There isn't any other."

"I shall try."

"Well, promise me you won't propose for a fortnight, anyhow; or until I
give you leave."

"We--all--always--do whatever you wish us to, extraordinary lady. I
wonder why?"

"You must go on wondering. But in the meantime I will--"

"You will----"

"Try to save you--as you saved Tibe."

XX

The Mariner was restless when we landed at the strange town of
Monnikendam, and had the air--or I imagined it--of expecting something.
As we walked through the wide Hoog Straat, he glanced absent-mindedly at
the rows of beautiful seventeenth century houses, as if he feared to see
Sir Alec MacNairne spring from behind some ornamented, ancient door, to
accuse him as a perjured villain. Even the exquisite church tower, which
has the semblance of holding aloft a carved goblet of old silver, did
not appeal to him as it would if he had not been preoccupied. And
instead of laughing at the crowds of children who clattered after us,
waking the clean and quiet streets with the ring of sabots, he let them
get upon his nerves. The girls were amused, however, and said that the
little pestering voices babbling broken English without sense or
sequence, were like the voices of the story in the "Arabian
Nights"--haunting voices which tempted you to turn round, although you
had been warned beforehand that, if you did, you would lose your human
form and become a stone.

Tibe was the real attraction; a sadder and wiser Tibe than the Tibe of
an hour ago, so sad and so wise that he did not even attempt to insist
upon a friendship with three snow-white kids which joined the procession
of his admirers.

Starr walked beside his aunt, as if to protect her in case of need; and
once or twice when I tried to attract their attention to some notable
facade or doorway, they were absorbed in conversation, and might as well
have been in New York as in Monnikendam on the Zuider Zee.

When I had shown the party what I thought best worth seeing, I had to
leave them to their own resources, and go alone to the boat. Hendrik
could not navigate "Lorelei" and her square-shouldered companion through
the series of locks by which the canal pours its soul into the heart of
the Zuider Zee.

It took me half an hour to do it, and when I had brought the two craft
to the last of the sea-locks, the four people and the one dog were
waiting for me, the most persistent of the children hovering in the
distance.

"It's a bigg