"And I must thank you," said Amine, looking inquiringly in Philip's face. "O, how much have I to thank you for!--and indeed I am grateful." "Yes, yes, she is very grateful," interrupted the old man; "but we are poor--very poor. I talked about my money because I have so little, and I cannot afford to lose it; but you shall not pay me the three guilders and a half--I am content to lose that, Mr Philip." "Why should you lose even that, Mynheer Poots?--I promised to pay you, and will keep my word. I have plenty of money--thousands of guilders, and know not what to do with them." "You--you--thousands of guilders!" exclaimed Poots. "Pooh, nonsense, that won't do." "I repeat to you, Amine," said Philip, "that I have thousands of guilders: you know I would not tell you a falsehood." "I believed you when you said so to my father," replied Amine. "Then perhaps, as you have so much, and I am so very poor, Mr Vanderdecken--" But Amine put her hand upon her father's lips, and the sentence was not finished. "Father," said Amine, "it is time that we retire. You must leave us for to-night, Philip." "I will not," replied Philip; "nor, you may depend upon it, will I sleep. You may both to bed in safety. It is indeed time that you retire--good-night, Mynheer Poots. I will but ask a lamp, and then I leave you--Amine, good-night." "Good-night," said Amine, extending her hand, "and many, many thanks." "Thousands of guilders!" muttered the old man, as Philip left the room and went below. Chapter V Philip Vanderdecken sat down at the porch of the door; he swept his hair from his forehead, which he exposed to the fanning of the breeze; for the continued excitement of the last three days had left a fever on his brain which made him restless and confused. He longed for repose, but he knew that for him there was no rest. He had his forebodings--he perceived in the vista of futurity a long-continued chain of danger and disaster, even to death; yet he beheld it without emotion and without dread. He felt as if it were only three days that he had begun to exist; he was melancholy, but not unhappy. His thoughts were constantly recurring to the fatal letter--its strange supernatural disappearance seemed pointedly to establish its supernatural origin, and that the mission had been intended for him alone; and the relic in his possession more fully substantiated the fact.