"Oh!" said Miss Van Buren, and buried her nose in the map.
She and Starr were tracing, or pretending to trace, our route to Gouda, whither we were going, and where we expected to lunch. Hurriedly she threw herself into a discussion with him as to whether we were now in the Lek or the Maas. Reason said Maas, but the map said Lek, though it was a thing, thought the lady, about which there could be no two opinions; it must be one or the other.
As a matter of fact, there are many opinions, and as I knew the history of the dispute, after all she had to turn to me, and listen. I talked to Starr, and at her, explaining how only experts could tell one river from another here, and even experts differed.
"Our waters are split up into so many channels that they're as difficult to separate one from the other as the twisted strands in a plait of hair," said I. "It was like Napoleon's colossal cheek, wasn't it, to claim the Netherlands for France, because they were formed from the alluvium of French rivers?"
Instantly the Chaperon ceased to admire Tibe's new and expensive collar, and opened a silver chain bag, also glittering with newness, which she had in her lap. From this she brought forth a note-book of Russia leather, and began to write with a stylographic pen, which had dangled in a gold case on a richly furnished chatelaine. This little lady had "done" herself well since yesterday.
"I shall take notes of everything," she announced. "That bit about Napoleon goes down first."
"Surely you knew, Aunt Fay," said the Mariner, with a warning in his lifted eyebrows.
"I don't know anything about Holland, except that it's flat and wet," she replied, defying him, as she can afford to do, now that, once an aunt, she must be always an aunt, as far as this tour is concerned. "It's not the fashion in my part of Scotland for ladies of position to know things about foreign countries they've not visited. It's considered frumpish, and though I may not be as young as I once was, I am not frumpish."
She certainly is not. The real Lady MacNairne does not dress as smartly, or have such an air of Parisian elegance as this mysterious little upstart has put on since assuming her part. Save for the gray hair and the hideous glasses, there could scarcely be a daintier figure than that of the Mariner's false Aunt Fay.
"However," she went on, "my doctor has recommended a tonic, and I shouldn't wonder if a spice of information might be a mental stimulant. Anyhow, I intend to try it, and ask questions of everybody about everything."