"Ask Miriam," I said sarcastically. "She ought to know."
"You can always tell whether cats are gentlemen or ladies by the shape of the head," Letitia went on irrelevantly, "but children are puzzles. This dirty little thing looks like a boy, Archie. I'm quite sure that it can't be a girl. I forgot to ask, and we really ought to know, don't you think?"
At that moment a loud voice was heard calling, "Letitia! Letitia!" And then: "Letitia! Where on earth is Letitia?" For a minute after there was dead silence. Letitia flushed, and an expression of violent anger dawned upon her face. I was too amazed to say anything. After what my wife had told me of Mrs. McCaffrey's bitter antipathy to a change of name, this looked like revenge. She undoubtedly proposed to show Letitia that she had no intention of changing her name. The child ran quickly to its mother, and we were left alone, in a tumult of astonishment.
"You must go and veto that, instantly, Letitia," I asserted gravely. "Stop it at once, before—before she calls me Archie. She'll do it. I know she will."
"You go," pleaded Letitia in fervent tones. "Do it for me, Archie. I've done so much."
"No," I declared relentlessly, "I will not interfere in household matters. You have asked me not to do so. You can tell her again that I am a bully, and a tyrant, and anything you choose. It sounds well, you know. You can put it all down to me, and inform her that if she dares to use your Christian name again she can depart to No. 33 Sixth Avenue, up one flight—or two flights—or any number of flights."
Letitia scarcely waited until I had finished my chaste remarks. She flew out of the room as though she had been shot, with the evident intention of striking while the iron was heated. I closed the door because I had no desire to hear. Perhaps it was an act of cowardice on my part, but, after all, Letitia herself absolved me from implicating myself in these matters. She had asked me to leave everything to her, and I had no intention of thwarting her in this instance.
She returned presently, looking completely relieved. There was even a smile upon her lips.
"How silly we were, Archie!" she said, sinking into a chair, "and how ready we were to think the worst of a poor, hard-working woman. She wasn't calling me at all. She heard the child in the drawing-room, and was calling the child. It is a girl, Archie, and its name is Letitia."