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diff --git a/old/53864-8.txt b/old/53864-8.txt deleted file mode 100644 index a7afc25..0000000 --- a/old/53864-8.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,3814 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Story of a Baby, by Ethel Turner - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: The Story of a Baby - -Author: Ethel Turner - -Release Date: January 2, 2017 [EBook #53864] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF A BABY *** - - - - -Produced by David Wilson and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive/American Libraries.) - - - - - - - - - -The Story of a Baby - - -[Decoration: NAVTILVS SERIES] - - - - -[Illustration: "'He is exactly twenty-one pounds,' she said."] - - - - -THE STORY OF A BABY - -BY ETHEL TURNER - - -[Decoration: The Navtilvs Series] - -WARD LOCK & BOWDEN: LIMITED -LONDON · NEW YORK & MELBOURNE -1896 - - - - -TO THE BEST WOMAN IN THE WORLD - -E. T., _Sydney_. - - - - -CONTENTS - - - CHAP. PAGE - I. THE BURDEN OF IT 1 - - II. THE RED ROAD COUNTRY 11 - - III. DOT AND LARRIE FALL OUT 21 - - IV. THE 'LITTLE MOTHER' 33 - - V. MORE RIFTS IN THE LUTE 45 - - VI. LARRIE THE LOAFER 58 - - VII. A POCKET MADAME MELBA 73 - - VIII. PICTURES IN THE FIRE 83 - - IX. A CONFLICT OF WILLS 97 - - X. A DARN ON A DRESS 111 - - XI. A QUESTION OF OWNERSHIP 124 - - XII. A LITTLE DIPLOMAT 131 - - XIII. DOT GOES BABY LIFTING 140 - - XIV. THE WHEEL IN THE BRAIN 147 - - XV. SULLIVAN WOOSTER, GENTLEMAN 154 - - - - -THE STORY OF A BABY - - - - -CHAPTER I - -THE BURDEN OF IT - - -Larrie had been carrying it for a long way and said it was quite time -Dot took her turn. - -Dot was arguing the point. - -She reminded him of all athletic sports he had taken part in, and of -all the prizes he had won; she asked him what was the use of being -six-foot-two and an impossible number of inches round the chest if he -could not carry a baby. - -Larrie gave her an unexpected glance and moved the baby to his other -arm; he was heated and unhappy, there seemed absolutely no end to the -red, red road they were traversing, and Dot, as well as refusing to -help to carry the burden, laughed aggravatingly at him when he said it -was heavy. - -'He is exactly twenty-one pounds,' she said, 'I weighed him on the -kitchen scales yesterday, I should think a man of your size ought to -be able to carry twenty-one pounds without grumbling so.' - -'But he's on springs, Dot,' he said, 'just look at him, he's never -still for a minute, you carry him to the beginning of Lee's orchard, -and then I'll take him again.' - -Dot shook her head. - -'I'm very sorry, Larrie,' she said, 'but I really can't. You know I -didn't want to bring the child, and when you insisted, I said to myself, -you should carry him every inch of the way, just for your obstinacy.' - -'But you're his mother,' objected Larrie. - -He was getting seriously angry, his arms ached unutterably, his clothes -were sticking to his back, and twice the baby had poked a little fat -thumb in his eye and made it water. - -'But you're its father,' Dot said sweetly. - -'It's easier for a woman to carry a child than a man'--poor Larrie was -mopping his hot brow with his disengaged hand--'everyone says so; don't -be a little sneak, Dot, my arm's getting awfully cramped; here, for -pity's sake take him.' - -Dot shook her head again. - -'Would you have me break my vow, St Lawrence?' she said. - -She looked provokingly cool and unruffled as she walked along by his -side; her gown was white, with transparent puffy sleeves, her hat was -white and very large, she had little white canvas shoes, long white -Suéde gloves, and she carried a white parasol. - -'I'm hanged,' said Larrie, and he stopped short in the middle of the -road, 'look here, my good woman, are you going to take your baby, or -are you not?' - -Dot revolved her sunshade round her little sweet face. - -'No, my good man,' she said, 'I don't propose to carry your baby one -step.' - -'Then I shall drop it,' said Larrie. He held it up in a threatening -position by the back of its crumpled coat, but Dot had gone sailing on. - -'Find a soft place,' she called, looking back over her shoulder once -and seeing him still standing in the road. - -'Little minx,' he said under his breath. - -Then his mouth squared itself; ordinarily it was a pleasant mouth, much -given to laughter and merry words; but when it took that obstinate look, -one could see capabilities for all manner of things. - -He looked carefully around. By the roadside there was a patch of soft, -green grass, and a wattle bush, yellow-crowned, beautiful. He laid the -child down in the shade of it, he looked to see there were no ants or -other insects near; he put on the bootee that was hanging by a string -from the little rosy foot and he stuck the india-rubber comforter in -its mouth. Then he walked quietly away and caught up to Dot. - -'Well?' she said, but she looked a little startled at his empty arms; -she drooped the sunshade over the shoulder nearest to him, and gave a -hasty, surreptitious glance backward. Larrie strode along. - -'You look fearfully ugly when you screw up your mouth like that,' she -said, looking up at his set side face. - -'You're an unnatural mother, Dot, that's what you are,' he returned -hotly. 'By Jove, if I was a woman, I'd be ashamed to act as you do. You -get worse every day you live. I've kept excusing you to myself, and -saying you would get wiser as you grew older, and instead, you seem -more childish every day.' - -She looked childish. She was very, very small in stature, very slightly -and delicately built. Her hair was in soft gold-brown curls, as short -as a boy's; her eyes were soft, and wide, and tender, and beautiful as -a child's. When she was happy they were the colour of that blue, deep -violet we call the Czar, and when she grew thoughtful, or sorrowful, -they were like the heart of a great, dark purple pansy. She was not -particularly beautiful, only very fresh, and sweet, and lovable. Larrie -once said she always looked like a baby that has been freshly bathed -and dressed, and puffed with sweet violet powder, and sent out into the -world to refresh tired eyes. - -That was one of his courtship sayings, more than a year ago when she was -barely seventeen. She was eighteen now, and he was telling her she was -an unnatural mother. - -'Why, the child wouldn't have had its bib on, only I saw to it,' he -said, in a voice that increased in excitement as he dwelt on the -enormity. - -'Dear me,' said Dot, 'that was very careless of Peggie, I must really -speak to her about it.' - -'I shall shake you some day, Dot,' Larrie said, 'shake you till your -teeth rattle. Sometimes I can hardly keep my hands off you.' - -His brow was gloomy, his boyish face troubled, vexed. - -And Dot laughed. Leaned against the fence skirting the road that seemed -to run to eternity, and laughed outrageously. - -Larrie stopped too. His face was very white and square-looking, his dark -eyes held fire. He put his hands on the white, exaggerated shoulders of -her muslin dress and turned her round. - -'Go back to the bottom of the hill this instant, and pick up the child -and carry it up here,' he said. - -'Go and insert your foolish old head in a receptacle for -_pommes-de-terre_,' was Dot's flippant retort. - -Larrie's hands pressed harder, his chin grew squarer. - -'I'm in earnest, Dot, deadly earnest. I order you to fetch the child, -and I intend you to obey me,' he gave her a little shake to enforce the -command. 'I am your master, and I intend you to know it from this day.' - -Dot experienced a vague feeling of surprise at the fire in the eyes that -were nearly always clear, and smiling, and loving, then she twisted -herself away. - -'Pooh,' she said, 'you're only a stupid overgrown, passionate boy, -Larrie. You my master! You're nothing in the world but my husband.' - -'Are you going?' he said in a tone he had never used before to her. 'Say -Yes or No, Dot, instantly.' - -'No,' said Dot, stormily. - -Then they both gave a sob of terror, their faces blanched, and they -began to run madly down the hill. - -Oh the long, long way they had come, the endless stretch of red, red -road that wound back to the gold-tipped wattles, the velvet grass, and -their baby! - -Larrie was a fleet, wonderful runner. In the little cottage where they -lived, manifold silver cups and mugs bore witness to it, and he was -running for life now, but Dot nearly outstripped him. - -She flew over the ground, hardly touching it, her arms were -outstretched, her lips moving. They fell down together on their knees by -their baby, just as three furious, hard-driven bullocks thundered by, -filling the air with dust and bellowing. - -The baby was blinking happily up at a great fat golden beetle that was -making a lazy way up the wattle. It had lost its 'comforter' and was -sucking its thumb thoughtfully. It had kicked off its white knitted -boots, and was curling its pink toes up in the sunshine with great -enjoyment. - -'Baby!' Larrie said. The big fellow was trembling in every limb. - -'_Baby!_' said Dot. She gathered it up in her little shaking arms, she -put her poor white face down upon it, and broke into such pitiful tears -and sobs that it wept too. Larrie took them both into his arms, and sat -down on a fallen tree. He soothed them, he called them a thousand -tender, beautiful names; he took off Dot's hat and stroked her little -curls, he kissed his baby again and again; he kissed his wife. When they -were all quite calm and the bullocks ten miles away, they started again. - -'I'll carry him,' said Larrie. - -'Ah no, let me,' Dot said. - -'Darling, you're too tired--see, you can hold his hand across my -shoulder.' - -'No, no, give him to me--my arms ache without him.' - -'But the hill--my big baby!' - -'Oh, I _must_ have him--Larrie, _let_ me--see, he is so light--why, he -is nothing to carry.' - - - - -CHAPTER II - -THE RED ROAD COUNTRY - - -In cool weather the Red Road was very pleasant walking. It wound up hill -and down dale for many a mile till it reached Hornsby, and branched away -into different country. - -All the way there were gum trees--gum trees and fences; here and there -were closer palings and garden shrubs indicating human residence, but -they were far apart and the road was very lonely. Parallel to it and -showing in places between the trees was the single line of the railway. -It did not spoil the scenery at all, it rather gave a friendly look to -it and reminded the pedestrian that in spite of the bush silences, the -towering trees, the vista of blue hills and the mountain-like freshness -of the air, he could be in all the bustle and happy fellowship of town -in half-an-hour. - -Away to the left the ground dipped, then rose again, in a blue soft -hill, dipped again, and the new rise was purple and beautiful. The third -dip, just a line, white sometimes and again blue was the harbour. On -clear days one could see the smoke of vessels. Beyond the hills and the -water-line stretched Sydney city, white and shining in the distant -sunlight. Further away, over near the sky, the grey blue hills and the -light that meant sand-stretches was Botany. - -Higher up, and between the first and second hill-rise, ran the river -they call Lane Cove. A great white building, St Ignatius, made one -land-mark and the Mortlake gas-works another; from those places the -residents knew their geography. That was Eastwood away over there, -nestling among hills; those blurred cottages indicated Ryde; just where -the tree tops showed in a hollow, was the head of the river, and right -away on the west horizon a certain patch was the highest place in the -blue mountains. In a few years the beautiful country-side will be -commonplace suburbs; there will be stucco villas and terrace houses, -shops and paved roads; the railway has broken its fastness and the -change is inevitable. - -The smooth grass slopes, the wooded stretches will live only in memory. -The great red-and-black and silver-limbed gums will be hewn down to make -way for spreading civilisation. The blue gracious hills will be thick -with chimneys and advertisement boards. There will be a double line of -railway, no longer picturesque, and big spreading stations instead of -primitive sidings where one held up a 'flag by day and a light at night' -to be picked up of the passing train. - -Past St Leonard's the railway is very new, a matter of months indeed. - -Before it was opened there were obstacles in the way of reaching Sydney -that made would-be residents shake their heads, and go to live at -Paddington, and Forest Lodge, and such crowded