Chapter 12

The Laeckenhalle and the Burg were mere names to them, as few scraps are thrown to either place by the guide-books; but so delighted were they with the carvings on the house of the Cloth Spinner's Guild and the marbles in the courtyard that I could hardly get them inside. Once within, Starr made Miss Van Buren laugh at the things she ought to have respected and linger before the things I hadn't intended to point out.

But I was not shocked at her flippant delight in a quaint representation of tortures in hell, nor was I stirred by her scorn of the stiff siege-pictures, with van der Werf offering his arm as food for the starving people, rather than surrender to the Spaniards. In spite of her distaste for the painting, however, she would not hear me decry van der Werf in favor of an obscure engineer, lately discovered as the true hero of the siege. Van der Werf should not be snatched from her by a man she chose to detest, so she argued and abused my treachery during the whole time spent among the relics of the siege. She glared at the saucepan retrieved from the Spanish camp as if she would have thrown it at my head. She thought me capable of denying authenticity to the blocks of taret-gnawed wood torn from the dykes when a worm made Holland tremble as Philip of Spain could never do; nor would she forgive me van der Werf, though I did my best with the tale of that time of fear when men, women, and children worked their fingers to the bone in restoring what the worm had destroyed, and keeping the sea from their doors.

I never yielded her a point, all the way up to the Burg, for at least I was cheating Starr of her. But in the fortress, on the ancient mound heaped up by Hengist, I and my opinions were forgotten. She wanted to be let alone, and pretend she was a woman of Leiden, looking out across the red roofs of the city, through the pitiless red of the sunset, for the fleet of rescuing barges.

Nevertheless, she did deign to ask how, if the way had been opened for the sea to flood the land, the people coaxed it to go back again. And she looked at me as she had looked at Starr, while I told how the thing had been done; how the water that floated William's fleet for the relief of the town was but two feet in depth; how only a gale from the south at the right time sent the waters flowing from the broken dykes above Schiedam north as far as Leiden; and how no sooner was the city saved than the wind changed, calling back the waters.

From the walls of the fortress we saw the sun go down; and then, with Starr in the ascendant again, we strolled through quiet streets, crossing bridges over canals spread with soft green carpets of moss. But we were not going to the hotel; and without a word about dinner, I asked if they would care to see a student's "diggings." I had only to add as a bribe that Oliver Goldsmith had visited there and carved his initials in a heart on the wainscotting, to make them eager to climb the steep stairs which led to my Surprise.

It began by my opening the door at the top with a key--instead of knocking. This set them to wondering; but I laughed, evading questions, and lured them into an oak-walled room, dim with twilight.

According to instructions, no lamp or candle had been lighted, but a glance showed me a large screen wrapped round something in a corner, and I knew that I hadn't trusted good old Mevrow Hoogeboom in vain.

Now I struck a match from my own match-box, and as the flame flared up, success number one was scored. It was the old-fashioned Dutch lamp-lighter of brass, to which I touched the match, that called out the first note of admiration from the strangers; and as I woke up candle after candle, in its quaint brass stick, the first notes rose to a chorus. What a lovely room! What walls, what dear old blue-and-white china beasts, what a wonderful fireplace, with handles to hold on by as you stood and warmed yourself! What chairs, what chests of drawers, what pewter tankards! If this were a typical room of a Leiden undergraduate, the Leiden undergraduates were lucky men.

I had to explain that it was hardly fair to call it typical; that only a man with money and a love for picking up old things would have quarters like these; still, the lodgings were typical of Leiden.

When the ladies had exhausted their adjectives, they grew curious concerning their host. I told them that the man was absent, because this happened to be the night of his Promotie dinner, but that I was free to do the honors.

"Well, I'm sick with envy of the fellow," said Starr, "and I for one daren't trust myself any longer, especially on an empty stomach, among his pewters and blue beasts and brasses. We'd better go away and have dinner."

