Louder and louder swelled the wails from the inner room, yet the nurse did not stir save to reach for her thread.
“But he’s crying--yet!” gasped Madam Wetherby.
The girl’s lips twitched and an expression came to her face which the little old lady did not in the least understand.
“Can’t you--do something?” demanded baby’s grandmother, her voice shaking.
“No, madam. I--” began the girl, but she did not finish. The little figure before her drew itself to the full extent of its diminutive height.
“Well, I can,” said Madam Wetherby crisply. Then she turned and hurried into the inner room.
The nurse sat mute and motionless until a crooning lullaby and the unmistakable tapping of rockers on a bare floor brought her to her feet in dismay. With an angry frown she strode across the room, but she stopped short at the sight that met her eyes.
In a low chair, her face aglow with the accumulated love of years of baby-brooding, sat the little old lady, one knotted, wrinkled finger tightly elapsed within a dimpled fist. The cries had dropped to sobbing breaths, and the lullaby, feeble and quavering though it was, rose and swelled triumphant. The anger fled from the girl’s face, and a queer choking came to her throat so that her words were faint and broken.
“Madam--I beg pardon--I’m sorry, but I must put Master Philip back on his bed.”
“But he isn’t asleep yet,” demurred Madam Wetherby softly, her eyes mutinous.