places that could be -reached by tram with a certain degree of comfort. - -But before the year of grace 1893, the train from the hills that only -just escaped being mountains, used to empty out its passengers on the -little St Leonard's Station. There were two ways only after that of -getting to Sydney. - -Either one merrily trudged a pathway mile, and then caught a North Shore -cable tram to the point where the Ferry boat leaves for the Circular -Quay, or one entrusted one's life and well-being to a vehicle that might -have been a Noah's Ark, or a bathing machine, or a convict van. - -In ancient days it used to run between Shoalhaven and Moss-Vale, as its -red painted sides still bore witness, but travellers in those parts did -better for themselves, so they brought it here, and charged sixpence -each way for the twenty-five minutes' journey. Now there is a -combination of the railway; pressure was brought to bear, and the New -South Wales Government finished in a hurry a work that had dragged on -till people despaired of its completion. The line winds down towards the -chimneys and smoke of 'The Shore'; one has glimpses from the train of -blue bright bays and white sails moored boats, and a broken wharf or two -waiting to catch the artist's eye. Then it skirts along the harbour, -close to the water, in a semi-circular sweep, and makes an eye-sore. Two -years ago, Lavender Bay was beautiful. - -But about the Red Road. Just at the top of one of the elevations, there -was a big stone house standing in the middle of an orange and lemon -orchard. Dot's mother lived here by herself. - -A mile and a half away down the road there was a weather-board cottage -in a garden running over with flowers. Larrie and Dot lived here, and -the baby of course. They had been going up to 'mother's' the afternoon -they quarrelled about carrying the child; they always went on Sundays. - -Very often Dot went on Mondays too, that was the day Peggie, her -_aide-de-camp_, made the cottage unsavoury with soap-suds. Tuesday -nights they always had dinner up at the house, Peggie never had time to -cook on Tuesdays, there were so many of Dot's dresses and Larrie's -shirts, and baby's multitudinous garments to be finely ironed. - -On Thursdays and Saturdays the mother used to come down to the cottage -and put it straight, and help poor Peggie, and bring a new knitted -jacket or bootees or a hood or pinafore for baby. - -The house was a big lonely place for such a little woman. She was even -smaller than Dot. She had a tiny fragile figure, and a tiny face, brown -and shrivelled with Australian suns. Her eyes were very big and -pathetic, something like Dot's in wistful moments, and her mouth with -its infinitude of lines, was very sweet. - -After her eyes, her brooch was the first thing that invited notice. It -was one of those large, very old-fashioned ones with a miniature set on -the front of it. Dot had begged her to cease wearing it; 'It isn't good -taste,' she had said once vexedly, 'keep it in a drawer;' but the mother -would not lay it aside even though it was the only thing in which she -had ever thwarted Dot in her life. - -When she went to bed she pinned it on her night-gown, when she dressed -in the morning she fastened her collar with it. A hundred times a day -her fingers strayed to it. In her sleep her hand stole up and closed -upon it. - -The miniature was of a very young man in the old fashioned naval uniform -that used to be worn forty years ago. He had the correct miniature -smile, but the eyes were well done and you could see his brow had been -splendid. He was Dot's father, dead sixteen years ago; it was the only -likeness he had ever had taken. - -Inside the brooch was a cluster of little heads, gaudily painted, six in -all; Dot, the seventh, had been born after it was done. - -Four of the heads pressed clay pillows in a churchyard not very far -away, seas washed over the fifth, and the sixth lay in a lonely grave in -the wilds of Western Australia. - -Dot was the only one alive, and now she had flown from the home-nest to -one of her own, leaving unutterable desolation behind her in the -mother's heart. - -It was because death had so broken and bruised this little frail mother -that she had never crossed Dot's will in anything since she was born. -The days of insistence and control, and obedience-seeking were buried -with the buried six. Dot ruled, and the mother poured out her heart at -her feet and worshipped with a love almost desperate. - -So when Dot said she was going to be married at once, albeit only -seventeen years had passed over her little sunny head, the mother had -not been able to refuse. She had only reminded Larrie, whom she loved -dearly and had known for years, how young her darling was, and on her -knees she had prayed him to be good to her always. Larrie was -twenty-two. For sixteen years he had come up to the house in the -holidays at the first sign of a ripening orange; he had eaten bananas -with Dot, one of them at each end of the fruit, when she was two. - -He had played cricket with her at six, climbed trees with her at ten, -pulled her hair and pinched her for being a girl at twelve, forgotten -her for a time at fifteen, and come back and married her at seventeen. - -He had £250 a year, and no guardians or parents to give him unasked -advice. So he resolved to take a year's holiday according to his -doctor's orders, before he started his profession, and teach and train -Dot till she was an ideal wife. He had all kinds of ideas on the -subject, though he was so very boyish to look at, and he intended to -inculcate Dot with them all. But for the first year he was so -exuberantly happy he forgot all about them. - -It was only when the baby was growing into months, and Dot was -continually forgetting some article of its clothing, or the kicking -exercise that was to make it an athlete, or when her piano made her -forget its existence for a little while, that he began to think he was -not doing his duty by her, and must turn over a new leaf. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -DOT AND LARRIE FALL OUT - -'And though she is but little, she is fierce.' - - -The cottage was a delightful place. It was built of weatherboard, not -the kind that overlaps, but that with a groove between each board. The -verandah was very wide and ran round the four sides; that was Larrie's -great extravagance when he improved the place. - -'Where's a fellow to smoke when it's hot or wet if there isn't a decent -verandah?' he said. - -He and Dot had walked miles upon it in the early months of the year, he -with his pipe in his lips and a look of great content in his eyes, she -with her hands linked at the back of her neck or slipped around his -arm. - -There was a profusion of hammocks and lounges and chairs that made you -lazy to look at them. That was Dot's extravagance. On one side the outer -wall was of yellow and white roses that flowered eternally, on another, -wistaria with delicate down-dropping blooms. The third--the kitchen -side--was passion-vines, and the fourth was clear, and showed a grand -sweep of country, and all the Sydney vista. - -There was a narrow hall and a painted front door, on either side of it -long French windows opening, one into the dining-room, the other into -Dot's beautiful little drawing-room. - -She had spent a week thinking out the furnishing of that room, and -nearly all her mother's wedding-present cheque upon it. - -'No, I won't have a carpet,' she said when her mother was dwelling upon -the advantages of Brussels over Wilton pile, 'and no, I won't have felt, -it's too stuffy looking; and if you buy me a proper tapestry suite I -shall set fire to it. In India people furnish sensibly, but in -Australia, which must be nearly as hot, they do everything in English -style.' - -The little mother ceased her suggestions, and Dot worked her own will -with really charming effect. - -The room was rather low, and the walls and ceiling tinted a delicate -green. There was a large centre square of white matting, fringed at the -edge and a border of pale green around it. The three French windows had -long soft curtains of white with pale green frills. No two chairs were -alike. They were of rattan and pith, and bamboo in quaint shapes. One -had a flat sea-green cushion of plush, one a triangular one of silk with -frills of coral pink; there was a lovely pith sofa lounge, wide, -inviting, with a pile of pillows in cool Liberty silk. In a corner the -piano stood, a beautiful instrument though very plain. It was not draped -in art muslin, and it had no photos or _bric-à-brac_ on it to jingle and -spoil the wonderful music Dot brought forth from it. A great lamp stood -beside it with a green crinkled paper canopy, restful to the eye. - -In another corner there was a low bookcase running along the wall; -volumes of Browning caught the eye, Tennyson, William Morris, Shelley, -Keats, all the gods. - -There was a sandal wood writing-table, with silver handles and silver -equipments, a silver lamp with a rose-leaf shade, and a photo of baby in -a silver chased frame. - -There was not a tambourine on the walls, not a single fan pocket, not a -plaque. Half-a-dozen pictures perhaps, bits of exquisite colouring -chiefly in long narrow gold frames; a sunset at Manly Lagoon, a bit of -the Kanimbla valley, with summer upon it, a water colour of the road -above Mossman's Bay, a woman's face, pale and unspeakably beautiful, -painted against a background of purple velvet, some chrysanthemums, -tawny yellow and brown. - -One or two engravings as well. 'Wedded' in an oak frame hung over the -piano. Dot said the man was Larrie's very counterpart; when she sang she -used to look up at it and feel glad he was her husband. On a tall easel -on a table there was the 'Peacemaker.' Larrie said the little girl was -Dot. There were bits of quaint china on the little tables, and a few -photographs, not many. Flowers there were in all possible places. -Daffodils and spiky leaves in the windows, roses and 'shivery' grass on -the tables, low vases of violets and primroses, tall ones of jonquils. -Dot dusted this room herself every morning, then before she could put -the duster away, the piano would tempt her, and the rest of the house be -forgotten. But for Peggie what a place it would have been! - -Peggie was a real Cornstalk. She was fully five-feet-eleven, and had -impossibly long arms and an impossible number of freckles. But she had -also all a Cornstalk's warm, honest heart; she was devoted to Dot and -Larrie, and absolutely worshipped the baby. She made no better a servant -as far as work went, than the average untrained Australian girl; but she -was wonderfully learned in the ways and wants of babyhood, and so was -invaluable to Dot who was absurdly ignorant. When Larrie had engaged -her twelve months ago at a Sydney registry office, he had asked her -name. - -'Marjorie Dorothy Pegerton,' she said. - -'Ah!' said Larrie, 'that's a high day and holiday name, shall we say -Mary on week days?' - -'Marjie, some folks call me,' she answered. 