for kings. He would have given a dozen kings for one baron carrying away a girl in the approved manner. The Glorioso influence was still on him.
“We shall see half of the sovereigns of Europe,” said Holsma, “and a dozen candidates——”
Walter wondered what the candidates would do in the “comedy.” Sietske explained.
There was still plenty of time. Holsma was going out to see a patient and promised to stop at Juffrouw Pieterse’s.
For reasons of fashion and feminine finery the play was not to begin till nine o’clock.
Walter heard that Femke, too, was to witness the performance; and from the conversation he gathered that the relations existing between the aristocratic family and the poor wash-girl were most cordial. Mevrouw Holsma sent Sietske to ask Femke to come in; but Femke preferred to remain with little Erich, with whom she was playing at the time.
“Erich?” thought Walter.
“I thought as much,” said Mevrouw Holsma. “That’s why she wasn’t at the table. She would rather stay with the baby.”
“She says, too, that we sit at the table too long for her,” added Sietske.
“She wouldn’t enjoy the play anyway,” observed William. “She’s a good girl, but she’s a little thick-headed. Don’t you think so, mamma?”
“Everyone must act according to his own convictions, and consult his own tastes. Femke is too good to be forced to anything.”
There must have been some special reason why the mother was going to the theatre with the rest, when she preferred to stay at home with little Erich, who had the measles. But she was going to remain “only a little while,” and then come back with Uncle Sybrand. He would return to the theatre taking Femke with him, if she cared to go.
“I call it thick-headedness,” affirmed William. “She just don’t want to put on a fine dress.”
“No, she doesn’t want to be a fine lady,” said the mother. “She is very sensible and fears that this might disturb her relations with her mother. We ought to have taken her when she was little; but Mrs. Claus couldn’t give her up then. And now Femke can’t give herself up.”
“She’s only stubborn,” William explained.
“She is proud,” corrected his mother, “too proud to appear other than she is. She wouldn’t exchange places with a princess.”
Uncle Sybrand came. He announced that the “Scylla” of Rotgans was to be given, followed by “Chloris,” with something else as a close. Holsma had already returned, bringing Walter the assurance that it was all right with his mother.
Walter was enchanted in anticipation. Was he still thinking of Femke?
William said: “So far as I’m concerned she can stay at home. Suppose the students were to see me with a peasant girl! What would they do for me when I enter college in September?”
Such an Amsterdamer calls everybody a “peasant,” even if he is a student and able to explain what sort of a “Scylla” that was.
All were now dressed and starting. Walter was to see his first “comedy,” and, perhaps, take a part in one.