"Go on thinking so, then," I sighed; "and anything else that will make you happy—little sister."
"Thank you. Now I know, by the mysterious way you're looking at me, that you have done something. I believe you made him—I mean Mr. van Buren—come to see us again sooner than he intended to."
"Perhaps. And perhaps I made him bring Freule Menela with him."
"Did you? I wish—but no. I mustn't think of that."
"Wait a few hours and then think what you like," said I. Yet I spoke gloomily. I could see where the Viking was to come in. But I could not so clearly see how I was to get out.
We walked a very long way before any one seemed to wonder where we were going, and why we should be going there; but at last we came to a tea-garden, or a beer-garden, or both; and the L.C.P. said that we must stop and give Tibe a bowl of milk.
Not a member of the party who did not appear singularly absent-minded, on stopping and grouping with the others again, not excepting Tibe himself; but his absent-mindedness was caused only by the antics of a water-rat, which he would have liked to see added to his milk. When it occurred to him to drink the milk, unenriched by such an addition, we were all eating pink and white ices, and Dutch cakes that must have been delicious to those who had no Freule Menela sticking in their throats.
Phyllis walked beside me all the way back to the hotel, and was dearer than ever now that, through my own quixotic act, I saw her rapidly becoming unattainable. But, as the ladies said good-night to us at the foot of the stairs, Freule van der Windt contrived to whisper, as she slipped her hand into mine—"For better for worse, I've taken your advice, Mr. Starr. I am absolutely free."
"How did you manage it?" I heard myself asking.
"Robert insisted on living in Rotterdam. He wouldn't even consent to winter at The Hague, though it's so near; so his blood is on his own head."