“Yes, my dear Mrs. Tuis-but on the other hand, think what might happen if she were kept in ignorance in this matter. She might bear another child.”
I got a new realization of the chasms that lay between us. “Who are we,” she whispered, “to interfere in these sacred matters? It is of souls, Mrs. Abbot, and not bodies, that the Kingdom of Heaven is made.”
I took a minute or so to get my breath, and then I said, “What generally happens in these cases is that God afflicts the woman with permanent barrenness.”
The old lady bowed her head, and I saw the tears falling into her lap. “My poor Sylvia!” she moaned, only half aloud.
There was a silence; I too almost wept. And finally, Aunt Varina looked up at me, her faded eyes full of pleading. “It is hard for me to understand such ideas as yours. You must tell me-can you really believe that it would help Sylvia to know this-this dreadful secret?”
“It would help her in many ways,” I said. “She will be more careful of her health-she will follow the doctor’s orders—-”
How quickly came the reply! “I will stay with her, and see that she does that! I will be with her day and night.”
“But are you going to keep the secret from those who attend her? Her maid—the child’s nurses—everyone who might by any chance use the same towel, or a wash-basin, or a drinking-glass?”
“Surely you exaggerate the danger! If that were true, more people would meet with these accidents!”
“The doctors,” I said, “estimate that about ten per cent. of cases of this disease are innocently acquired.”