"I put my foot against it and touched its beastly fur!" cried Roddy, and suddenly began to scream again.
"Roddy! How dare you make that abominable noise?"
Mrs. van Cannan's voice fell like a jet of ice-cold water into the room. Behind her in the doorway loomed the tall figure of Saxby, the manager, with McNeil and the others. Christine's warm heart would never have suggested such a method of quieting the boy, but it had its points. Roddy, though still shaking and ashen, stood up straight and looked at his mother.
"All about a silly spider!" continued the latter, with cutting scorn.
"I am ashamed of you! I thought you were brave, like your father."
That flushed Roddy to his brows.
"It has fur—red fur," he stammered.
"You deserve a whipping for your cowardice," said Mrs. van Cannan curtly, and walked over to the bed. "The thing is half dead, and quite harmless," she said.
"Half dead or half drunk," McNeil jocosely suggested. "I never saw a tarantula so quiet as that before."
"The question is how long would it have stayed in that condition?" said
Saltire significantly. "For you are mistaken about its harmlessness,
Mrs. van Cannan. It is one of the most poisonous and ferocious of its
tribe."
They had got the strangely sluggish beast off the bed by knocking it with a stick into an old shoe, and were removing it. Christine only vaguely heard the remarks, for Roddy hid his eyes while it was being carried out, and was trembling violently against her. It seemed amazing to her that Mrs. van Cannan did not realize that there was more than mere cowardice in his behaviour. The trouble was so plainly psychological—the memory of the loss of a loved little brother subtly interwoven with horror of that particular species of venomous insect. Christine herself had a greater hatred of spiders than of any creeping things, and well understood the child's panic of disgust and fear. It filled her with indignation to hear Mrs. van Cannan turn once more and lash the boy with a phrase before she swept from the room.