'Or there's Dolly--I'm not -particular--you can even call me Peg if you like, Mr--what was it the -gentleman said your name was?' - -'Armitage,' said Larrie, 'and let us decide on Peggie; it is unique, and -altogether charming in these days.' - -They were both very fond of Peggie, she was the stay of the cottage in -all domestic affairs--it would have fallen to pieces but for her, and -the baby--well there is really no knowing what would have happened to -that same baby had it not been for Peggie. - -Larrie generally minded the baby on Thursday mornings. It was Thursday -morning now. Peggie was doing her routine work for that time, scrubbing -the bare pine floors of the bedrooms. Larrie and Dot both hated carpets. - -Larrie was smoking his third postprandial pipe, and was pacing up and -down one side of the verandah; he would have liked to have gone the -whole distance, but then there was the baby. - -It was lying in a hammock in a nest of pillows, and looking with calm, -large gaze out into all the world that appeared through a gap in the -rose creeper. There was the pink flush of recent sleep on its little -soft cheeks, and its hair, the softest, warmest gold in the world, was -all tumbled and curly with washing. It had a wonderful amount of hair -for so young a child, and Dot's pride in it was forgivable, for nearly -all the babies of her acquaintance were bald. - -Have you ever kissed a baby's neck? Was ever anything so warm and white -and velvety? The neck of Dot's baby was absolutely beyond description. -Its mouth was red, bowshaped. Sometimes it gave wide wet touches on -Dot's cheeks, and she would whisper excitedly to Larrie that it was -kissing her. - -Such wonderful, wondering eyes it had, intensely blue, intensely -earnest. There had been moments when Larrie felt he would give his soul -to know just what his baby was thinking of. - -Did you show it a beautiful flower or a low hanging silver moon, a -picture, something bright with colour? it seemed to be looking away far -beyond them and smiling in a faint sweet way, because it saw fairer -things than ever you dreamed of. - -Its hands--well, perhaps they were like most babies' hands, but neither -Dot, nor Larrie, nor Peggie, nor the little mother would have allowed it -for a moment. They were like the inside of a flushed, curled, rose-leaf, -and when they closed round your finger, you felt how strangely sweet, -and soft and warm they were. From the long open window came the sound of -Dot's voice, singing. The baby was listening as it lay in the hammock. -Larrie was listening as he smoked, though in a half reluctant way. - -When little souls are born, just before they come to us from the -wonderful place of souls, they have to do with a lottery. To a thousand -little blind struggling souls, there are half-a-dozen great good gifts. -Nine hundred and ninety-four draw blanks, but the band of six come down -to us blessed, rejoicing. Dot had been of the six. She had drawn a -voice. Generally Larrie rejoiced because of it. - -Not this morning, however. He had been brooding lately over Dot's -deficiencies, and he almost wished she had been of the nine hundred and -ninety-four. For one thing, he could have walked all the four sides of -the verandah if she had been. The thought rankled. - -'Dot,' he called in 'a voice.' - -Only little bursts of melody answered him. She was singing a rippling -song of Schubert's; it was in keeping with the warm, soft air outside, -the twittering of birds, the faint motion of the gum leaves. - -'Dot!' he shouted. - -She put a curly little head between the window curtains. - -'Well, Larrakin?' she said. - -'Come and mind the baby,' he said shortly, 'I want to smoke.' - -'But baby doesn't mind smoke at all--do you, small sweet?' she said, -going over to the hammock. 'Oh Larrie, look how uncomfortable he is, -you're a nice one to look after him; and where's his comforter? he'll -have no thumb left presently.' - -'I threw it away,' Larrie answered, 'all that indiarubber can't be good -for him, I don't intend him to have another.' - -'Stupid!' said Dot. She kissed the baby, tickled it, tossed it, then -laid it down again. - -'What did you call me for,' she said. 'I was just enjoying myself.' Her -eyes still had the look of being away in the spheres. 'He's all right -there and it's your turn to mind him, Larrie. I walked him about for an -hour in the night.' - -She moved to go in again. - -'Stop here when I tell you, and mind him,' he said in an unpardonable -voice. - -Dot gave him a surprised look. - -'You forget yourself, Larrie,' she said quietly. - -She went in and her fingers wandered into the quiet, calm music of one -of Mendelssohn's gondola songs. But she took it in rather hurried time. -Larrie disturbed her when he had this mood on. He came behind her and -lifted her hands off the keyboard. - -'Go and mind the child this minute.' The flame in his eyes showed itself -instantly in hers. - -'How dare you speak to me like that!' she said. - -'Go and mind the child,' said Larrie. - -Dot crashed a passionate chord on the piano, she lifted her right hand -for a brilliant run. But Larrie picked her up in his arms and put her -outside on the verandah near the hammock. Then he went in and closed the -drawing-room door behind him. - -By the time she had flown round through the dining-room he was locking -the piano. - -'How _dare_ you!' Dot said in trembling fury. 'My piano! give me that -key instantly.' - -'Go and mind your child,' he said. He was stooping a little, for the key -stuck, since it was never used; his head was almost on a level with the -lid. - -The next minute he was standing straight in confused astoundment. Dot -had dealt him a passionate box on the ear, and fled from the room. - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -THE 'LITTLE MOTHER' - -'Kiss and be friends, like children being chid.' - - -It was unwritten law that thunder storms at the cottage should never -travel to the house. But when Dot hurried up the drive and burst into -the dining-room with a scarlet face and glowing eyes, the mother was -afraid something was wrong. - -'Why, it's Thursday, Dot!' she said, 'I was just coming down.' - -Dot took off her wide brimmed hat and fanned herself for a moment. - -'There was curry cooking in the kitchen,' she said; 'onions, pah!' - -'How's the baby, why didn't you bring him?' asked the little mother. - -'Oh, bother the baby,' said Dot. - -'Is Larrie's neuralgia better?' the mother ventured after a little -pause. And 'bother Larrie,' was Dot's wifely response. - -The mother got out the twenty-seventh pair of boots she was knitting for -baby, and worked two rows in silence. She wondered if it was Larrie's -fault or Dot's. Larrie's she was sure. She wished Dot was her one little -girl again, so she could take all the troubles for her. - -'How did Peggie like the new soap I left her?' she said, anxiously -flying from topics that made Dot's brows frown. - -'Bother Peggie,' said Dot. 'She washed baby's nightgowns with it, and -the whole world's placarded with advertisements that say don't. Idiot!' - -'The oranges are ripening beautifully,' said the poor little mother. - -Dot went over to her and kissed her passionately. - -'You're the best woman in the world,' she said. - -Tears of quick pleasure sprang into the mother's eyes. - -'_My_ little girl,' she said softly. - -She held Dot from her a minute, and scanned the flushed face with eyes -that saw everything. - -'I wish I was,' Dot said, in a stifled tone, 'just yours.' - -Anger crept into the mother's big eyes. 'Has Larrie?'--she said, -'Larrie, has he--does he?'--indignation overcame her. - -'Oh no,' said Dot, ashamed of so nearly infringing the law. 'Larrie's -all right--what are you running your head against, small woman?' - -'He is good to you?' suspiciously. - -'_Very_ good.' - -She got up and went to the piano. 'I came to have a good practice,' she -said. 'One can't with baby about.' - -She screwed up the stool, opened the lid, and got out a pile of music. -Wagner was at the bottom of the canterbury, and she sought for him, and -then attacked him with level brows. - -By the time she had made ten mistakes, and the little mother's head was -aching, there was the click of an opening gate. - -'I--' said Dot, 'I--think I shall go home.' She jumped up and peeped -through the Venetian. 'Baby may want me, and--and--if Larrie should -happen to come in, you needn't say I've been; he thinks I walk too -much.' - -She gave her mother a hurried kiss on the top of her cap, and slipped -out of the back door and across the paddocks to the train. - -Larrie came down the hall with slow step. He sat down in Dot's old -rocking-chair. 'Morning, mum,' he said, 'the oranges are looking -lovely.' He was eating one he had plucked near the gate, but did not -seem to be paying any attention to the taste of it. - -The little mother regarded him with eyes full of severity, though she -tried to hide it. - -'Dot is not looking well,' she said, 'haven't you noticed? We mustn't -let her do too much, we must be very careful of her, Larrie boy.' - -Larrie looked a trifle disturbed for a minute, then righteous wrath -prevailed over incipient anxiety. 'Why she doesn't do anything,' he -said, '_anything_.' - -'She's very young,' was the mother's reply. - -'Oh, that's nothing,' said Larrie 'lots of girls of eighteen are married -and do everything.' - -'Not little tiny girls like Dot,' urged mother, 'you mustn't be hard on -her, Larrie, she'll be all she should be in time.' - -'But not if I don't teach her,' he insisted; 'why, how can she?' - -'It comes of itself,' the mother answered. - -But a dark look of recollective annoyance spread over Larrie's brow. - -'She forgot baby's teething necklace three days last week, she's always -forgetting things,' he said. - -Then he too remembered the law, and ate the rest of his orange in -silence. - -'I wish you would not come down to the cottage quite so often,' was the -remark with which he broke a meditation that had involved criss-crossed -brows and five slow minutes. A little odd sound broke from the mother's -lips. Larrie looked up and saw she was white under her brown and her -eyes were piteous. - -He crossed over to her with two swift steps. He knelt down beside her -chair, and put both his arms round her thin waist. - -'How dare you, mum, how _dare_ you have such thoughts!' he said. He -kissed her several times in an eager, boyish way. 'You _know_ you could -never come too often for me, you _know_ you are more to me than my own -mother ever was. It's only Dot, don't you see? She's getting too -dependent, mum. We'll have to let her stand alone a little more. Peggie -spoils her, you spoil her--I even spoil her myself--mightn't it be a -good thing to let her do things by herself for a change, just for a -trial, mum? And she shall come here of course. Only, don't you come to -the cottage for a bit, and do all the things she leaves undone in that -quiet little way you have.' - -'Not even Saturdays, Larrie? That's the hardest day.' - -'No,' Larrie said. 'Be a good little mum and leave her to me.' - -He stood up, all his six feet and odd inches, his young face grave, -resolute, his eyes full of seriousness. - -'He looks like a man fit to be trusted with his own wife,' the little -mother told herself as she looked up at him. - -Aloud, she said in a tone of wistful resignation. 'Very well, Larrie, -you will be gentle with her, I know--she's such a little thing.' - -Larrie walked home. He was thinking all the way of the new leaf he was -about to turn. Dot had behaved in an altogether unforgivable manner. He -must be firm with her, very firm, he told himself. He was inclined to -spoil her, as he had said, and overlook her faults--but from now, he -must show her, too, his displeasure at the disrespectful way she had -treated him in the morning. Boxing a husband's ears! - -The red burnt on his brow as he opened the gate, thinking of it and -heard Dot trilling Amiens' song as she watered some sickly pelargoniums -she was trying to grow. - -'I must be firm, very firm,' Dot had told herself. 'No husband should -order his wife about in the way Larrie ordered me. He is a little, just -a little inclined to tyrannise, and I shall be laying up unhappiness for -myself if I do not nip it in the earliest bud.' - -When she saw his figure coming down the hill, she laid the baby down in -the cot inside and bade Peggie give an eye to him. Then she popped on a -clean muslin dress with forget-me-nots sprinkled all over it, tied the -blue ribbons of her picturesque garden hat in a coquettish bow at the -side of her chin, and when Larrie opened the gate she was flitting about -the flower beds with an absurdly small red watering can in her hand and -the gay little song on her lips. It certainly was provoking. - -[Illustration: "When Larrie opened the gate she was flitting about the -flower beds."] - -He had pictured her coming to his side with eyes all wet and sorry, and -asking forgiveness for being so naughty and childish. He had decided -to forgive her after a time, but to show her first, quietly and gravely, -how much in error she had been. And now-- - - 'Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly! - Then heigh-ho, the holly! - This life is most jolly.' - -and a whole gamut of lilts and trills of her own introduction. - -Larrie closed his lips very tightly and strode past her into the house. - -'I might have known she would turn into that kind of woman,' he -muttered, casting off his straw hat in the dining-room. 