--with its smoke cloud and widespreading
mass of buildings, like gray bubbles against the clear sky--was sinking
out of sight. We were teuf-teufing comfortably along a modest canal,
leading us southward, and Alb was explaining to the L.C.P. and the van
Buren girls that, to reach Rotterdam by the shortest way, he meant to
avoid the places we had seen: Aalsmeer, with its menagerie of little
tree-animals, and the great Haarlemmer-meer Polder. Suddenly, as the
motor's speed increased, after taking me on, Phyllis left Robert and
Nell, to come to my side. A look from her beautiful eyes warned me that
something interesting was due, and by one accord, we moved as far as
possible from our friends.

"Best of brothers," she whispered; "I've been dying to thank you. At
last my chance has come. You are wonderful! You _said_ you would, you
know, and that I was to trust you; but I never thought you _could_. How
did you do it?"

"With my little hatchet," I answered dreamily.

Her eyes opened wide. "Your--what?"

"It needed a sharp instrument," said I. "But how did you know it was
mine?"

"You were with her so much, and had so many private talks. I felt you
had a plan. But I could only _hope_, not expect. Do tell me everything."

"Suppose you tell _me_ everything," I bargained. "We may be playing at
cross purposes. What has happened to you?"

"I'm engaged," said Phyllis. "Isn't it glorious?"

"I don't know that I should go so far as to say that," I replied,
wondering why my heart was not aching harder.

"Perhaps, then, you've never been in love?" she suggested.

"Oh, haven't I? I've been in nothing else lately--except hot water."

"You do say such odd things. But I bless you, if I can't understand you.
You've made me _so_ happy."

"You didn't tell me you were in love with Robert."

"Of course not--_then_. It would have been too bold, even to tell
myself, when--he was engaged to some one else. But pity's akin to love,
isn't it? And there was no harm in pitying him because he was bound to
a--a _creature_, who could never deserve his love."

"Even if he hadn't given it to you."

"That was _fate_, wasn't it? But if it hadn't been for my clever
brother, we could never have belonged to each other."

"Some men are born brothers, some achieve brotherhood, others have it
thrust upon them," I muttered. "You and he had better take advantage of
the lull to be married," I said aloud.

"The lull?"

"In Freule Menela. She'll be