"You needn't go away," said I, jerking an old-fashioned bell-rope, and drawing the screen aside. Behind it, was what I had hoped would be there--a table laid for five, with plenty of nice glass and silver, and banked with pink and white roses. As everybody exclaimed at the sight, an inner door opened and two waiters from the Levedag, who had been biding their time for my signal, appeared in answer to the bell.

"It's black magic," said Aunt Fay. "I believe these men are genii, and you've got the lamp in your pocket. How I _wish_ I hadn't left Tibe at the hotel. He would have loved this, poor darling."

"Dinner is served, sir," announced one of the genii; and laughing, I offered the Chaperon my arm.

"But it _can't_ be for us," objected Miss Rivers.

"It's for no one else," said I.

"How can we eat the man's things, when he's never seen us, and we've never seen him?" Miss Van Buren appealed to Starr. But it was I who answered.

"You see him now," I confessed. "These are my rooms. I lend them to my cousin, but I've kept the right to use them. As for the dinner, it's my dinner, and it will be a humiliation to me if you refuse to eat it."

These words were meant for her, and I looked straight at her as I spoke, so there could be no mistake. Red sprang to her cheeks. She bit her lip, and what she would have answered or done if left to herself I shall never know, for Miss Rivers slipped one arm coaxingly within the arm of her stepsister, and said, with a laugh, to make it seem that all three were jesting----

"Why, of course she won't refuse. None of us would forgive her for spoiling our pleasure. Come along, Nell."

So Nell did "come along," like the sweet and sensible girl she really is, when she has not been driven to defiance by blundering young men; and we sat down to eat the best dinner that Leiden could provide at short notice. Nothing that was truly Dutch had been forgotten, but the most brilliant success was not the _plat_ on which the _chef_ would have staked his reputation. It was nothing more nor less than the dish with which all Leiden invariably occupies itself on the 3rd of October, anniversary of blessed memory. On that day it was, three hundred and thirty odd years ago, that a little boy ran joyously home from a flying visit to the deserted Spanish camp, with a pot of carrots and potatoes mixed together in a hotch-potch; therefore, with hotch-potch does Leiden to this hour celebrate the Great Relief, eating with thanksgiving.

And my guests ate with compliments, enjoying the idea if not the food, as if they had been Leideners. Last of all, we had grilled herrings with mustard, on toasted bread, a quaint conceit which I had to explain by telling how, on the 3rd of October, bread and herrings are still distributed to the poor, because it was with herrings and bread that the Dutch boats, coming to the relief of Leiden, were loaded.

I managed to keep the party long at the table, and when the Chaperon proposed going, I looked at my watch, counseling patience for half an hour.

"If you'll wait," I said, "I'll show you something rather special on the way home--something that can't be seen by every one."

Then I told about my cousin; how this was his great day, and how, without being invited, we could share the fun. I told how, early this morning, Jan's Paranymphs had donned evening dress, according to old custom, and driven in smart carriages (the horses' heads nodding with plumes) to the railway station to meet their principal's father, mother, sisters, and pretty cousins; how the party had then come to these rooms, where Jan had received them, half shamefaced in his "swallow-tail"; how, not long before we arrived at the University, Jan had gone through his torture in the "sweating-room," and before the examiners with his relatives present; how the ladies, after seeing the town, had been ungallantly packed off home, before the best fun began. How Jan had returned, to cast away his evening things at the time when most people think of putting them on, and rush to the Students' Club in morning dress. How his Paranymphs and friends had met him, and at a big round table--soon to be covered with glasses--the Professors' servant (called "Pedel" of the University) had handed the new Doctor his official appointment, in return for a fee of ten gulden. How the dinner had begun in speech-making and music, with an adjournment after the first part, to the garden for coffee, liqueurs, and cigars; how, when the table had been cleared and rearranged, everybody had marched back to risk their lives by eating lobster and quantities of indigestible things. How Jan would then have had to make his "palaver," thanking his friends for their speeches in his honor; and how, while he was speaking, the waiters would be placing a large napkin at the plate of each man--a mere napkin, but destined for an outlandish purpose. "By this time," I went on mysteriously, "those napkins are fulfilling their destiny, and if you would like to see what it is, you've only to follow me."

