Her sobs, her cries and writhings—for strange, sharp, piercing pangs began to be added to the mere mental tortures—at length attracted the attention of those who waked, and roused those who snored.... Iron bedsteads creaked, relieved of heavy bodies—a candle-end flared in a lantern at the Corporal’s end of the room.... The stalwart figure of Moggy Geogehagan, arrayed in an ancient watch-coat, with her head tied up in a red-spotted handkerchief, and a blue yarn stocking tied round her neck—a certain cure for cowlds!—was illuminated by the candle’s yellow flicker, demanding to be inforrumed av the rayson av the outrajis hullaballoo?
Receiving no reply, the indomitable Moggy strode to the quarter whence the crying came. You saw her lift the hanging shawl and disappear behind its meager screen. From within her voice proceeded, pitched in a key less raucous than was usual:
“’Tis her Woman’s Hour that has come too soon upon the poor young crayture!... Let a brace av dacent women that are mothers, come quickly widin to me here!”
Ah! they were no longer troll-wives, grim female goblins of a strange nocturnal underworld! With one touch of the magic wand of Sympathy, brandished in her big red fist, did Moggy Geogehagan transform them into beings of warm human flesh and blood.
They left their beds and gathered round the flimsy tent of shawl and counterpane that housed the timid sufferer. Brawny women and scrawny women, little women and big women; women half-naked and not at all ashamed; women who habitually retired to rest as fully clothed as any Boer’s vrouw. Pity and Compassion, hidden in these rough natures as silver in lead, or gold in quartz, or the ruby in its rough brown matrix of corundum, came shining to the light. The sheep with the goats, the “dacent” with the disreputable—they vied with each other in doing what they could. Even Pink Bonnet rose to the emergency, vindicating her oft-vociferated claim to be a woman, after all....
There was a gaunt bare whitewashed room with a rusty stove and a double row of moldy pallets in it, that was termed—with irony none the less grim because unconscious—the Barrack Hospital. No place was set apart where the soldier’s wife might be tended in sickness, or bring forth her babe in peace; but thanks to Moggy Geogehagan and the two dacent women, and the rest that made a living wall of themselves between the poor young mother and the strange male eyes she dreaded so—the pale, rainy dawn that climbed over the high spiked walls of Spurham Cavalry Barracks, brought with it a new young life.
Thus Joshua Horrotian, coming back, yawning and shivering, at the expiration of his allotted term of hours On Guard, was met upon the threshold of the troop-room by the lady of the villa near the fireplace, big with news that made him stare.
“’Tis a grand boy, God bless it!—though he kem before he was joo, bedad!” trumpeted Mrs. Geogehagan, opening a chink in the clean, but yellowed flannel petticoat that had something that squirmed inside....
“And God bless you for a good woman, Mrs. Geogehagan!” stammered Joshua Horrotian. He added: “But oh! my poor girl! To ha’ gone through her trial under the eyes of a crowd o’ strangers, was cruel hard on her!”