I took a long breath, and lifted up my hand, and—and—I ain't a-goin' to tell about that. Let's go into the other room.
There set the three other grownups, holdin' their hands over their ears, with pained lookin' faces. Even at that they heard the sound of a dozen short, sharp claps, and the sound of the quick cries, and then there was a silent spell, only broke by the great big sobs of the little kid in the next room,—sobs that sort of exploded their way out, shakin' the little body till the crib rattled.
The sobbin' got weaker and weaker, and come further apart, and I stole out of the bedroom, wipin' my face with my handkerchief.
“I think she'll be a good girly now,” says grand-daddy, gentle-like.
That baby, shocked and surprised, laid on the pillow thinkin', as much as a baby could think. Something cruel and unexpected had happened to her.
Me and Marthy had turned cruel. She didn't have no one to love up to. She had been hurt. Her papa dear had hurt her, because she had cried for “laim.”
“I hope she will,” says Marthy in reply to grand-daddy, and that minute from the bedroom, come Deedee's voice.