CHAPTER 11: A Death Trap.
Never did a patient receive more unremitting care than that which was lavished upon Rupert Holliday in the stately old house at Dort.
The old housekeeper, in the stiffest of dresses and starched caps, and with the rosiest although most wrinkled of faces, waited upon him; while Maria von Duyk herself was in and out of his room, brought him flowers, read to him, and told him the news; and her father frequently came in to see that he lacked nothing.

As for Hugh, he grumbled, and said that there was nothing for him to do for his master; but he nevertheless got through the days pleasantly enough, having struck up a flirtation with Maria's plump and pretty waiting maid, who essayed to improve his Dutch, of which he had by this time picked up a slight smattering.

Then, too, he made himself useful, and became a great favourite in the servants' hall, went out marketing, told them stories of the war in broken Dutch, and made himself generally at home.

Greatly astonished was he at the stories that he heard as to the land around him; how not infrequently great subsidences, extending over very many square miles, took place; and where towns and villages stood when the sun went down, there spread in the morning a sea very many fathoms deep.

Hugh could hardly believe these tales, which he repeated to Rupert, who in turn questioned Maria von Duyk, who answered him that the stories were strictly true, and that many such great and sudden catastrophes had happened.
"I can't understand it," Rupert said.