“It’s perfectly wonderful that you should be here now,” she declared. “But you look badly. Are you tired?”
“Yes, dear,” I said. (Such a difficult person to deceive!) “To tell the truth, I’m pretty nearly done up. You see, I was caught in the storm, and I was desperately sea-sick.”
“Why, you poor dear! Why didn’t you go to sleep?”
“I didn’t want to sleep. I was too much excited by everything. I came to see one Sylvia and I found two!”
“Isn’t it absurd,” she cried, “how she looks like me? Oh, I want to see her again. How long will it be before I can have her?”
“My dear,” I said, “you mustn’t worry—”
“Oh, don’t mind me, I’m just playing. I’m so happy, I want to squeeze her in my arms all the time. Just think, Mary, they won’t let me nurse her, yet—a whole day now! Can that be right?”
“Nature will take care of that,” I said.
“Yes, but how can you be sure what Nature means? Maybe it’s what the child is crying about, and it’s the crying that makes its eyes red.”
I felt a sudden spasm grip my heart. “No, dear, no,” I said, hastily. “You must let Dr. Perrin attend to these things, for I’ve just had to interfere with his arrangements, and he’ll be getting cross pretty soon.”