“God bless you, my lovely,” she says, and puts out the light.
Miss Waterlow is alone.
* * * *
Miss Waterlow at this time was one. It is a tremendous age to be, and often she would lie on her back and laugh to think of all the babies who were None. When she was six months old, Mr. Waterlow, who was a poet, wrote some verses about her and he slipped them proudly into Mrs. Waterlow’s hand one evening. Owing to a misunderstanding, they were used to wedge the nursery window, which rattled at night; and though they wedged very delightfully for some time, Mr. Waterlow couldn’t help feeling a little disappointed. Mrs. Waterlow was, of course, as sorry as she could be when she understood what had happened, but it was then too late. As Mr. Waterlow said: Once you have bent a piece of poetry, it is never quite the same again. Fortunately for all of us, two lines at the end, torn off so as to make the wedge the right thickness, have survived. They go like this:
“She never walks, and she never speaks—
And we’ve had her for weeks and weeks and weeks!”
Now the truth was that Miss Waterlow could speak if she wanted to, but she had decided to wait until she was quarter-past-one. The reason was that she had such lovely things to remember, if only she could remember them. You can’t talk and think. For a year and a quarter she would just lie on her back and remember ... and then when she had it all quite clear in her mind, she would tell them all about it. But nobody can speak without practice. So every night, as soon as she was alone, she practised.
She practised now.
“Teddy!” she called.
Down on the floor, at the foot of her bed, Teddy-bear, whose head was nodding on his chest, woke up with a start.
“What is it?” he grumbled.