They were on their feet in an instant. We scrambled down the narrow stairs, and out into the starlit night. Leiden was a city of the dead. Not even a dog played sentinel for the sleeping townsfolk; not a cat sprang out of the shadows as I led my band through a labyrinth of canal-streets, floored as if with jet nailed down with stars. But suddenly the spell of silence was broken by an explosion of sound which crashed into it like breaking glass. A brassy blare of music that could not drown young men's laughter, burst on us so unexpectedly that the three ladies gave starts, and stifled cries. I stopped them at a corner, and we huddled into the shadow, flattened against a wall.

"The Napkins are coming!" I said, and I had not got the words out before the blue darkness was aflame with the red light of streaming torches, a wild light which matched the band music. There was a trampling of feet, and in the midst of smoke and ruddy flare sequined with flying sparks, came torch-bearers and musicians, led by one man of solemn countenance, holding in both hands a noble Nougat Tart--the historic, the indispensable Nougat Tart. Then, with a measured trot that swung and balanced with the music, followed the Napkins, wound turban-fashion round the heads of their wearers, and floating like white banners with the breeze of motion. First came a Paranymph thus adorned, then the learned Doctor holding fast to the leader's coat-tails; behind him the second Paranymph, and clinging to his coat the hero's father, with the whole procession of turbaned friends tailing after.

They swept by us as a comet sweeps down the sky, and concerned themselves with our group against the wall no more than a comet does with such humble stars, dusting the outskirts of the Milky Way, as shrink from his fiery path.

"A vision of goblins," said the Mariner, when he had got his breath.

"What fun! But why do they do it?" asked Miss Rivers.

"Why? I'm sure I don't know," I laughed, "except because they always have, and I suppose always will, while there's a university at Leiden. That's all we'll see, but it isn't all there is to see. By-and-by the procession will go prancing back to the Club, where the next thing will be to get over the big reading-table, then over the buffet of the bar, without once breaking the chain of coat-tails, through passages and kitchens to the club-room once more, where the chain will be split up, but where the chairs in which the men will sit to drink champagne and eat the Nougat Tart, must be _on_ the tables and not round them."

"And will that be the end?" inquired the Chaperon, who ever thirsts with ardor for information.

"Not nearly," said I. "The third part of dinner will be due, and every one's bound to eat it, even those whose chairs have fallen off from the pyramids of small tables, and whose heads or bones have suffered. They'll have dessert; and at dawn the best men will be taking a country drive."

"I begin to understand," said Starr, "how your people exhausted the Spaniards. Good heavens, you could wear out the Rock of Gibraltar! And I see why, though you can eat all day and all night too, you don't put on fat like your German cousins."

"When we begin a thing, we Dutchmen see it through," I replied modestly.

"So do we Americans," remarked Miss Van Buren.

"I wonder which would win if the two interests were opposed?" I hazarded, a propos of nothing--or of much.

"I should bet on America," said she.

"I _don't_ bet," I returned, with all the emphasis I dared give; though perhaps it was not enough to tear up a deep-rooted impression; albeit the seed had been sown for but four-and-twenty hours.

So ended the lesson for the first day.

It was not an easy lesson for me. But I regret nothing.

XIII

"Look here," said the Mariner next morning, rapping on my door at the hotel, "how soon could we start for Katwyk?"

"I thought the expedition was given up," I answered, "as nobody spoke of it last night."

"Not in your presence, but my worthy aunt rejoices in a sitting-room, and we met there--some of us--to discuss the expedition. The girls _think_ they're keen to go, but it's a case of hypnotism. _She_ wants a thing, and in some curious way, known only to herself, she gives others the impression that they are wanting it frantically."

"I've noticed that," said I.