'A man never -knows a girl till he's married to her, she never shows herself in a true -light before.' - -He went into an adjoining bedroom for a linen coat to get cool in. - -Baby was disporting himself in the high-sided cot; his little legs were -bare and kicking against the pillows, his arms were bare, and his soft, -sweet neck. Such a gurgle and chirrup of welcome he gave his father! He -banged his heels on the iron, he gave a rapturous little leap, and said -'Googul, googul, googul.' - -Larrie glanced half-shamefacedly through the window to make sure Dot -could not see, and then he went over to the cot and said glad responsive -'googuls,' and submitted his crisp curls to the wee fingers, and tossed -him about in his arms. - -But when the dinner-bell rang he laid him down in a hurry, and moved out -of the room. Only he could not quite call up the stern 'firm' manner -again. - -Dot sprang up the verandah steps, and went into the bedroom to take off -her hat, and wash invisible gardening marks from her fingers. - -'I won't quarrel,' she whispered to herself, 'but I must really show him -I am not to be bullied. I will be _very_ firm.' - -'Googul' said baby. - -Such a mournful little googul! there were actually two tiny tears -welling up in the blue wide eyes, for tossing and petting were joyful to -him. - -Dot shut the door. Then she said '_Baby_' in a tempestuous little way, -and two quick answering tears sprang up in her own eyes as she lifted -him up to her. It was such a lonely, reproachful little 'googul.' She -sat down on the bed with him, and made his small heart gladsome again -with kisses and baby-talk. - -The door opened one inch--then wide. - -'The curry coolin' as 'ard as it can, and master lookin' black, and 'ere -you are,' said Peggie resentfully. 'Give 'im to me, the darling angel.' - -Dot handed him over, and hurried into the dining-room. - -'You're putting milk in, what are you thinking of?' Larrie said in an -injured tone after two minutes' silence. Dot was actually thus spoiling -the cup of tea he always drank brown and sugarful. Peggie had forgotten -the slop basin. Dot got up to go to the cupboard which was near Larrie's -end of the table. - -'If you'll never be naughty again I'll forgive you,' she said in a -whisper at his elbow. Her eyes were wet, sorry, pleading. - -'You _dear_ little girl,' Larrie said. He laid down his knife and fork -and put his arms round her waist, 'I was a perfect brute to you, it was -all my fault.' - -'No, mine,' said Dot. - -'_Mine_,' insisted Larrie. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -MORE RIFTS IN THE LUTE - - 'This grew: I gave commands, - Then all smiles stopped together.' - - -But naturally this kind of thing could not go on for ever. - -Quarrels, with little tender makings up like that had a certain charm -while their freshness lasted. But when the fallings out became events of -almost weekly occurrence, the fallings in were no longer things to be -put away in 'the hushed herbarium where we keep our hearts' -forget-me-nots.' - -Larrie _was_ exacting and inclined to be tyrannical. And Dot _was_ -careless and childish, and unreasonable. The first week that the mother -did not come down to look after Peggie, and do her fifty odd acts of -straightening, the cottage was in a glorious state of muddle. - -Larrie by nature was an order-loving and somewhat methodical man, and -had an inborn objection to see Dot's pretty slippers lying about the -house, or stray articles of baby's clothing on the verandah chairs. He -thought breakfast things too ought not to be left on the table till all -hours in the morning, and when Dot asked him how he could expect Peggie -to dress baby and make the beds _and_ wash up by ten, he retorted -brutally that she was a lazy little slattern, and should do it herself. - -'A slattern is a person untidy in herself,' Dot replied, 'you can't say -you've ever seen me like that, Laurence Armitage!' - -And he certainly could not. Whatever her faults were, Dot was a little -lady to the backbone, and would have been always sweet and fresh, and -guiltless of pins and rents if she had never been able to afford more -than fourpence half-penny prints to clothe herself with. Shabby finery -she had a wholesome detestation for; however plain her dress might be, -it was always dainty, her shoes fitted trimly, her collar was above -reproach and fastened with precision, her gloves were unsoiled, and her -hats always fresh if only trimmed with Indian muslin. - -But she was certainly a shocking young person where household matters -were concerned. There was plenty of work to do even in so small a place; -Peggie, however, had cheerfully taken it on her own shoulders at the -beginning, and the things she ought to have done and left undone, the -little mother did. - -It was not until there was a third member in the family that the -housework was appreciably neglected. When the fascination of 'dressing -baby' was no longer new to Dot, and Peggie, its devoted worshipper, -begged to add that duty to her others, Dot consented with alacrity. And -Larrie looked on and told himself daily these things ought not to be. - -One day there was a very great passage-at-arms. Peggie had gone to -Sydney for the day to spend her month's wages in a fearful and wonderful -hat she had long had her eye upon, and Dot was left with the whole -burden of the household upon her shoulders. - -Generally on the rare occasions of Peggie's absence, the mother came -down and presided over the kitchen and the baby, and Dot had little else -to do than lay the table and help to dish up. But to-day Larrie's wicked -conspiracy stood in the way. - -The mother sent down a little note; it was very hot, would Dot mind if -she did not come, her head was inclined to ache badly? And Larrie had -'business in town' and would be back by the train just in time for -dinner. - -Dot felt overwhelmed with the responsibilities of her position. - -'I think you had better take baby up to mother's first, Larrie,' she -said, 'I don't see how I am to mind him and cook the dinner and do -everything.' - -'How does Peggie manage when you're away? My dear Dot, I hope you are -not going to give me the idea that you are one of those women utterly -without resource,' said my lord Larrie. 'My sister Charlotte--' - -'Grace!' cried Dot, 'spare me the recapitulation of the puddings she -could make and the wonders she could do at sixteen.' - -'Well, I only wanted to show you,' said Larrie. - -He brushed the dust off his shoulders, set his straw hat perfectly -straight on his head--he always wore it tilted forward or stuck jauntily -back in these wilds--and with a paternal kind of kiss to Dot and a -grandfatherly one to the baby, he departed. - -'I'll just show him what I can do,' said Dot going kitchenwards. 'Horrid -boy!' - -It was six or thereabouts when the 'horrid boy' returned. He was -hungry--amazingly hungry--and apart from his experiment he really hoped -that there was a very nice dinner ready. The white tablecloth was on the -dining-room table and the flowers were exquisitely arranged, drooping -blossoms of wistaria and delicate leaves on a ground of pale yellow -silk. There were also some knives and forks in a heap, two salt-cellars -and the silver gong. From the bedroom came doleful baby wails that -filled all the cottage. From the kitchen a strong smell of burning. - -'Gracious Lor,' said Peggie. - -But 'Hang it all!' was her master's remark. - -Peggie set her bandbox down and followed at his heels into the kitchen. - -Dot was standing over the fire. Nearly every piece of crockery in the -house stood dirty upon the table. Egg shells lay about, the sugar jar, -the currant, the peel, the pepper, the flour, and all the store cupboard -were in evidence. She turned a peony face towards them. 'Dinner's not -ready yet, and it's no use being cross, Larrie, if only you knew what a -bother I've had with the fire.' She lifted a saucepan with a groan and -set it aside. - -'Is there _anything_ to eat?' Larrie asked in a tone not altogether -mild. 'The place smells like a crematorium.' - -Dot sniffed. 'Does it?' she said. 'The meat's burnt, I couldn't help it, -it burnt while I ran in to dress baby, and then a visitor came after I -put some cakes and a batter pudding in the oven, and they burnt, there's -a boiled pudding though, it'll be cooked in half-an-hour, and we can -have eggs for once.' - -Peggie hastened to her bedroom to change her very best dress for an old -one in which she might take command of her region. - -'You really mean to say, Dot, that in all these hours you haven't been -able to cook a little dinner,' Larrie began. His chin squared itself, -his lips closed. - -'It's no good making faces, my good man,' Dot said. 'I've cut my thumb, -and I've burnt my wrist, and had sparks in my eyes, and now this is all -the thanks I get.' - -'Eggs when a man comes in hungry for his dinner!--and a pudding not -cooked! The table--' - -'_Will_ you go out of the kitchen, Laurence Armitage,' Dot said facing -round. 'Do you think I've not had enough without _you_ beginning?' - -'--The table not set and a crying baby,' Larrie went on. - -'Larrie, _do_ you want to provoke me into throwing a saucepan at your -head like an Irish washerwoman?' Dot said. - -She took the lid off the potatoes and disclosed a pulpy mass boiled out -of all recognition. - -'I don't profess to be perfect; accidents will happen even to the sister -Charlottes.' - -'It's this kind of thing that drives a man from his home to seek comfort -and pleasure elsewhere,' Larrie said darkly. He really felt exceedingly -ill-used, and Dot's heated face and worried expression did not appeal to -him at all. - -He even steeled his heart to the little tired tremble in her voice that -showed the tears were near, and all the time came the distracting sound -of baby's mournful screams that no one had time or inclination to -soothe. - -'You're a bad wife, Dot,' Larrie said, fully persuaded she was. - -Dot gave a hysterical laugh. - -'All this because your food's not ready to put in your mouth; men are as -bad as animals in the Zoo when meal time is delayed!' - -'You fail in your duty in every respect, look at this kitchen, Dot, -think of the dinner, listen to your child.' - -But Dot, utterly tired and overwrought, burst into a passion of tears -and brushed past him. - -'I h-h-hate you,' she said, 'I _wish_ I wasn't married to you, oh I _do_ -wish I wasn't.' - -'And so do I,' returned Larrie grimly. Even dinner did not restore his -equanimity, albeit he made a tolerably hearty one with four boiled eggs, -quantities of bread and butter, and half a tin of sardines as dessert. - -Dot stayed out in the garden and refused food entirely. - -She wept oceans of tired, hot tears and told herself she was the most -miserable woman on earth. Later, when only her eyelashes were wet and -the quiet evening wind had cooled her cheeks and heart, she still -wondered why girls all the world over were in such a hurry to marry. - -She thought wistfully of her careless, unfettered girlhood that she had -cut so short through her own wilfulness. - -'I might have had eight more years,' she whispered to herself, -'twenty-five is the proper age to marry, he would have been older and -more patient too, and I should never have felt like this.' - -She put down her head on the old seat back and sobbed again -heartbrokenly for 'like this' meant that love was dying. - -Then the wind dried her tears once more, and she sat staring at a patch -of light that fell from the dining-room lamp out upon the little lawn: -she was wondering drearily how she should be able to live out all the -other days of her life. - -Larrie stepped out on the verandah, she could see the red of his cigar -and the dusky outlines of his figure. - -'Dot,' he called. - -The wind carried his voice over the sleeping flowers, and the wet grass -down to the broken seat and flung it at her. She slipped out of her -place and stole off towards the piece of ground that was still -unreclaimed bush; she could not bear his presence yet. But he saw her -white flitting dress and followed. - -'The dew's as heavy as it can be, you'll get another cold,' he said, -'come in.' - -She shook her head without looking at him. - -'Come in, and don't be a silly child,' he said. - -Again she shook her head and walked on. - -But he caught her arm and turned her gently but firmly round. - -'I don't want to have to carry you,' he said. Then he threw his cigar -away and spoke gravely. - -'Look here, Dot, I'm not going to say anything more about this -afternoon, we'll let that go, all I want you to understand is you must -give up being childish, and act in a way that befits a married woman. -I'm tired of this.' - -Dot did not speak, she hardly heard the words in fact, only the cold -tone they were spoken in. She wondered vaguely if her love had been -dying for a long time or if to-night was only the beginning. She hoped -she should not live long, she felt quite glad to think the doctor had -said she had no constitution; how _could_ she go on living if calm -careless affection was going to take the place of the wonderful love -that had once made a glory of their every hour. They had both been -incredulous of the existence of such a place as the dead level of -matrimony--was this it indeed they had already come upon? - -'Well?' said Larrie, 'I'm waiting, Dot, are you going to give it up?' - -She gave a little start. 