Mrs. Howe whispered something in Mr. Howe's ear. Whatever it was, the effect was electrifying. Husband's have their weak points like other mortals. The smoking-cap was received into favor—so was the chibouk.
In default of any preference of Mr. Howe's for the baby's name, Mrs. Howe had selected "Fenella Fatima Cecilia." It was written on a card, all ready for the Reverend Doctor Knott, who had the misfortune to be a little deaf, laid by the side of the gilt Bible, and held down to the table by an alabaster hand, with a real diamond ring on the third finger.
The baptismal basin was of silver, with two doves perched on the edges. The water to be used on the occasion, said to have come from the river Jordan, was in a state of preparedness in a corked bottle in the china closet.
All the preparations were completed, but still the baby slept on. Mrs. Howe was rather glad than otherwise, partly because it gave her plenty of time to survey her new apparel in a full-length mirror, partly because the baby always had "such a pretty color in its cheeks when it first 'woke," and she wanted to carry it in when the flush was on.
The last pin was adjusted in the maternal head-dress; the Reverend Dr. Knott had arrived, so had the appreciative select; Mr. Howe's cravat and waistcoat had been duly jerked into place by his wife, and now the baby "really must be woke." Mrs. Howe sprinkles a little jockey-club on Mr. Howe's handkerchief, takes one last lingering look in the mirror, readjusts a stray ribbon, changes the latitude of a gold head pin, then steps up to the rose-wood cradle, and draws aside the lace curtains.
What a pity! There is no flush on the babe's face! and how very pale she looks! Mrs. Howe takes hold of the plump little waxen hand that lies out upon the coverlid. What is there in the touch of her own flesh and blood to blanch her lip and palsy her tongue?
Ah! she can not face death, who could gaze with stony eyes on misery worse than death?
"Vengeance is mine—I will repay, saith the Lord."