“No, sah.”
“Well, don’t you have anything to do with him,” said Barry, somewhat unreasonably, and he went away.
Left alone, Brick stood quietly in the middle of the floor for a few minutes. Then he began to shudder, at first in pretense, then in reality. Then he said a number of charms. Not all the churchgoing and Sunday school teaching that he had had could shake his faith in them. Finally he jumped into bed with all his clothes on, and repeating, “Snake hiss, and toad turn, water bless me ere I burn!” he called Bylow the dog to lie closer under the bed, then drawing the blanket over his head shiveringly tried to go to sleep.
CHAPTER XXI
Mafferty Unfolds a Plot
Mrs. Tom Everest was putting her baby to bed. Surely there never was such a provoking baby. He laughed, and played, and gurgled in his throat, he caught her hands in his own, he tried to bite his toes, he lapped at a little black bag she wore on her belt; in short, he was so naughty that at last she said seriously, “Baby, if you don’t lie down mother will slap your hannies.”
At this he shouted with laughter. He clapped his offending hands, he made a wild dash at her with his mouth, then suddenly there was silence. He was dead tired; all day he had been just as bad as he could be. He was braving the old Sleep Man, and now, in the twinkling of an eye, he had succumbed. One tired yawn, one last exquisite baby look of perfect trust in the young mother bending over him, and Tom junior was off for Sleepy Town.
Mrs. Tom laid the downy head on the pillow, she drew the coverlet over the pink limbs, she dropped a kiss, light as thistle down, on the moist cheek. How could she leave him, her one baby, her treasure, and she was fussing over him in the unique way that mothers have when there was a knock at the door.
“What is it, Daisy?” she whispered, turning her head.
“Mr. Mafferty, ma’am,” said the little maid; “in the parlor. Wants to see you special.”
“Tell him I will come at once,” and only waiting to adjust a screen about baby’s tiny bed, young Mrs. Everest tripped downstairs.