'What do you mean?' - -'Give up being so childish, will you try?' - -'Oh yes,' she said dully. That was very easy to promise, she felt so -old, so very much a woman to-night. - -Larrie was only half satisfied with that quiet 'Yes.' Where was his -little loving eager girl gone who would have done anything in the world -once had he asked it, done it gladly and rejoiced at its difficulty, -flung her arms round his neck and asked to be tried still more? - -Only that spiritless 'Yes,' was her answer to-night. He stifled a sigh -of bitter disappointment. This was _marriage_, he supposed. - -'It's beginning to rain,' he said heavily, 'go in.' - -She turned to go,--they had been standing for the last few minutes near -the old broken seat. - -Never yet had they parted after the making up of a quarrel without a -kiss, and he would not omit it now. - -But he stooped his head in almost an awkward way down to her bent one, -and it was not the kiss of a lover. - -She merely submitted a drooped cheek to his lips, and went slowly up to -the house alone. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -LARRIE THE LOAFER - - 'She had - A heart--how shall I say? too soon made glad, - Too easily impressed: she liked what e'er - She looked on, and her looks went everywhere.' - - -Larrie and Dot had come upon the great rock that lies near the beginning -of the matrimonial path of all those who marry for love. - -Oh the wonderful capacity they had in those days for torturing -themselves! Larrie used to brood continually in secret over the change -that had come into their lives; his manner grew cold and indifferent and -he consumed as much tobacco as a man long years in the bush, and Dot -used to shed hot, angry, grieving tears in private and devote herself -to the management of the house or the baby in the time that once she -had always devoted to her husband. - -Once in one of the passionate little outbursts she was subject to, she -scoffed at him for his idleness. - -'No wonder you are so fault-finding, Larrie,' she said, 'staying at home -day after day like an old maid. Other husbands don't tie themselves to -their wives' apron-strings as you do.' - -It was a little unjust of her, this pettish speech, though she had -received provocation. - -Larrie had had a bad illness, a kind of brain fever soon after his last -law examination, and really had been ordered to take a long holiday. - -'You are a man of means,' the doctor had said. 'Travel about, loaf -generally for a year or two, do anything you like, but avoid regular -brain work.' - -As a first step to a thorough holiday he had married Dot, and as his -means, divided, would not permit of travel, he settled down with an -easy mind to 'loaf.' - -He used to ride, and fish, and shoot, walk, read, and work in the garden -generally, but there were times when he had fits of superlative laziness -and did absolutely nothing but lie in the hammocks and smoke, or wander -about after Dot. - -At first this state of things had been very delightful and idyllic, but -after eighteen months Dot found it very trying, and used to wish -sincerely that Larrie went off to business in the morning like other men -and stayed away till evening. She felt certain he would appreciate both -herself and his home more if he did so, and, seeing he was apparently -quite well and strong, there seemed no reason for him not to go. - -It was this feeling that had prompted the cutting speech about being -tied to her apron, a garment by the way which she never wore on any -occasion. - -Larrie was bitterly offended. - -'You are tired of me, it has come to that already,' he said, and there -was such a note of pain in his voice that she had slipped her arm round -his neck in her old impetuous way. - -'It was horrid of me,' she said, 'of course you have a right to stay at -home always if you like. Forgive me, Larrie.' - -And he had forgiven her after a time, even kissed her kindly and told -her not to mind. - -But the very next day he had taken an office in town and sent a man to -paint 'Laurence Armitage, Solicitor,' in white letters on the door. - -All her entreaties now would not keep him at home a day, he caught the -business train at eight o'clock in the morning and the evening one home -at five. - -He was like everyone else's husband at last, and the garden of Eden had -become merely a cottage with a piece of ground attached. - -But oh, such long, long days they were to both of them at first. - -Larrie, of course, had really nothing to do for weeks and weeks. He -used to sit on his uncomfortable cane chair, put his long legs on the -window-sill and smoke and think half the day. Or he would pin a 'Back in -ten minutes' notice on his door and stroll aimlessly about town or drop -into the offices of other men he knew, and envy them their busy air of -occupation. - -Dot had never thought so many hours went to the day before. - -Baby slept a great deal, and just beginning to teethe, was cross and -less companionable than usual. The household tasks that she took upon -herself now did not last long, and the little mother did so much sewing -for everyone in the cottage that there was really nothing left for Dot -to do, but put on occasional buttons and tapes. She resolved to let her -voice fill up the blank in her life, it was her one great gift, and she -determined she would cultivate it assiduously and then--but she had not -yet quite decided what difference the 'then' would make. - -The Red Road Country had a little plain church at the top of one of its -hills, and Dot led the singing as a matter of course. - -Sometimes she took long solo parts in the anthems, and then the ugly -barn-like place of worship seemed full of glory. Several times people -had come all the way from the shore just to hear the clear, sweet, -joyous voice of that one little person in the front row. She had been -asked more than once to join the choir of different big churches in -Sydney, but there was no train service at all on Sunday for the line, -and Larrie naturally refused to have an empty house the greater part of -the day just because his wife had a voice. Choir practices were on -Wednesday afternoons, and Dot attended regularly now; for one thing they -helped to pass the time, for another she had a genuine desire to have -the singing each Sunday as good as possible, and knew her presence -stimulated the other members. - -The Red Road Country is growing famous for its healthiness. People with -land to sell in the district and the few boarding-house keepers, -advertise it as 'The Sanatorium of New South Wales.' Doctors are -beginning to send their patients there occasionally, instead of to the -Blue Mountains, and the pure, gum-tree filtered air certainly works -wonders. - -Mr Sullivan Wooster had been sent up for a month. He occupied a high -position in the musical world of Sydney. He taught, conducted concerts, -gave recitals of his own on organ and piano, and composed pieces that -met with high praise in the old world. An attack of pleurisy had -prostrated him recently, and he had come up to the Red Road Country -for his convalescence, refusing to be sent to a more distant place. -A Wednesday afternoon came a week after he had arrived. He was almost -dying with the _ennui_ of the place; the abounding gum trees were -beginning to prey upon his very soul. He had taken rooms at a cottage -where the recommendations had been 'No children, beautiful views, and -a piano.' - -But the daughter of the house had artistic yearnings that she longed to -impart, a passion for waltzes, and a tousled fringe that Wooster was -always dreading to find detachments of in his custards. The healthful -Eucalypt on hill and dale comprised the view. - -Naturally he spent most of his time on the Red Road. When he heard -voices in the little church that afternoon, he strolled to the door just -for the urgent want of something to do. When he heard Dot's voice, he -went in and sat down in the extreme back seat, much to the discomfiture -of a nervous member of the choir. - -After the practice was over he shook hands with the clergyman's wife who -had officiated at the little organ. He knew her very well; she had found -these lodgings for him, and had sent him tomatoes on one occasion and -some of her own orange wine, marvellously nasty stuff, on another. - -He asked after her husband, praised the views, thought the weather would -change, said nothing bitter about the landlady's daughter, and offered -to preside at the organ the next Sunday. Then he asked to be introduced -to the girl with the beautiful voice. - -A quarter of an hour later he was walking home with Dot. - -Her books--she had three of them--were his excuse, and the fact that he -had been walking that way before he turned in at the church. All the way -they talked music. - -Dot's eyes were bright, her speech eager. What a pleasant, unlooked for -change this was for her! - -She knew him well by repute, as indeed did everyone in Sydney--she had -been to his concerts, she played his compositions,--some of her friends -had been his pupils,--he seemed more like an old than a new friend by -the time they reached the top of the second hill. Half way down they -noticed the gathering clouds; by the time they reached the gate it had -begun to rain heavily. - -Dot did not hesitate a moment. He had been ill she knew: a wetting might -prove serious. - -'You must come in,' she said, pushing open her little gate, 'come and -wait till it clears.' She preceded him up the path and sprang up the -verandah steps into shelter, shaking the raindrops off her little short -curls and laughing breathlessly after the few minutes' hurry. - -'What a _dear_ little girl!' he said to himself, following with the -utmost gladness. - -He had never spent in all his life a pleasanter hour than the next one. - -His artistic eye was charmed with the arrangements of the simple -drawing-room, it was a real pleasure to run his fingers upon a good -piano once more--here was all the music that made the earth a happy -abiding place, and above all there was the presence of the sweet little -girl with short soft curls, wide, eager eyes, and a voice truly -wonderful. Oh the beautiful hour it was! - -They had both gone straight to the piano as naturally as ducks go to -water; they tried whole pages of different operas together, and went -twice through some of the songs, just for the sheer pleasure of singing. - -Then he played some Beethoven she had never found beautiful before, and -after that she played at his request piece after piece, and he was -surprised at her culture. - -He almost feared once or twice that the whole occurrence was an -enchanted dream which would fade presently. - -On his knees at the Canterbury drawer he found the score of _Faust_ bent -open at the 'Jewel Song.' He held it up eagerly. - -'Let me hear you in this,' he said. 'You sing it?' - -Dot nodded joyously and opened it on the music holder as he took his -seat. - -She gave a little cough to clear her throat. He stood up, real concern -on his face, and closed the book instantly. - -'There is _nothing_ so culpable as over-tiring the voice; it was -criminal of me to let you sing so much,' he said. - -There was a warm flush on her cheeks and her eyes were brilliant. - -'Let us have some tea then,' she said, with an excited little laugh. - -She crossed the room and rang the bell at the fireplace. Quite a -professional look was on his face. - -'I do trust you take proper care of your voice, Miss Armitage,' was his -really anxious remark. - -Dot's eyes flew open, then she laughed aloud just as Peggie appeared in -the doorway. - -'Tea, please, Peggie, and baby--baby first,' was her order. - -Peggie departed, surprised displeasure on her face: she wondered who was -the strange gentleman her mistress was on such good terms with, and she -thought it most inconsiderate that she should want afternoon tea when -there was so much ironing on hand. But she slipped a fresh muslin -pinafore on the baby and put on his best little red shoes, before she -carried him in to them all warm and flushed with his afternoon sleep. - -'I believe you thought I was only a girl, Mr Wooster,' Dot said with a -merry laugh as she stood up with her beautiful darling in her arms for -inspection. - -Mr Sullivan Wooster was certainly looking as thunderstruck as if the -pretty bundle of muslin, and lace and sweetness she held had been a -phoenix instead of the dearest little baby in the world. - -'I never dreamt,' he began. 