Part 23 (1/2)
”And so I do,” I cried. ”I should be perfectly miserable if I had to give him up just as he is getting teeth, and so wakeful.”
”What are you taking to keep up. your strength, dear?” asked Aunty.
”Nothing in particular,” I said.
”Very well, it is time the doctor looked after that,” she cried. ”It really never will do to let you run down in this way. Let me look at baby. Why, my child, his gums need lancing.”
”So I have told Ernest half a dozen times,” I declared. ”But he is always in a hurry, and says another time will do.”
”I hope baby won't have convulsions while he is waiting for that other time,” said Aunty, looking almost savagely at Martha. I never saw Aunty so nearly out of humor.
At dinner Martha began.
”I think, brother, the baby needs attention. Mrs. Crofton has been here and says so. And she seems to find Katherine run down. I am sure if I had known it I should have taken her in hand and built her up.
But she did not complain.”
”She never complains,” father here put in, calling all the blood I had into my face, my heart so leaped for joy at his kind word.
Ernest looked at me and caught the illumination of my face.
”You look well, dear,” he said. ”But if you do not feel so you ought to tell us. As to baby, I will attend to him directly.”
So Martha's one word prevailed where my twenty fell to the ground.
Baby is much relieved, and has fallen into a sweet sleep. And I have had time to carry my tired, oppressed heart to my compa.s.sionate Saviour, and to tell Him what I cannot utter to any human ear. How strange it is that when, through many years of leisure and strength, prayer was only a task, it is now my chief solace if I can only s.n.a.t.c.h time for it.
Mrs. Embury has a little daughter. How glad I am for her! She is going to give it my name That is a real pleasure.
JULY 4.-Baby is ten months old to-day, and in spite of everything is bright and well. I have come home to mother. Ernest waked up at last to see that something must be done, and when he is awake he is very wide awake. So he brought me home. Dear mother is perfectly delighted, only she will make an ado about my health. But I feel a good deal better, and think I shall get nicely rested here. How pleasant it is to feel myself watched by friendly eyes, my faults excused and forgiven, and what is best in me called out. I have been writing to Ernest, and have told him honestly how annoyed and pained I was at learning that he had told his secret to Dr. Cabot.
JULY 12.-Ernest writes that he has had no communication with Dr.
Cabot or any one else on subject that, touching his father's honor as it does, he regards as a sacred one.
”You say, dear,” be said, ”you often say, that I do not understand you. Are you sure that you understand me ?”
Of course I don't. How can I? How can I reconcile his marrying me and professing to do it with delight, with his indifference to my society, his reserve, his carelessness about my health?
But his letters are very kind, and really warmer than he is. I can hardly wait for them, and then, though my pride bids me to be reticent as he is, my heart runs away with me, and I pour out upon him such floods of affection that I am sure he is half drowned.
Mother says baby is splendid.
AUGUST 1.-When I took leave of Ernest I was glad to get away. I thought he would perhaps find after I was gone that he missed something out of his life and would welcome me home with a little of the old love. But I did not dream that he would not find it easy to do without me till summer was over, and when, this morning, he came suddenly upon us, carpet-bag in hand, I could do nothing but cry in his arms like a tired child.
And now I had the silly triumph of having mother see that he loved me!
”How could you get away?” I asked at last. ”And what made you come?
And how long can you stay?”
”I could get away because I would,” he replied. ”And I came because I wanted to come. And I can stay three days.”