"Oh, you have? Well, she's a wonderful woman. I daren't dwell upon the things she's got out of me already, or ask myself what she'll get before the play's finished. That sitting-room, for instance, I suppose it will end in her always having one. Did you observe Tibe's collar? It cost twenty-five dollars, and the queer part is that I _offered_ it to her. I thought at the time I wanted him to have it. Now, I ask you, as man to man, is it _canny_? And she has a traveling-bag with gold fittings. I presented it under the delusion that I owed it to her as my--temporary relative. Heavens, where is this to end? Not at Katwyk, with the Rhine. But we've got to go there. Anything to please her."

Strange to say, the hypnotic influence must have stolen up from her ladyship's room on the floor below, and along the corridor to mine, for I found myself thinking: "She rather likes me, and can be useful, if she dominates the two girls in this way. I must do my best to keep her on my side."

No doubt this was the form the influence took, but I made no struggle against it. On the contrary, I assured Starr that the expedition to Katwyk would be a good expedition; that I would be dressed in ten minutes; that I didn't mind about breakfast, but would have a cup of coffee with Hendrik; that if the party came on board "Lorelei" in half an hour, they would find her ready.

"All right, I'll tell them," said he. "I did want to stop and see a few pictures, for it seems a burning shame to leave the town where Gerard Douw, and Steen, and lots of other splendid chaps were born, without worshiping at their shrines, but----"

"They're rather bare shrines at Leiden," I consoled him. "You've seen much better specimens of their work elsewhere. You'd be disappointed."

"Just as well to think so. I'll give your message; but as there are three ladies and one dog, you'd better expect us when you see us."

In spite of this fact I had little time to spare, though it appeared that _en route_ to the boat a delay was caused by Tibe jumping into a cab with two elderly ladies from Boston, who, so far from reciprocating his overtures, nearly swooned with terror, and had to be soothed and sustained by the entire party.

The canal that leads from Leiden to Katwyk-aan-Zee passes the houses of Descartes and Spinoza; and altogether the short journey by water did not lack interest, for Katwyk has become a colony of artists. Once there, we walked to the sluice where the Rhine seeks its grave in the North Sea; and as it happened that the tide was high, with a strong shore wind, I could show the Cyclopean defenses of our coast at their best. With the secret pleasure which I believe all men take in pointing out things to women, I explained the great series of gates through which the river passes to its death. All were closed against the raging waves, which leaped and bellowed, demanding entrance, rearing their fierce heads twelve feet or more above the level where the Rhine lay dying. When the tide should turn, and the wild water retreat, the sluice-gates would be opened, and the river would pour sea-ward, sweeping away the masses of sand piled up in fury by the cheated waves.

We lunched on board the "Lorelei," I munching abjectly on deck, on duty at the wheel, while from the cabin below came to my ears the tinkling of girls' laughter, and the merry popping of corks. In theory I was better off than Tantalus, for Tantalus had no beer or sandwiches; but, on the other hand Tantalus was not in love with a girl whose voice he could hear mingling with his rival's; so practically there was not much to choose.

Luckily I had not to bear the strain for long. I did my best yesterday, in talking of Haarlem, to awaken interest in the huge Haarlemmer-meer Polder, and its importance in the modern scheme of the Netherlands. Now my eloquence was rewarded, for they hurried through their luncheon, not that they might cheer the skipper's loneliness, but that they might miss no feature in the landscape.

We were skirting one side of the green plain which has been reclaimed from the water, converting the meer into a "polder." Our canal flowed many feet above the level of the surrounding land, so that we looked down upon men tilling, upon white-sailed boats cutting through miniature waterways as if they navigated meadows, and upon cows grazing knee-deep in mist, which rose like blowing silver spray, over the pale-green waves of grass.

These black-and-white cattle, according to Miss Van Buren, form the upper circles of the cow-world in Holland. Not only do they live up to their traditions by being cleaner and sleeker than the cows of other countries, but they know themselves to be better connected than the mere red-and-white creatures with whom they are occasionally forced to share a meadow. To show that they understand what is due to their dignity, they refuse to talk with the common herd, and stand with their backs to any red-and-white nonentity that may presume to graze near, conversing among themselves in refined monotones with the air of saying, "Who _was_ she?"