'I quite thought--I certainly imagined Mrs -Ingram said _Miss_ Armitage; as well--,' his eyes sought her little bare -left hand. - -Dot laughed that happy little laugh of hers again. She went over to the -Canterbury and emptied a small Dresden cup upon her palm. - -'I always take my rings off before I play,' she said, 'it's a pernicious -habit, I know; my husband is always trying to break me of it, but I -really do it unconsciously. I never can play properly with them on.' - -After that, of course, he paid dutiful, expected court to the baby, and -made the correct remarks about its eyes and long eyelashes and the -quantity of its hair. But he no longer thought the occurrence an -enchanted dream that might fade any minute. The baby gnawing -thoughtfully at its dear little shoe as it sat on the hearthrug, while -Dot poured out tea, gave a surprising air of reality to everything. - -The rain had not ceased for a moment, so there was good enough excuse -for Mr Wooster's prolonged stay, but Dot was greatly astonished to see -Larrie come up the path presently, and know it was half-past five. She -excused herself and slipped out to meet him. He came in cold, wet, and -cross. It struck him how bright Dot's face was and how exceedingly -beautiful she was looking as she opened the door for him. - -'I have a visitor here, Larrie,' she said in a whisper, 'be quick and -get your mackintosh off. It is Mr Sullivan Wooster and he is so nice; -don't stay to change your coat.' - -But 'Confound him!' said Larrie. - -He wanted Dot and Dot only just now. All the day he had had an -unutterable longing to take her in his arms and beg her to let them -start afresh, and make life a beautiful thing again. And now there was -a visitor here. - -'You must ask him to stay for dinner, of course,' Dot said. 'He's had -pleurisy and can't go home in the rain. It's lucky there's roast fowl -to-day, and I'll open a bottle of those apricots.' - -Larrie was sulkily taking off his mackintosh as she talked. - -'What the deuce brought him here?' he said. Dot said 'H'sh,' and gave -him a little poke to remind him of the proximity of the drawing-room. - -'I'll tell you after,' she said. 'I must go back now, I've left him -alone with baby, and perhaps he's not educated up to them.' - -He went kitchenward to ask for dry boots, and Peggie was dishing up. -The appetising smell reminded him he was too hungry to tell her to keep -things in the oven on the chance of the visitor going. And as he went -back again up the hall he saw the weather was too abominable to turn a -dog out. But he said 'Confound it' under his breath outside the door, as -necessary preparation to pressing Mr Sullivan Wooster to stay to -dinner. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -A POCKET MADAME MELBA - - 'Out of the day and night - A joy has taken flight.' - - -Larrie had not yet taken Dot in his arms as he had intended that -afternoon, and he had not asked her to begin afresh, so the result was -still 'dead level.' - -But Dot was no longer unhappy. Every minute of her time was filled, and -with a real object now in life, she felt she had been childish to waste -so many hours in weeping and dwelling on imaginary differences in -Larrie's manner. - -She began to teach herself Italian with the aid of several grammars, -text books, dictionaries, and Mr Wooster. - -She practised the most uninteresting vocal exercises with unwearied -patience, and her perpetual singing of scales made Peggie take to a -permanently closed kitchen door and remark in confidence to baby that -his crying was music to it. - -All this because Mr Wooster, musical critic and composer, had told her -that if her voice was carefully cultivated and lost none of its -wonderful purity and freshness in the process, he did not know any -singer in Australia she would not surpass, that her fame would be equal -in time to Melba's or any of the first singers of the day. - -She did not tell Larrie this new wonderful secret that made her heart -sing even when her lips were silent. She wanted to keep it as a grand -surprise to him, and in bursting out on an astonished world to amaze him -also, and fill him with pride and gladness at her power. He was so used -to her voice, had heard her chirping, and chirruping, and trilling ever -since she was five, and though of course he loved it as he loved her, it -had not occurred to him that she was extraordinarily gifted. - -Naturally he had heard praise and admiration and considered them only -her due, but she had lived so quietly in this lonely Red Road country, -both before and after her marriage, that she had never had the -opportunity of hearing really competent criticism before. Even she -herself had not dreamed her gift was so rich. - -Fond of singing she had always been, it came as naturally to her as -speech; she knew she had the best voice in the district, but that was -not saying much; and sometimes when she had been to concerts in Sydney -it had struck her that she could render certain songs of the performers -quite as well as they did, if not better. - -Mr Wooster's words had been as a flash of lightning illuminating all her -future life. What dreams she had over the piano as she climbed to clear -B's and wonderful birdlike upper C's! How proud Larrie would be of her, -what fame should be hers, how they would travel with the wealth to -come, and oh, what a brilliant, beautiful future baby's should be! - -She told Wooster that she wanted to keep the secret from her husband at -present, and he smilingly acquiesced, so great was her happiness in it. -In asking Larrie's permission to give a few lessons to his wife he only -said, as twenty others had done before, that her voice was very good -indeed and would be much improved by training. - -Larrie gave his consent half unwillingly; Dot's singing he considered -was quite good enough for anything, _he_ was quite satisfied; but he -saw it would seem churlish to refuse, and Dot would take it as a fresh -instance of his 'tyranny,' so he allowed the lessons to begin. - -He was not half so happy as Dot in those days. Poor Larrie! - -It was very slow, unexciting work sitting in a twelve-foot-square office -all day, waiting for clients who never came. - -He had the feelings of an exile, too, whenever he thought of the dear -little cottage where the days had all been short and bright. It seemed -as if Dot had banished him from the little kingdom because she was tired -of him, and it was real torture to him to notice how light-hearted and -happy she seemed without him, while he was more miserable than he had -ever been in his life. - -Dot could persuade herself both into and out of anything she wished with -happy feminine ease. But with Larrie it was different. He was -long-headed and his reasoning was nearly always excellent, but when he -had once planted an idea in that head of his, it almost required an -earthquake to uproot it. That was what Dot stigmatised his 'aggravating -obstinacy.' - -He had upbraided her more than once for having what he called 'moods,' -not being always the same to him, having the odd little fits of coldness -or petulance that most women have occasionally, and can never explain -logically and satisfactorily. But Dot used to retort that if she was -subject to moods, he had 'tenses' which were infinitely more -objectionable. - -A matter that she would shed a few tears over and then dismiss, he would -brood over until he worked himself up into a state of positive -wretchedness. - -He really could not help himself, it was a certain kink in his nature -that made him so, and the 'tenses' were times of misery both to himself -and Dot. - -Once in the early days of the baby, he had taken up the notion that Dot -cared for it far more than she did for him, she was so wrapped up in it, -and would spare him so little time from it. - -He had grown absolutely jealous of the poor innocent little morsel, and -so miserably unhappy, that it had needed a domestic cyclone and manifest -neglect of the child before Dot could bring him to a healthy state of -mind again. - -He loved his little sweet wife with a passionate fervour and -devotedness, that only one man in a thousand is capable of. - -She was as necessary to him as the breath to his lungs, the blood to his -heart. Had it been needful, he would have fought the whole world -single-handed for her sake and never felt one of the scars. - -But the very strength of his love made it a little cruel sometimes, he -demanded almost too much of her and she could not always understand or -be patient with it. - -And now there was a cloud gathering on the domestic sky, and Dot with -astonishing blindness thought it was a new, wonderful sun that was going -to cast a warm, beautiful light over everything again. - -'Oh, what _will_ Larrie say?' she exclaimed in a fit of eager, childlike -pleasure one afternoon when she had sung the 'Jewel Song,' in a way that -even Wooster, carping critic as he was, could pronounce none other than -perfect. - -He looked at her tenderly, he nearly always said '_dear_ little girl' to -himself when she was like that. - -'I think he will say he could not be prouder of his wife than he is,' -he answered. 'When shall you tell him?' - -'Oh, not yet,' Dot said. 'Not yet on any account, electric shocks are -the salt of life. Imagine his face when I lay the programme before him, -"The Jewel Song--Mrs--Lawrence--Armitage."' Her eyes sparkled, she gave -one of her happy little laughs. '_How_ I wish the battery was ready!' - -Wooster was standing in the window looking absently out. - -He had a clear cut face, ascetic would describe it, only women novelists -are credited with adoring that word. It was not the face of a musician -at all, at least it had not the liquid dreaming eyes, and wide, massive, -brow framed in wavy hair that we conjure up generally when we speak of a -musician's face. It was monkish rather, the lips were clean shaved and -somewhat severe, the hair very short and dark, and the eyes just now -merely thoughtful. They were brown in colour, almost black on occasion, -and had perhaps even more variety of expression than most people's -eyes. In figure he was rather below the average height but he bore -himself easily. 'I would rather you spoke to your husband, Mrs Armitage, -before the programmes are printed,' he said, unconsciously making chords -with his fingers on the window ledge. It had occurred to him that -perhaps it was rather a bold step for his pupil to be contemplating a -public appearance without her husband's knowledge. - -'Not for _any_ consideration,' Dot said with great decision. 'All I am -living for is the programme surprise. He shall know two days before the -concert, not a second sooner.' - -Wooster played a chromatic scale with his thumb and second finger till -he found the dust on the ledge made them unclean. He pocketed them and -turned round. - -'He may consider I am abusing my privileges in preparing to bring you -out like this,' he said. - -But Dot cried, 'Nonsense,' with haste and impatience. 'It is the last -thing he would think of,' she said; 'why, he will be delighted, of -course. He does not dream he has a wife talented enough to sing in the -Centennial Hall before a mighty audience of all musical Sydney.' - -'Then you really will not tell him?' - -'Is there a stronger word than "No?" One absolute and irrevocable? If -there is, consider it said.' - -He laughed. - -'Suppose my nervous prudence makes me present him with the bagged cat.' - -'In that case,' said Dot, 'I should take my revenge in flat A's. Have -you no regard for me?' - -He forgot the dust and played another slow scale. