“There!” she said at last, surveying him with a feeling of satisfaction, “he will sleep at least a couple of hours. By that time I shall get rested, and can manage him better. I suppose it’s because he’s so tired, and everything is new.”
With this apology for Charlie in her heart, and a half remorseful feeling for her lately displayed impatience, she descended the stairs to the dining-room, where the rest of the family were already seated at the table.
A few minutes later, and while she was deep in an account of matters and things at Charlie’s home, the cook came up-stairs in something of a fluster.
“Plaze, ma’am, there’s something on the house.”
“Something on the house?”
“Yes. McKillop’s boarders across the way are all at the windows, an’ the men is laughin’ and the women frightened.”
With one accord a sudden and informal adjournment to the parlor window was made, the result being a verification of the cook’s statement.
“What on earth can be the matter?” said grandmother.
At this moment Mrs. McKillop, after a series of incomprehensible gestures, which nobody could translate with any clearness, dispatched her girl across the street.
“There’s a child, ma’am,” she exclaimed, in breathless excitement, “a baby, walking about on the outside of your house like a fly! he’s— Howly Father!”