Anyhow I know this, that in those pre-parental days I would ask people whom I had just met—and with no misgivings—as to whether or not they had any children. But I never dared to do it after the new love-birds began singing in my mother-heart. It seemed cruel, lest they should be compelled with shame to acknowledge they had none; even in my most inconsiderate years I would never ask a homely spinster if her dance card were full—if I may pluck an illustration from the giddy days of old.
It was with trembling joy that we drew near, never so near together, to this great gladness of our lives. Then came my great darkness; then the holy dawn. I swiftly forgot all about the darkness—for joy that a man was born into the world.
Gordon was beside me when I realized it all, showering little timid words of endearment down upon me as though he feared I were hardly able to stand them. His lip was quivering when I looked up; and I saw his glance turn from me to something that lay beside me on a pillow. A low gurgling kind of sound came from the little bundle on the top of it.
"Isn't that sweet?" I murmured—for I knew—my eyes fallen shut again. Gordon looked at me with overflowing eyes—then he turned and went softly out of the room.
I was faint and weak when he came back; but I held his hand, lest he should go away again.
"Say a little prayer for the baby," I whispered; "say it out loud," and Gordon knelt low beside the bed and prayed. But I noticed that all his prayer was for me, that I might be given back to him—and I told him, before he had time to get up, that he had forgotten about the baby. So he prayed again, for us both this time; and I don't think I ever before felt what a true priest of God was this man of mine, and I rejoiced that the new life which lay beside me was breath of his breath and soul of his soul. And I think we both forgot, in those blessed days, all the sorrows of the past, the turmoil of the present, the portent of the future.
What a new world it all turned out to me! A new heaven, indeed; and a new earth—which was more to us just then—as the Bible says. Everything was wonderful. I can remember yet the foolish delight with which one day I counted all the baby's toes—and found he had exactly ten. I knew, of course, that this had happened often enough before, but still it struck me as beautiful that they should have come out so even; a miscalculation, considering how many have to be outfitted for the journey, would have seemed pardonable in anybody's baby but my own. And I had never known before how intelligent a baby could be in its very early dawn. For instance, mine had a strange habit of lifting his little hand high above his head, then slowly letting it drop.
"I can't make out what that gesture means," his father (those words were a new strain of music) said to me one day as we bended over the babe together; "you don't suppose he sees that fly, do you?" referring to a winged intruder that was hovering, like ourselves, above our treasure.
"Oh, no," I answered; then suddenly, "Gordon, do you know, I believe I can tell what baby's trying to do. He's trying to pronounce the benediction, just as sure as anything. That's you in him, Gordon; he's going to be a minister."
"I believe that's just what he's doing," said Gordon, enchanted; "look—there he's doing it again."