Delia sat perplexed. Of all unforeseen complications this was surely the least imaginable. And with all the acquired Ralston that was in her she could not help seeing the force of Joe’s objection, could almost find herself agreeing with him. No one in New York had forgotten the death of the poor Henry van der Luydens’ only child, who had caught small-pox at the circus to which an unprincipled nurse had surreptitiously taken him. After such a warning as that, parents felt justified in every precaution against contagion. And poor people were so ignorant and careless, and their children, of course, so perpetually exposed to everything catching. No, Joe Ralston was certainly right, and Charlotte almost insanely unreasonable. But it would be useless to tell her so now. Instinctively, Delia temporized.
“After all,” she whispered to the prone ear, “if it’s only after you have children—you may not have any—for some time.”
“Oh, yes, I shall!” came back in anguish from the cushions.
Delia smiled with matronly superiority. “Really, Chatty, I don’t quite see how you can know. You don’t understand.”
Charlotte Lovell lifted herself up. Her collar of Brussels lace had come undone and hung in a wisp on her crumpled bodice, and through the disorder of her hair the white lock glimmered haggardly. In her pale brown eyes the little green specks floated like leaves in a trout-pool.
“Poor girl,” Delia thought, “how old and ugly she looks! More than ever like an old maid; and she doesn’t seem to realize in the least that she’ll never have another chance.”
“You must try to be sensible, Chatty dear. After all, one’s own babies have the first claim.”
“That’s just it.” The girl seized her fiercely by the wrists. “How can I give up my own baby?”
“Your—your—?” Delia’s world again began to waver under her. “Which of the poor little waifs, dearest, do you call your own baby?” she questioned patiently.
Charlotte looked her straight in the eyes. “I call my own baby my own baby.”