"Oh, shut up!"

"And do you know where we finish?"

"What do you mean, finish?"

"At Singapore. You know that's the regular tour."

"Oh, well.... I've heard it; but that's nonsense."

"So many of us go on that tour. It's not a circular tour, Gerrit. It doesn't bring you back ... to Paris."

"What a queer way you have of saying those things!" said Gerrit, laughing uncomfortably. "You were always a strange girl. Tell me, your father ... was a waiter, wasn't he?"

"No, a gentleman. My mother was a laundress ... in Brussels."

"And those twelve years of yours in Paris...."

"Made me into a Parisian, you think?... Gerrit, I longed for Holland!"