Part 10 (2/2)
”Maggie O'Brien, if you say a single word to me I won't do a thing!”
Rosie glared at her mother threateningly.
”Mercy on us, Rosie, how you talk! I won't say a word! I promise you on me oath I'll be as quiet as a mouse! You won't hear a sound out o' me, will she, baby darlint? I'll be like the deaf and dumb man at the Museum. He talks with his fingers, Rosie. You'd die laughin' to see him....”
At the cooling touch of water, little Geraldine quieted her whimpering and began to smile wanly. The sight of her neglected body made Rosie's anger blaze anew.
”Maggie O'Brien, I don't believe you've touched this baby for a week!
You ought to be ashamed o' yourself! Just look at how chafed she is, and her body all over p.r.i.c.kly heat, too!... Where's the corn-starch?”
”Rosie dear, I'm awful sorry, but we're out o' corn-starch. I've been meanin' this two days to have you get some.”
”Well, I'd like to know what I'm going to put on Geraldine!”
”Couldn't you run over to the grocery now?”
”No, I can't! It's almost time for my papers. I know what I'll do: I'll borrow Ellen's talc.u.m.”
”Oh, Rosie, Ellen wouldn't like that!”
”I don't care if she wouldn't! I guess she helps herself to other people's things. Besides, if she's so particular about her gentlemen friends, she ought to be glad to have Geraldine all powdered up with violet talc.”
”Don't tell me, Rosie, that you mean to be puttin' Geraldine in the front room! Ellen'll be awful mad!”
”Let her be! When she begins to ramp around, you just _sick_ her on to me! I'll be ready for her! Besides, I guess Geraldine's got some rights in this house!”
On the floor of the front room, between two chairs, Rosie made a cool little nest, protected with mosquito-netting. The tired baby sighed and turned and was asleep in two minutes.
”You poor little thing!” Rosie murmured as she stood a moment looking down at the dark circles under Geraldine's closed eyes and at the cruel p.r.i.c.kly heat that was creeping up her neck. ”You poor little thing!”
She went back slowly and thoughtfully to the kitchen. Before her mother she paused a moment, then looked up defiantly. ”Ma, has Geraldine a clean dress to go out this afternoon in the baby-buggy?”
Mrs. O'Brien's face began to beam with delight. ”Ah, now, do you mean to say----”
Rosie cut her off shortly. ”Maggie O'Brien, if you say one word to me I'll drop the whole thing!”
Mrs. O'Brien stopped her ironing to stretch out a timid, conciliatory hand. ”Rosie dear, why do you always be so sharp to your poor ma? I won't say a word, I promise I won't. Geraldine's things is at the bottom of the basket, and the moment I finish this waist of Ellen's I'll get at them.”
Rosie felt a sudden pang of shame, but a foolish little pride made her keep on scolding.
”Well, I got my papers to attend to now, but see that you have those things ready by the time I get back.”
”Indeed and I will!” Mrs. O'Brien declared with head-shaken emphasis.
All afternoon on her paper route Rosie thought of poor, neglected little Geraldine with her chafed body and sad, tired eyes. It wasn't her fault, poor baby, that she had come eighth in a family when every one was too busy and hard-worked to pay attention to her.... But it was a shame--that's what it was! I just tell you when there's a baby around, some one ought to take proper care of it!... Rosie wanted dreadfully to fasten blame somewhere, and the person naturally responsible would seem to be her mother.
For some reason, though, she couldn't work up much of a case against Mrs. O'Brien. That poor soul had enough to do, and more than enough, without ever touching Geraldine. She was not, it is true, the best manager in the world, and she was dreadfully helpless in the hands of unscrupulous people like, say, her own daughter Ellen; but when all was said and done, she was fearfully hard driven, early and late, and never a day off. And yet how cheerful and uncomplaining she was! How loving and kind, too, never remembering the cross words you gave her nor the short, ill-natured answers. No matter how you had been acting, she would call you ”dear” again, the moment you let her....
Moreover, even if she did not wash Geraldine as often as she should, Heaven knows it was not to save herself. Maggie O'Brien would have gone through fire and flood for the benefit of any of her children, living or dead, and Rosie knew this. No, no. The things slighted were not slighted because she was lazy and selfish, but because there were not hours in the day for her one pair of hands, willing but not very skilled, to do all there was to do in the crowded little household.
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