“No; I have forgotten too long. I want to remember.”
“Richard! O! O!—Richard, I hate pills—I’m not a lady—won’t anything soften you!”
And at that moment the nurse, carrying the child, came round a bend of the garden. She stared and rocked, singing something tuneless; but Miss Christmas, darting past me, seized the infant from her arms, and carried it to the path.
“Richard!” she whispered, “for his sake—your little brother’s!”
My brother again. Never had anyone but this girl voluntarily assumed the natural relationship. I wavered for the first time. She saw it, with her sex’s quick intuition, and held out the warm soft bundle.
“Have you never taken him in your arms?” she said. “He’s so small and weak. There, hold him, and let him plead for me.”
“Miss Christmas!” cried the nurse.
Her tone, all the immeasurable menial warning it conveyed, stiffened me instantly. I held out my arms and received the burden.
I could have laughed at its insignificance. The apparent proportions of it had made me expect something staggering. It lay on me like a doll. Before I knew myself, I was smiling into the little red puffy face.
There followed a sharp exclamation, and on the instant Lady Skene had snatched my brother from my hands. She had come upon us unobserved. Her face was alight with an expression I had never seen there before. The statue had blazed into momentary life. She was a woman, and a cruel woman confessed for the first time in my knowledge of her.