said; "I do not disturb
you?"

"Yes, occupied in dishing up the dinner," Julia said, "which is just
the best of all times for you to have come. Johnny!" she called;
"Johnny, Joost is here."

Mr. Gillat, who had been carefully placing the dish where the cinders
would fall into it, came to the door.

"This is Mr. Gillat, a very old friend of mine," Julia explained, and
Joost bowed deeply, offering his hand and saying, "I hope that you are
well, sir."

Whereupon Mr. Gillat impressed, imitated him as nearly as he could,
and Julia looked away.

They had dinner in the kitchen on Sundays as well as week days, they
made no difference to-day. Joost looked round him once or twice; he
had never seen a place like this. It was the front kitchen; the
cooking and most of the house-work was done in the back one, a big
barn-like place with doors in all corners. The front one was half a
kitchen and half a sitting-room, warm-coloured, with red-tiled floor
and low ceiling, heavily cross-beamed and hung with herbs and a couple
of hams, in great contrast to the whiteness of the kitchen at the bulb
farm. There were brass and copper pots and pans such as he knew, but
they reflected an open fire, a dirty extravagance unknown to Mevrouw.
Joost glanced at the fire, and it is to be feared that he was at heart
a traitor to his native customs. Then he looked at the open window
where the sunshine streamed in--as was never permitted in Holland--and
he wondered if it really spoilt things very much, and, being a
florist, thought it certainly would spoil the tulips in the mug that
stood on the wide sill.

During dinner they spoke English for the sake of the Captain and Mr.
Gillat; Joost spoke well, if slowly, with a careful and accurate
precision. He also observed much, both of outside things, as the fact
that Johnny and the Captain cleared the table while Julia sat still,
contrary to Dutch custom. And also of things less on the surface--as
that Julia was head of the household and that Captain Polkington was
not the impressive and authoritative person Mijnheer seemed to think.
Concerning this last fact he made no remark when, on his return home,
he described the ways and customs of Julia's cottage to his parents.
The description served Mevrouw at least, as representative of all
English households ever afterwards.

When dinner was done and everything cleared up, or rather Julia's
part, she took Joost into the garden.

"Now," she said in Dutch