“Pill—Mrs. Hartwell! Oh, Harold,” reproved the doctor's wife, mildly.
But the doctor only chuckled the more, and said:
“You wait and see.”
If Billy's friends were worried before because of her lassitude and lack of ambition, they were almost as worried now over her amazing alertness and insistent activity. Day by day, almost hour by hour, she seemed to gain in strength; and every bit she acquired she promptly tested almost to the breaking point, so plainly eager was she to be well and strong. And always, from morning until night, and again from night until morning, the pivot of her existence, around which swung all thoughts, words, actions, and plans, was the sturdy little plump-cheeked, firm-fleshed atom of humanity known as Bertram, Jr. Even Aunt Hannah remonstrated with her at last.
“But, Billy, dear,” she exclaimed, “one would almost get the idea that you thought there wasn't a thing in the world but that baby!”
Billy laughed.
“Well, do you know, sometimes I 'most think there isn't,” she retorted unblushingly.
“Billy!” protested Aunt Hannah; then, a little severely, she demanded: “And who was it that just last September was calling this same only-object-in-the-world a third person in your home?”
“Third person, indeed! Aunt Hannah, did I? Did I really say such a dreadful thing as that? But I didn't know, then, of course. I couldn't know how perfectly wonderful a baby is, especially such a baby as Bertram, Jr., is. Why, Aunt Hannah, that little thing knows a whole lot already. He's known me for weeks; I know he has. And ages and ages ago he began to give me little smiles when he saw me. They were smiles—real smiles! Oh, yes, I know nurse said they weren't smiles at the first,” admitted Billy, in answer to Aunt Hannah's doubting expression. “I know nurse said it was only wind on his stomach. Think of it—wind on his stomach! Just as if I didn't know the difference between my own baby's smile and wind on his stomach! And you don't know how soon he began to follow my moving finger with his eyes!”
“Yes, I tried that one day, I remember,” observed Aunt Hannah demurely. “I moved my finger. He looked at the ceiling—fixedly.”