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -PICTURES IN THE FIRE - - 'A rain and a ruin of roses - Over the red rose land.' - - -May had come in wet and blustering. The gum trees waved wild mournful -arms up to dull skies, the cottage garden was flowerless, green, and -dripping. Even the creeping roses that bloomed eternally, hung crushed -and wet or dropped their poor spoiled petals on the spongy paths. - -Three months ago the back paddock had been a place of delight for the -eye, all tall waving lines of Indian corn grown for the fowls, there had -been poppies amongst it, real scarlet English poppies that some one had -sown, as well as the white and pink garden varieties. Dot had hidden -there for fun one light evening with baby in her arms, and Larrie had -sought her vainly for half an hour, it was so tall and thick. And when -he had found her she had a wreath of poppies around her head, and baby -was stuck all over with pink ones; the two had looked such darlings he -had picked them both up in his arms and carried them all the way to the -verandah hammock, and when he dropped them in, had said with breathless -conviction, - - 'There are none like them, none.' - -To-day in the paddock there were only dead brown stalks and leaves, -broken or bending before the rain. The poppy days were dead and the long -light beautiful evenings, things of the vanished summer. - -Even the hammocks that had swung invitingly in the sunshine, lay in -tangled heaps on the laundry shelf; the verandah was in a flood, and -gusts of wind and rain blew into the house at every fresh opening of a -door or window. - -There was an iron roof to the cottage, and had not Dot's enthusiasm been -so great just now, the ceaseless, melancholy drip and beat of the rain -upon it would have proved too monotonous an accompaniment to her songs. -But in truth she hardly heard it. To-morrow she was going to tell -Larrie. - -The morning post would bring her the programme, and two days later the -great concert was to take place. She danced baby round the house in her -excitement, such hard work it had been to keep her secret when there had -been no other thought in her head for weeks. - -She painted a delightful little picture that to-morrow was going to -frame. - -The background was the dining-room with the red curtains drawn, and a -glowing log in the open fireplace; she put baby on the rug in his new -pale blue frock with the short sleeves, and Larrie in the big easy chair -with his feet on the fender and a pipe in his lips. And since in mental -pictures the brush may depict thoughts, she drew him, thinking -anxiously of his income which the sudden depreciation in the value of -property all over the colony was just now affecting greatly. - -And then she was going to ask him to take her to the big concert at the -Centennial Hall to show him the names on the programme in a careless -way. - -And his face was to grow first amazed, and then bright with pride and -gladness, and the rest of the evening they were to spend in making plans -for the brilliant future. - -How delicious it was going to be! Her heart was throbbing with -anticipation, her very blood seemed leaping in her veins. - -But baby objected to be jumped up and down in the ecstatic little way -she was treating him to; he gave vigorous signs of annoyance, so she -sank into her low chair, and rocked soothingly. But she could not keep -silent when he said with such wise, round eyes that he knew everything -about everything, and was as pleased as herself. - -'Bab-bab,' he began encouragingly, and hit at her with his dear little -fists. - -And 'He should be a little prince, he should,' was her deliciously -inconsequent answer, punctuated with kisses on his wee nose. - -'Bab-bab-bab'--he tried to walk excitedly up the front of her dress in -a horizontal position, and then make gleeful clutches at her hair. - -But the short little curls slipped through his fingers, and he kept -tumbling back in her lap, a little heap of cuddlesome sweetness. - -'Little son, small little sweet, mamma's boy bonnie,' she whispered -again and again and again, her face in his neck or on his soft thick -hair. That was her way of telling him that all the rest of their lives -was going to be a bright golden dream, a triumphal march through the -world, over a carpet of rose leaves and under a canopy of the bluest sky -ever stretched out. - -The very way he rounded his eyes and stuck his fingers in her mouth to -be bitten, and crowed 'bab-bab,' showed how perfectly he understood and -approved. - -But presently he began to nod like a little heavy-headed rose, and she -nestled him up close to her breast and sang softly, happily below her -breath. - -Drip, drip on the roof fell the rain; splash, splash in the path-puddles -where the blown roses were drowning; tap tap, at the misty window panes. - -There was a kink somewhere in the rocking-chair, it made a not unmusical -little sound at each backward swing, marking time to Dot's low singing. -Baby could not have slept properly without that gentle jerk between the -rise and fall. - -The logs fell asunder. - -All Dot's enchanted castles were building in the red glow, now they rose -up gloriously with the blaze, and the gladness in her eyes deepened. - -'Bab-a-bab,' murmured baby sleepily, a gleam of blue just peeping -through the long lashes to discover the noise. But the soft singing bore -him off again, and the rock, rock, rock of the chair. - - 'Sweet one hush, little baby sleep, - Rock-a-by soft on my breast, - Creep in my hand, little fingers, creep, - Little dear baby, rest.' - -The lashes lay quiet again on the little cheeks, one small hand uncurled -from Dot's finger, and lay open on her knee. Again the logs fell apart, -again the castles grew glorious. Baby's hand curled up again, but the -sweet lashes were too heavy to lift. - - 'This is the place for a baby's head, - And this is the place for its feet, - Rock-a-by off to the land of bed, - Lull-a-by, hush small sweet.' - -A wild gust of wind flung itself at the cottage, every door and window -rattled, the garden gate clicked and then banged. - - 'Lull-a-by, sweet, - Rock-a-by, sleep, - Heed not the rain and the wind, dear, - Watch o'er her sweet - Mother will keep, - And up in the sky there is God, dear.' - -Some one opened the front door, and the sound of the rain grew louder, -then the dining-room handle was turned. Dot gave a little whispered cry -of surprise. 'Larrie!' she said, but so softly that baby's hand never -stirred. - -It was hours before his usual time, and never before had he shortened -his voluntarily imposed exile. - -She noticed how exceedingly wet he was, there was not a dry thread upon -him, the water was even now pouring off him and making a pool on the -floor. Then she saw the white passion on his face, the terrible look of -his lips, his eyes. She laid the child down on the sofa cushions and -went towards him slowly, and with fading colour. What dreadful thing was -coming? - -'Larrie!' she said, a frightened tremble in her voice, as she put out -her hands to touch him. But the anger in his eyes deepened. He went -closer to her, he actually grasped her roughly by the shoulders and -shook her. - -'How _dared_ you?' he said. 'How dared you?' - -She looked at him with parted lips and widening eyes. She could find -nothing to say so intense was her amaze. - -'How dared you?' he repeated. He shook her again to hasten her answer. - -But she only said 'I think you're mad,' and caught her breath. - -He saw he was wetting the shoulders of her pretty pink tea-gown with his -coat and took his hands away. - -The genuine surprise on her face disarmed him a little, it even occurred -to him for the first time that he might have the inexpressible relief of -finding he was mistaken. - -His eyes grew a shade quieter and he did not speak for a minute. - -In the brief interval wifely concern appeared on Dot's face. She put her -hand on his wet sleeve and tried to move him towards the hall. - -'Come and get dry things,' she said, '_how_ wet you are!' - -But he would not stir. - -'I want to speak to you,' he said. - -'When you are dry,' urged Dot, 'it can wait three minutes.' - -He sat down on a chair. - -'Now,' he said. - -She sat down, too, just on the edge of the sofa by the sleeping child. -She was concerned because a fly would hover round its face and distract -her attention. - -'I went to Bayley's this morning to get some notepaper printed,' Larrie -said, and paused. But Dot seemed to find nothing very remarkable in -that, and looked merely attentive. - -'There was a proof of _that_ on the counter,' he continued, and threw a -sheet of old English printing on pale green paper towards her. - -She started up, vexation on her face. - -'Oh _what_ a shame!' she cried. She read it through standing up, and the -knowledge that all the colours were straightway rubbed out of her -beautiful picture, made two curves of disappointment show at her mouth -corners. - -'Then it _is_ your name?' said Larrie, and his voice sounded positively -faint. - -Dot brightened a little. 'Of course it is,' she said, 'I wish you hadn't -seen it though; I was dying to surprise you, Larrie.' Then she went up -closer to him. 'Aren't you going to kiss your own pocket Madame Melba?' - -She felt how flat the scene had fallen even as she spoke, and was fit to -cry at the disappointment. Then she remembered Larrie's anger a few -minutes back, 'But what made you so cross?' she said. - -'How dare you do such a thing?' he said, his eyes beginning to blaze -again, 'how dare you; this comes of letting that infernal fellow come to -the house so much.' - -'You mean Mr Wooster?' Dot was beginning to fear for her husband's -sanity. - -'It's his concert, you are singing at his instigation, you have kept it -hidden from me.' His voice rose. - -'Of course I have,' Dot said. Then she spoke very slowly, 'Do you really -mean to say, Larrie, that all this is because I am going to sing on -Friday?' - -'Friday!' shouted Larrie, he had actually not seen the date, so absorbed -had he been in the sight of his own name on that green paper, with Mrs -prefixed. - -'Because I'm going to sing on Friday?' repeated Dot. - -With a superhuman effort he controlled himself; he knew the impotence of -anger. - -'Tell me _everything_,' he said shortly, 'and stand there.' - -Dot was moving towards the sofa again. She came back to him to save time -though the tone was provocative; she knew that he would have held her by -sheer physical force if she refused while he was like this. Then she -told him the very high opinion Mr Wooster had of her voice; how he felt -confident she had but to be heard by competent critics to be assured of -success, how he had arranged this concert to give her the opportunity -and how she had been keeping the secret just to surprise him. He heard -her to the end and acquitted her of concealing it for any unworthy -motive. - -'But I should not dream of allowing you to appear in public,' he said, -'so you can tell Wooster as soon as you like that he must fill your -place.' He stood up as if the matter was settled, he even took off his -hat and remarked that it was wet. - -But Dot had gone very white. - -'You mean to say, Larrie, that you would try to stop me now?' she said. - -'I mean to say I _shall_ stop you, there will be no trying about it,' he -answered. - -His temper had not perfectly balanced itself again, and that together -with the unpleasant dampness he was just beginning to feel, made his -speech somewhat despotic. - -'Your reasons?' Dot's voice was quiet, dangerously so. - -'I do not care for my wife to sing in a public place like that, I don't -approve of the way the thing has been managed, I don't like you having -so much to do with that fellow, that is quite enough,' he moved to the -door. 'Where's that old brown coat of mine, I hope you haven't given it -away.' - -But Dot was sitting on the sofa again, fighting with herself far too -fiercely to think of old brown coats, indeed, the question conveyed no -intelligence to her at all. Out of twenty conflicting emotions, -rebellion was by far the strongest. She said, 'I shall go, I shall go,' -again and again and again in such stormy whispers, that baby stirred and -tossed the linen antimacassar off his hands. Larrie had gone to get dry. - -'I shall go,' she repeated with strong emphasis on the last word. - -'Bab, bab, bab,' said baby softly. He yawned deliciously and flung up -his arms. - -Dot gave him a hurried pat or two. - -'Go to sleep,' she said. - -'Googul,' he answered insinuatingly. He struggled into a sitting -position and leaned towards her. But she lifted him on to her knee quite -unresponsively. There was nothing in her mind but Larrie's command that -meant death to her rose-coloured dreams. She hardly recognised baby's -presence at all. - -'He is not my master,' she said aloud, her eyes full of rebellion. - -But 'Yes he is,' answered Larrie quietly, as he came in again through -the second door. