ly sooner."

"I don't see how," Robert repeated. "I was in hopes that she and Miss
Rivers, her stepsister, could have been persuaded by my mother to pay us
a long visit, and give up an objectionable plan they have. But Cousin
Helen--Nell, as Miss Rivers calls her--has been pig-headed even with my
mother. I am sure it is not Miss Rivers's fault. She is not that kind of
girl."

"Do you mind telling me the objectionable plan?" I asked.

"I shall be glad to tell," said he, "and see if you don't agree with me
that it is monstrous, though, strange to say, now mother has talked with
the girls, _she_ does not seem to think it as bad as she was inclined to
at first. She tells me that they are determined to persist, and she
thinks they will come to no harm. My cousin has been left a motor-boat
by a friend's will. You must have seen it: Captain Noble's 'Lorelei,'
which used to lie near the Rowing Club. She and Miss Rivers have come
to take a trip through the waterways of Holland, though my mother has
learned that their financial circumstances hardly warrant such an
undertaking."

"Plucky girls!" was my comment.

"Ah, but you don't know all. A young man is going with them, a strange
American young man, whom they never saw till yesterday."

"By Jove! In what capacity--as chauffeur?"

"Not at all. As a sort of paying guest, so far as I can understand the
arrangement."

"It sounds rather an odd one."

"I should say so; but I mustn't make you think it's worse than it is.
There was a misunderstanding about the boat. The American thought he'd
hired it from the caretaker, and they were sorry for his disappointment.
He has an aunt, a Scotswoman of title, who is to be of the party."

"That makes all the difference, doesn't it?--not the title, but the
aunt."

"It makes a difference, certainly; but the man may be an adventurer.
He's an artist, it appears, named Starr----"

"What, the Starr whose Salon picture made so much talk in Paris this
spring?"

"Yes; but being a good artist doesn't constitute him a good man. He
might make love to the girls."

"Beast! So he might, aunt or no aunt. She'll probably aid and abet him.
I don't know that I blame you for objecting to such an adventure for
your cousin."

"Oh, it isn't so much for her--that is, except on principle. But I've
done all I can, and my mother has done all she can, so you can imagine
what my cousin's pig-headedness is like to resist us both. My mother
tells me she c