“Oh, Steve!” said Mamie.
The White Hope had gone to sleep again with the amazing speed of childhood, and Mamie was looking pityingly at the bedraggled object which had emerged cautiously from behind the waterproof.
“I got mine,” muttered Steve ruefully. “You ain’t got a towel anywhere, have you, Mame?”
Mamie produced a towel and watched him apologetically as he attempted to dry himself.
“I’m so sorry, Steve.”
“Cut it out. It was my fault. I oughtn’t to have been there. Say, it was a bit of luck the kid waking just then.”
“Yes,” said Mamie.
Observe the tricks that conscience plays us. If Mamie had told Steve what had caused William to wake he would certainly have been so charmed by her presence of mind, exerted on his behalf to save him from the warm fate which Mrs. Porter’s unconscious hand had been about to bring down upon him, that he would have forgotten his diffidence then and there and, as the poet has it, have eased his bosom of much perilous stuff.
But conscience would not allow Mamie to reveal the secret. Already she was suffering the pangs of remorse for having, in however good a cause, broken her idol’s rest with a push that might have given the poor lamb a headache. She could not confess the crime even to Steve.