“A child like that!” interrupted Mrs Seaton.
“A child in appearance, I grant, but quite a woman in sense and patience. She has surprised me many a time.”
“But she has had no experience. She cannot know—”
“Oh, that is the best of it. She will do as she is bidden. Save me from those ‘experienced’ persons who have wisdom enough for ten! I can trust this little maid that she will do exactly as I bid her. She is a very conscientious person—religiously inclined, I should think. At any rate, she is just the nurse I should choose from all the sisterhood for your poor little boy—just the firm and gentle attendant he needs now. Trust me. I know her well.”
It is possible that in speaking thus the doctor’s first wish was to set the mind of the mother at rest about leaving her child, but he could say what he did without doing any violence to his conscience. He really had admired and wondered at Christie’s management of the little Lees during his frequent visits to their nursery.
“And besides,” he added to himself, “the poor little fellow will be better when away from his mother’s unbounded indulgence for a while. It will be better for all concerned.”
So the matter was arranged—not without many misgivings on Mrs Seaton’s part, however. Her directions as to Christie’s management of the boy were so many and so minute that the poor child was in danger of becoming bewildered among them. To all she could only answer, again and again:
“I will be very careful, ma’am;” or, “I will do my best.”
It was well for Mrs Seaton that there was but little time left, or her heart, and Christie’s too, might have failed. At the very last moment the mother had a mind to change her plans.
“After all,” she said, “perhaps it would have been wiser to send him to his aunt’s. Her children are noisy and troublesome, to be sure; but I should have felt easier about him. Mind, Gertrude, you are to write every day till your father returns. And, Christie, remember, you are to obey the doctor’s directions in all things. He is to call every day. And don’t let Clement fret him. And, Gertrude, be sure to write.”