Part 17 (1/2)

”The child's always been well, ma'am,” Andrews was standing, the image of exact correctness, in her mistress' bedroom, while Feather lay in bed with her breakfast on a convenient and decorative little table. ”It's been a thing I've prided myself on. But I should say she isn't well now.”

”Well, I suppose it's only natural that she should begin sometime,”

remarked Feather. ”They always do, of course. I remember we all had things when we were children. What does the doctor say? I hope it isn't the measles, or the beginning of anything worse?”

”No, ma'am, it isn't. It's nothing like a child's disease. I could have managed that. There's good private nursing homes for them in these days. Everything taken care of exactly as it should be and no trouble of disinfecting and isolating for the family. I know what you'd have wished to have done, ma'am.”

”You do know your business, Andrews,” was Feather's amiable comment.

”Thank you, ma'am,” from Andrews. ”Infectious things are easy managed if they're taken away quick. But the doctor said you must be spoken to because perhaps a change was needed.”

”You could take her to Ramsgate or somewhere bracing.” said Feather.

”But what did he SAY?”

”He seemed puzzled, ma'am. That's what struck me. When I told him about her not eating--and lying awake crying all night--to judge from her looks in the morning--and getting thin and pale--he examined her very careful and he looked queer and he said, 'This child hasn't had a SHOCK of any kind, has she? This looks like what we should call shock--if she were older'.”

Feather laughed.

”How could a baby like that have a shock?”

”That's what I thought myself, ma'am,” answered Andrews. ”A child that's had her hours regular and is fed and bathed and sleeps by the clock, and goes out and plays by herself in the Gardens, well watched over, hasn't any chance to get shocks. I told him so and he sat still and watched her quite curious, and then he said very slow: 'Sometimes little children are a good deal shaken up by a fall when they are playing. Do you remember any chance fall when she cried a good deal?'”

”But you didn't, of course,” said Feather.

”No, ma'am, I didn't. I keep my eye on her pretty strict and shouldn't encourage wild running or playing. I don't let her play with other children. And she's not one of those stumbling, falling children. I told him the only fall I ever knew of her having was a bit of a slip on a soft flower bed that had just been watered--to judge from the state her clothes were in. She had cried because she's not used to such things, and I think she was frightened. But there wasn't a scratch or a shadow of a bruise on her. Even that wouldn't have happened if I'd been with her. It was when I was ill and my sister Anne took my place. Ann thought at first that she'd been playing with a little boy she had made friends with--but she found out that the boy hadn't come that morning--”

”A boy!” Andrews was sharp enough to detect a new and interested note. ”What boy?”

”She wouldn't have played with any other child if I'd been there”

said Andrews, ”I was pretty sharp with Anne about it. But she said he was an aristocratic looking little fellow--”

”Was he in Highland costume?” Feather interrupted.

”Yes, ma'am. Anne excused herself by saying she thought you must know something about him. She declares she saw you come into the Gardens and speak to his Mother quite friendly. That was the day before Robin fell and ruined her rose-coloured smock and things.

But it wasn't through playing boisterous with the boy--because he didn't come that morning, as I said, and he never has since.”

Andrews, on this, found cause for being momentarily puzzled by the change of expression in her mistress' face. Was it an odd little gleam of angry spite she saw?

”And never has since, has he?” Mrs. Gareth-Lawless said with a half laugh.

”Not once, ma'am,” answered Andrews. ”And Anne thinks it queer the child never seemed to look for him. As if she'd lost interest.

She just droops and drags about and doesn't try to play at all.”

”How much did she play with him?”

”Well, he was such a fine little fellow and had such a respectable, elderly, Scotch looking woman in charge of him that Anne owned up that she hadn't thought there was any objections to them playing together. She says they were as well behaved and quiet as children could be.” Andrews thought proper to further justify herself by repeating, ”She didn't think there could be any objection.”