It was a sight to see Bell unbuckle her gown,—which when at work she gathered round her, and fastened in some wonderfully fast-loose way,—shake herself, and stalk off in response, especially to the front door, to any ring that seemed peremptory.
Sir John McLelland was making his first call after the marriage. He handed Bell his card, politely asking at the same time if Mr. and Mrs. Barrie were at home. Bell looked at the card, but it was in German text, and therefore unintelligible. She looked at Sir John, but that did not help her; she then turned on her heel,—the swiftest, cleverest motion of the kind that could be imagined,—walked briskly to Mrs. Barrie, and said, “There’s a man at the door, a weel-put-on man, and he asked for you; an’ he gied me a ticket, an’ he’s there yet.”
Mrs. Barrie soon put such mistakes right. She found Bell an apt scholar, scrupulously clean, sterlingly honest, and always busy, though not fussy. At first Bell was most at home among the hens, cows, pigs, and in the garden, but she soon became well up in all household work. Even the addition of the children one by one never seemed to tax Bell’s powers heavily. The first two, James and Mary, were healthy, and in Bell’s homely phrase, “never looked behind them;” but the third, “Wee Nellie,” had been from her birth “a feeble, delicate little thing.” When she was about three years old, scarlet fever attacked the children, beginning with Lewis, the baby. His was a mild case; so were those of James and Mary, but Nellie’s was a severe one. Her pulse ran very high, her little body was covered with the bright scarlet “rash,” her throat sorely affected, her breathing laboured and requiring more effort than the weak constitution could spare. Mrs. Barrie and Bell were unwearied in their efforts to relieve the poor sufferer, and gently was she passed from knee to knee in her restless moods, gently was she laid down again, and coaxed and humoured and waited on with unspeakably tender care.
BELL AND WEE NELLIE.
Between Bell and Nellie there had been a special intimacy. She had called herself “Bell’s bairn;” and as her age and health did not admit of her joining the other children at play, she was seldom out of the kitchen, except when Bell wrapped her cosily in a plaid, and carried her about the parks or garden, where Bell diverted herself quite as much as the “wee whitefaced girlie,” by humouring her childish whims, and joining in, if not provoking, her wondering interest. And ever and anon, as Nellie expressed delight at what Bell said, or did, or pulled, or showed, Bell would press her warmly to her breast, and croon over words of endearment about her “wee croodlin’ doo,” “her ain darling Nellie,” “she was Bell’s bairn,” and tell her that when she was big she would help Bell to milk “Daisy,” and feed the hens. The cosiest corner in the kitchen was Nellie’s “housie.” There she would play for hours, sometimes sitting on her little stool, and chatting with Bell “like an auld body;” sometimes fondling her black-and-white kitten Tibby; sometimes putting to sleep her favourite doll “Black Tam,” who, although he had neither arms nor legs, and his trunk had by long wear lost the black paint, and appeared as bare timber well time-soiled, still retained on his head, which had been gouged out to imitate the woolly hair of the negro, crescent-shaped indents of his original blackness, and his lips were flecked with streaks of their primitive crimson; sometimes playing with broken bits of china, drawing Bell’s attention to those with gold on them as “Nellie’s pennies.” And not infrequently did Bell take the wee lassie into her kindly lap, and press her to her kindly bosom, and sing, and sigh as she sung, her favourite if not only song of the “Bonnie, bonnie banks of Benlomond.”
“WEARIN’ AWA’.”
It need hardly be recorded that Bell’s agony at Nellie’s illness was only equalled by that of Mrs. Barrie,—possibly by that of Mr. Barrie, but only possibly. She had been struck with the hectic flush which glowed on Nellie’s face, and saw that the fever was sore on her; but she hoped against hope, until on the seventh day of the illness a spasmodic movement of the weak body, and a hazy gleam of the weary eye, revealed to Bell that Nellie’s recovery was hopeless. The thought of losing her came so suddenly on Bell, that she nearly broke down in the room; but restraining herself as her eye rested on Mrs. Barrie’s calm motherly face, intent on anticipating and ministering to the wants of the sufferer, Bell whispered that she would “see if the bairns were all right, and be back immediately,” and left the room. She walked noiselessly through the lobby, at the darkest corner of it gave two or three great “gulps,” and uttered a bitter “Oh! dear, dear.” This was what nature demanded; this at least, more if she could have got it; but this little snatch relieved her pent-up heart, and braced her for further service. After seeing that the other children were right, she glided into the sick-room, from which Mr. Barrie, with a remark or rather a sigh about “too many breaths,” emerged as she entered. She took the fever-tossed child gently out of Mrs. Barrie’s wearied arms, and did her best to relieve the difficulty of breathing, so harassing to the watchers, and so sore on the patient. Gradually the fitful struggles became less violent; Nellie got quieter, softer, powerless. She half opened her eyes, then closed them slowly, and said in a faint voice, with a long eerie tone, “Bell.” Bell, half choking with grief, bent over her and kept saying, “Yes, ye’re Bell’s bairn, ye’re Bell’s ain bairn;” but observing her weary, weary face and increasing softness, she looked wistfully at the invalid, then sympathizingly at Mrs. Barrie, and, rising softly, laid the wee lamb on Mrs. Barrie’s lap, slipped noiselessly to Mr. Barrie’s study, and opening the door very slightly, said, “Please, sir, come ben, or the angels will be before you!” She got another gulp as she waited to follow him into the sick-room, and that helped her greatly. The little darling recognised “papa,”—smiled as she lisped his name,—smiled if possible more sweetly as she heard her mother’s voice, in quivering accents, saying, “My ain wee wee Nellie!” and sighed audibly, “Mamma’s wee-wee,”—she then closed her eyes, and in the act of raising her tiny hand to her throat, it fell powerless, and Wee Nellie was Wee Nellie no more, or rather, as Bell said, Wee Nellie for ever.
“THE LAND O’ THE LEAL.”
Her delicate health and consequent helplessness, as also her gentleness, had endeared her to Mr. Barrie. When all was over, he muttered, “She was a pleasant child, lovely and beautiful in her life;” and added in a firmer voice, “It is well with the child, it is well.” Bell lifted the little body from its mother’s lap, and laid it gently on the bed. Her tears were streaming, but she had got the first bitter pang over, and putting her arm on, or rather round, Mrs. Barrie’s shoulder, she said, “Come away, mem, for a little; I’ll put all right.” Mrs. Barrie obeyed mechanically, and was persuaded by Bell to lie down in bed. There wearied nature asserted her prerogative, and she slept soundly for a considerable time. When she returned to the sick-room, all traces of illness, in the shape of couches, baths, phials, and confusion, were away; the old crumb-cloth which had been put down to preserve the carpet was exchanged for a clean linen drugget; the fire was out, the fire-place filled with fir-tops; the window was open, and the blind drawn down; here and there about the room were little muslin bags filled with lavender-seed; and on the mantelpiece, which, when she left, was covered with tumblers and cans and glasses of medical stuff, overlapped with paper, or having spoons in them to the hazard of their balance, stood three tumblers filled with bunches of lavender; and on the bed lay all that remained of Nellie, “dressed and laid out,” her little body making all the more appearance that the snow-white bedcover was tightly laid over it. On her face lay a muslin handkerchief, kept down by a bag of lavender on either side.
As Mrs. Barrie approached the bed, Bell walked to the other side of it, and slowly folded down the face-cloth. All traces of suffering and weariness had vanished; the face was that of a child smiling in sleep.