“About that time mother went off with cholera, and then I told Mrs. Westbrooke about my baby, and asked if I might bring it and show it to her. You don’t know how pretty she was, with her golden-red hair curling all over her head, and her sweet blue eyes. My lady got very fond of her the three days she stayed with me, and, when I spoke of carrying it away, she said:
“‘I do not believe I can let baby go. It seems like my own lost darling. Will you let me have her?’
“‘For your own?’ I said, and she answered:
“‘Yes, for my own.’
“This was just what suited me,—to see my pet grow up a lady,—and I told her yes, and as the master did not oppose it more than to say ‘that he did not care especially for other people’s brats, and this one must be kept out of his way,’ it was settled that baby should stay, and I do believe my mistress came to love it like her own. She gave it her lost baby’s name, and had it christened ‘Gertrude Heloise Westbrooke,’ so it sure would have a name. She was a sweet-tempered lady, but weak and nervous like. I think she had consumption, for nothing in particular appeared to ail her, only she was tired like all the time, and never could sleep nor get rested, and at last she died, and left an annuity of forty pounds a year to little Gertie, and said I was to have the care of her.
“About a year after her death the master married a fashionable, fussy little woman from Glasgow, who disliked children worse than he did, and never noticed Gertie in any way after she found out that she was not Mr. Westbrooke’s own. I was about to be married myself, and asked the master if I might have the child. He was more than willing, and so I took her to my own comfortable home on the second floor of a house in what is now Abingdon Road, but was then Newland Street. All this time I had not been able to track you, though I never went out that I did not look for you; and many’s the time I drew my little girl to the gardens of Kensington and even to Hyde Park, where I sat by the hour watching the people as they went by in hopes of seeing you. But I never did, and I had almost given it up, when one day in October I went into a linendraper’s on High Street to get a new slip for my darling. The girls were all very busy, and I had to wait a bit, and was looking at the dresses in the window when I heard some one say, ‘Isn’t she beautiful?’ and looking up I saw you coming in. I knew you in a moment, though you was handsomer than ever, and looking well and strong. In my excitement I forgot what I had come to get, but stood watching you, my heart beating so loud I was afraid you might hear it.
“I do not remember what you bought, but you ordered it sent to ‘Mrs. Dr. Barrett’s, No. —— Caledonia Street,’ and then left the shop, while I followed close behind. You turned into that shady lane or road which leads past the Holland House to Bayswater, and I kept as near you as I could without attracting your attention. Once you sat down under a tree as if you were tired, and going a little further on I sat down too, and watched you when you did not know it. There was a pretty little girl about Gertie’s age playing near, and I remember you called her to you, and smoothed her curls, and caressed her little hands, and asked her for her name, and when she went back to her nurse there was a sad, sorry look in your eyes and, on your face, and I said to myself, ‘Is she thinking of the baby, I wonder?’
“I knew from Anne that a woman in deep black, with her vail drawn closely over her face had been to the hospital to inquire after it, and had seemed relieved when told it had been taken by a woman who was sure to be kind to it. I was certain the lady in black was your mother, but could not tell whether she had ever inquired again for the child. I meant to know for sure where you lived, and if Caledonia Street was your home; so when you got up, which you did after a time, I got up too, and kept close behind till you reached Notting Hill station. I was standing by you when you got your ticket, and took the same carriage you did, and alighting at the same station, followed you to your very door, and saw you go in like one who was at home. There was a baker’s shop near by, and I bought some bread and buns which I did not want, and questioned the girl who waited upon me with regard to the houses in the neighborhood, pretending I was looking for one to rent. In this way I learned that the Mrs. Dr. Barrett who lived at No. —— took lodgers, and had a beautiful daughter, a Miss Lyle, the child of a first marriage, the girl supposed, as old Dr. Barrett, who had owned the place for a long time, had only been married to the present Mrs. Barrett two or three years when he died. So much I learned, and then I left the place for home, determining to keep track of you after that, and not lose sight of you again. I knew when you were governess at Allanbanke, and when you played the organ in —— church, and used sometimes on Sundays to take Gertie there to listen to the music, but never gave her a hint as to who the musician was. There was a kind of pleasant excitement in watching you and feeling that I had your secret, and I enjoyed it to the full.
“At last you were lost to me for a while,—I nursed my husband in his last sickness, but greatly to my delight you unexpectedly turned up again at the very house where my cousin Norah was living as lady’s maid,—at Oakwood, you know. I saw you there one evening when I was calling on Norah, and learned that you were Mrs. Sinclair’s companion, and was going abroad with her. As Norah, too, was to go with her mistress, I was certain to know when you returned, and I did, and saw you dressed for dinner one day, and thought you the most beautiful woman I ever saw. I was a widow then. My husband had been dead some time, but he had left me quite comfortable for a woman of my class, while Gertie’s annuity was sufficient for her. I was anxious that she should have a good education, and I tried to bring her up a lady so far as I knew myself. Just what I intended to do, or whether I should ever let you know of her existence, had now become a matter of some doubt, for I loved the girl too well to part with her willingly. She was the very apple of my eye, and I said unless something happens to me, or her mother marries rich, I will keep the secret all my life. Still I liked to be near you,—to know just what you were doing, and so I applied to your mother for apartments, with what success you know. Then Colonel Schuyler came, and Norah told me of your probable marriage with him, and I had a great battle with duty and my love for little Gertie. The first told me that when you was in a position to do for the child what I never could, I ought to give her up, while the last said I never could; she was all the world to me, and I decided to keep her a spell at least, especially as through Norah it was so arranged that I was to go to America when you did. In any event I should have followed you after a while, and I thought it a special Providence which made my going with you so easy. You can imagine the interest I have felt in you and everything belonging to you, and how at times, when I saw my darling snubbed by the young ladies at the Hill, I have been tempted to claim her right to be there as their equal and companion.
“I never could tell whether Colonel Schuyler knew that such a child ever had existence. If he did not, and your passing for Miss Lyle instead of Mrs. made me suspect that he did not, I thought it would be a cruel thing for me to tell it to him, and that of itself might have kept me from it, even if I had loved Gertie less. If it was not for this frequent pain which warns me of sudden death, I should perhaps keep the secret forever; but I must not leave my little girl alone if anything happens to me, and so I write it down, begging you to take her and do justice to her, for I swear to Heaven she is the child born in Dorset Street, Jan. ——, 18—, of the young woman Heloise or Edith Lyle, whose mother called herself Mrs. Fordham, and left the baby on the steps of the —— Street Hospital.