There's little in the history of the Netherlands which Miss Van Buren does not know, for she is proud of her Dutch blood, though she won't say so before me. The others are frankly ignorant; but the Chaperon has read a book of Rider Haggard's called "Lysbeth," and was deeply interested in the Haarlemmer-meer, where the "treasure" of that story lay hid; but it was news to her that the great inland sea had once sent a destructive flood to the gates of Amsterdam, and that as punishment it had been drained away. Miss Van Buren--whom I think of as "Nell"--knew all this, including the very day in 1840 when the work was begun, and how many months the pumps had taken to drink the monstrous cup dry; but the mysterious little lady who rules us all, and is ruled by Tibe, expected to find the Haarlemmer-meer still a lake, and was disappointed to learn the meaning of "polder." She thought thirty-nine months too long for draining it, and was sure that in America (where she quickly added that she had "once been") they would have done the work in half the time.

Every one fell in love with the outskirts of Haarlem, as "Lorelei" swam into the River Spaarne. Though the glory of the tulips was extinguished (like fairy-lamps at dawn) three months ago, the flowers of summer blazed in their stead, a brilliant mosaic of jewels.

"The Dutch don't seem a nation to have gone mad over a tulip; but perhaps they were different in the seventeenth century," said Miss Rivers, looking at me, as if I stood to represent my people.

"And the English don't seem the kind to have lost their heads over a South Sea Bubble, but they did," retorted Nell, as if she were defending us.

They liked the houses along the river-side, houses big and little, which look as if the front and back walls of their lower stories had been knocked out, and the space filled in with glass. They were amused by the rounded awnings over the balconies, which Nell likened to the covers of giant babies' perambulators; and they laughed at the black-painted doors picked out with lines of pale green, which contrasted with a whitewashed facade.

At Haarlem I had another surprise for them, which I arranged before leaving Rotterdam. It was one which would cost nothing in trouble, little enough in money, and would give pleasure to everybody--except to my chauffeur, who is in love with my mother's French maid, and no doubt was reveling in the thought of a long holiday at Liliendaal.

When I'd brought "Lorelei" through the bridge, and hove her to by the broad quay, there stood close at hand a handsome, dark-blue motor-car.

"What a beauty!" exclaimed Nell. "That's much grander than Robert's." Then she glanced at me. "I beg your pardon," said she, demurely. "I'm afraid the car my cousin has is yours."

"So is this," said I.

"Dear me, what is It doing here?" she demanded, sorry to have praised a possession of the enemy's.

"It's waiting to take you round Haarlem," I replied. "I thought it would be a nice way for you to see the place, as the suburbs are its speciality, so to speak, and motoring saves time."

"You're a queer chap, Alb," remarked the Mariner. "You have such a way of keeping things up your sleeve, and springing them on one. You ought to be called 'William the Silent.'"

"Why, that's what he is called, didn't you know? Mr. van Buren told us," exclaimed Phyllis, and ended up her sentence with a stifled shriek which could have meant nothing but a surreptitious pinch.

I would not have glanced at either of the girls for anything; but I would have given something to know how Nell was looking.

"Have you any more belongings here?" asked the Chaperon, gaily. "Such as an ancestral castle, where you could give us another surprise feast?"

I laughed. "As a matter of fact, I have an ancestral castle in the neighborhood. It isn't mine, but it was my ancestors', and if I can't exactly entertain you in it, I can give you tea close by at a country inn. Perhaps you've read about the Chateau of Brederode, within a drive of Haarlem?"

I saw by Nell's face that she had, but she was the only one who did not answer, and the others hadn't informed themselves of its existence.

Hendrik, helped by my chauffeur, got out the small luggage which is kept ready for shore duty--the Chaperon's splendidly-fitted dressing-bag making everything else look shabby--and the five of us (six with Tibe) got into the car, I taking the driver's seat.