VIII.
The white lamb stood on the table beside her cot.
Mamma put it there every night so that she could see it first thing in the morning when she woke.
She had had a birthday. Suddenly in the middle of the night she was five years old.
She had kept on waking up with the excitement of it. Then, in the dark twilight of the room, she had seen a bulky thing inside the cot, leaning up against the rail. It stuck out queerly and its weight dragged the counterpane tight over her feet.
The birthday present. What she saw was not its real shape. When she poked it, stiff paper bent in and crackled; and she could feel something big and solid underneath. She lay quiet and happy, trying to guess what it could be, and fell asleep again.
It was the white lamb. It stood on a green stand. It smelt of dried hay and gum and paint like the other toy animals, but its white coat had a dull, woolly smell, and that was the real smell of the lamb. Its large, slanting eyes stared off over its ears into the far corners of the room, so that it never looked at you. This made her feel sometimes that the lamb didn't love her, and sometimes that it was frightened and wanted to be comforted.
She trembled when first she stroked it and held it to her face, and sniffed its lamby smell.
Papa looked down at her. He was smiling; and when she looked up at him she was not afraid. She had the same feeling that came sometimes when she sat in Mamma's lap and Mamma talked about God and Jesus. Papa was sacred and holy.
He had given her the lamb.
It was the end of her birthday; Mamma and Jenny were putting her to bed. She felt weak and tired, and sad because it was all over.
"Come to that," said Jenny, "your birthday was over at five minutes past twelve this morning."
"When will it come again?"
"Not for a whole year," said Mamma.
"I wish it would come to-morrow."
Mamma shook her head at her. "You want to be spoiled and petted every day."
"No. No. I want—I want—"
"She doesn't know what she wants," said Jenny.
"Yes. I do. I do."
"Well—"
"I want to love Papa every day. 'Cause he gave me my lamb."
"Oh," said Mamma, "if you only love people because they give you birthday presents—"
"But I don't—I don't—really and truly—"
"You didn't ought to have no more birthdays," said Jenny, "if they make you cry."
Why couldn't they see that crying meant that she wanted Papa to be sacred and holy every day?
The day after the birthday when Papa went about the same as ever, looking big and frightening, when he "Baa'd" into her face and called out, "Mary had a little lamb!" and "Mary, Mary, quite contrary," she looked after him sorrowfully and thought: "Papa gave me my lamb."