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -A CONFLICT OF WILLS - - 'What things wilt thou leave me, - Now this thing is done?' - - -Wednesday loosened itself from the other pearls and dropped off the -string of days into the strange awful place where have fallen all the -days that have ever been. Thursday slid along the thread, trembled and -fell. Friday moved on to fill its place. Such a little time, and it too, -and the things of it would be gone beyond recall for ever. - -Larrie had grown visibly thinner in the short space. He was staking all -the happiness of his life on the issue of this. To him the thing was -almost terrible in its plain simplicity. He had looked at it from every -point of view, had reasoned it out and thought of nothing else, all -through the two waking nights and the long day between. And he could -only see two paths for Dot to walk in, one that was right and would lead -to happiness once more, and one that was so utterly wrong that she would -step into it not carelessly and unknowingly, but wilfully and with wide -open eyes. - -It could only be love that would make her do another man's bidding -rather than his. - -From that second path he told himself there could be no return. - -Dot went about with a feverish look in her eyes, and lips almost as set -as Larrie's own. She was going to make this strike for her rights, and -in future have the independence due to the nineteenth century married -woman. - -Larrie spoke of the irrevocableness of the step. To him it was as grave -as life and death. But deep in Dot's heart was the knowledge of her -power over him. She called to mind all the quarrels of their wedded -life--had he not always forgiven her? Even the times when he had not -been the first to make up, her tears and grief had made his arms open -for her immediately. She only whispered this to herself, it made her a -little ashamed to think of trading on it. - -Then out loud she told her conscience several things. - -First, that this was only one of Larrie's aggravating fits of -opposition, and when he got over it and knew what a name she had made -for herself, he would be glad she had not taken him at his word. - -Second, that since her gift was so great, it would be wrong not to give -the world the benefit of it, she remembered the scriptural -napkin-wrapped talent. - -Third, that it would be sheer ingratitude after all Mr Wooster's -trouble, to spoil his concert at the last minute. - -And fourth, that no one literally interpreted that word 'obey' in the -marriage service, now that the equality of the sexes was recognised. - -It was merely a relic of darker ages when woman had been little more -than a chattel; the progress of the century had made it elastic, before -long it would be removed altogether. - -On Friday they had eggs for tea. At least, Peggie had put a stand on the -table, with bread and butter, and other eatables, but they were both too -agitated to do more than crack the tops, and take salt and pepper on the -edge of their plates. This was to be the last chance. Peggie removed -baby, and looked anxiously at the quiet young couple as she did so. She -was afraid there was something really serious this time, so pale was her -master's face, so brilliant Dot's eyes. - -'Well?' Larrie said heavily. - -'I'm going,' answered Dot. 'I've got my dress ready, and made all -arrangements, it's too late to stop now.' - -Larrie swallowed some tea and went even whiter. This was the final -wrecking of their lives. 'Dot, I _beg_ of you to think of it again,' he -said. - -She slipped from her chair and went to his end of the table. 'Darling, -let me go!' she said, 'see, I beg of you--you could give in and let me, -and then it wouldn't be disobedience.' She put her arms round his neck, -her flushed cheek against his, 'Dear old Larrie, do! I have set my heart -on it so! do let me go happy, dearest, dearest!' - -If only at that minute she had said she would give it up, he could -almost have let her go, greatly as he disliked the publicity for her, -and the connection with Wooster. But he could not help mentally -finishing her last sentence--'Or I shall have to go unhappy.' - -'I can't,--you must see I can't,--how can I, Dot? it is impossible,' he -said. But she clung tighter. - -'Once you loved me too well to refuse me such a thing, my husband, don't -let me think I am so little to you now.' He tried to put her away, but -her arms held him. - -'Darling, let me,' she begged, 'let me, let me,'--the tears were running -down her cheeks. 'I will be so good afterwards, oh this is everything to -me, Larrie,--Larrie, don't be cruel to me, I must, must go--oh, -darling, let me, let me.' - -He was making a promise to himself to be kept faithfully, since he saw -how very much this was to her. If she would give in now, say she would -give in as a true wife should to her husband, he would let her go, he -would even take her himself, for it would prove she did not put that man -before him. - -'Dot,' he said, and lifted her on to his knee and held her hands -tenderly in his own, 'you must obey me in this, can't you see you must, -my darling? Perhaps I have been harsh or unkind about it. Yesterday I -_told_ you to obey me, now I _ask_ you, my darling, my little girl, Dot, -little, little wife. Say you will.' - -But she only stirred restlessly. - -He put his face down to hers. - -'Darling, think of our happiness, how can we go on living if you persist -in breaking up everything like this. There _must_ be a head, Dot, in -everything, there must be obedience. What would a ship be without a -captain, or soldiers without their chief, an office with no one in -authority? And the husband _must_ be the head of the wife. Darling, say -you will obey me in this.' - -But Dot could not. All her pleading had gone for nothing, why should she -listen to Larrie's? She moved his arms away and stood up, her eyes dry -and bright again. - -'You have refused me the only thing I have ever asked specially since we -were married, Larrie,' she said. - -'You will stay?' he said. - -'You profess to love me, and then you act like a tyrant to me. Why -should you always have _your_ way in things?' - -There was a red spot on her cheek. - -'You will obey me, Dot?' - -She walked restlessly up and down the room. She moved some ornaments on -the mantelpiece and put the curtains straight with trembling fingers. -She remembered she ought to be dressing even now. In two hours the -concert would begin, and if she gave in her opportunity would be gone -for ever, and just because Larrie was obstinate and stupid! - -Baby's ivory rattle, still wet from his mouth, lay on the sofa. She -picked it up and put it in her work-basket. Then she altered the -position of two photographs on the mantelpiece. She moved one of -Larrie's silver cups--in it there was a green programme crumpled up into -a ball. - -'Dot, you will obey me?' - -'No, I will _not_,' she said passionately. 'I am tired of being told to -do things. I want a little liberty as well as you. I will _not_ spoil my -future just because you want to be a petty czar.' - -She crossed to the door. A flame sprang up in Larrie's eyes. - -'You will be sorry to the end of your life if you go,' he said. - -'No, I shall be glad,' said Dot. - -Peggie came in to know if they wanted hot water, or if the master would -have another egg. She was really too anxious to keep away. - -'I've got a nice brown one, laid to-day, sir,' she said persuasively. - -He shook his head impatiently. The woman looked over to Dot, standing -with the door handle in her hand, 'Shall I fetch the baby for you?' she -asked. - -'No,' said Dot sharply. - -So she went out to the kitchen again, and looked grave as she lifted -baby from his high chair, where he was perfectly happy with a saucepan -lid and a tin spoon. - -'_That_ obstreperous,' she said, and sighed. Then she added, 'poor man,' -under her breath. - -Someway she generally sided with Larrie at such times, though she was -devotedly fond of Dot. - -'I'm going to dress,' Dot said from the door. - -'How do you propose getting there?' He did not look at her as he spoke. - -She twisted the handle. 'Of course I had expected you would come. As it -is I have sent word to mother, she is coming down in the buggy for me at -seven. Mr Wooster is going there for dinner, he will drive. No, mother -doesn't know; I only said you couldn't come.' - -Larrie got up and walked to the window; he could not answer her. - -She looked at his big square back for a minute and the short-clipped -curls on his head. Then she turned and went away to dress. Only a thin -partition separated her bedroom. He heard every sound as he stood in the -window, the opening and shutting of drawers, the plashing of water, her -hurrying steps across the floor, the creak of the wardrobe door. Every -minute he thought she would repent and come in to him, his own sweet, -small wife again; then the thought became a hope, and when the wardrobe -creaked the hope died, and there was almost a prayer instead. But the -door opened and she came in fully dressed. - -It was her wedding dress she wore, the white, trailing, exquisite silk -she had knelt beside him in at the altar eighteen months ago. It was cut -a little low now, and showed her white, soft neck and chest; her arms -were bare between the shoulder puff and glove top. - -'Larrie,' she said with a little cry, 'oh, let me, Larrie!' - -But he stood still. - -'_That_ dress!' he said hoarsely. - -In very truth she had not thought of the associations of it as she had -slipped it on to-night in excitement and anger. - -'You--you know I had it made into an evening dress,' she faltered. - -'But for this!' - -'I had nothing else to wear.' - -He turned from her one minute, then back again, and looked at her with -wrathful eyes. He had a wild impulse to force her to stay, to compel her -to obey him by the superiority of his physical strength. Was she not his -wife, his property, did she not belong to him till death? He almost -thought he would get a whip and beat her, beat her savagely. She would -love him better he felt certain; he told himself there was more truth -than half the world dreamt in the saying that wife-beaters, always -provided they are neither drunk nor brutal, are best beloved by their -wives. - -But he knew in a calmer mood he would despise himself for doing it, and -he felt, too, how imperfect would be the victory. - -'You are going?' was all he said, and 'Yes,' she answered. - -Wheels sounded a little distance off, they both knew what it was. - -'As surely as you go, Dot, you will repent it.' Larrie spoke slowly, -quietly, his face was deathly pale. - -She was trembling from excitement, there was a vague fear in her eyes. - -'What would you do?' she said with a little nervous half laugh. - -'I would never forgive you, never have you for my wife again,' he -answered, and his face looked as if he meant it. - -She shivered a little, but held her head proudly. 'Perhaps you would be -glad of the excuse,' she said, with a pitiful attempt at scorn. - -He did not speak. The buggy rattled up to the door, they heard -Wooster's voice checking the horses, the mother's saying she would not -get out as it was so late. - -'Why don't you go?' he said coldly, seeing she stood perfectly still. - -'I--' she said. It was the sound of a sob strangling in her throat. - -He would not help her though her eyes were speaking imploringly. If he -had put his arms round her that minute and begged her as at tea to stay, -even now she would have given it up. But he stood like a rock, his face -hard, his chin square, his lips bitter. - -The bell rang, and Peggie's heel-down slippers went up the hall. - -Dot moved a step nearer to him. - -'_Ask_ me to stay, Larrie,' she whispered, and this time the sob would -not be strangled. - -But he turned right away from her. - -'I would rather die than ask you again,' he said with passion in his -voice. - -'Mr Wooster,' said Peggie cheerfully. - -She had quite beamed at the man when she opened the door, the quarrel -would have to be smoothed over now a guest was here. - -But five minutes later Dot came out into the hall, her train a yard -behind her, a great white fur-trimmed cloak around her. - -There was a beautiful angry colour in her cheeks, a defiant light in her -eyes; but her lips were saying smiling things. Mr Wooster was behind -with a roll of music and an opossum rug. - -Peggie watched them through the front door and down the steps, she saw -Dot lifted in beside her mother and well tucked up; she watched the -buggy lamps flash passing out of the gates and disappear round a curve -in the road. Then with quite a weight at her kindly heart, she went in -to see if the 'poor master' wanted anything. But he was standing in the -middle of the room with folded arms, and such a look on his face, that -she shut the door softly behind her, and went away. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -A DARN ON A DRESS - - 'Come in at last, - Inside the melancholy little house - We built to be so gay with.' - - -It was raining again, and there was that sound of wind in the trees that -only the Australian bush knows. Eastward, stars were out in the sky, -but, from the south, blue-grey masses were drifting up to the low rain -cloud that had put out all the lights of the southern cross, and only -left the two pale pointers. An hour ago the sky had been blue, for there -was a great moon, but now the rain had washed all the colour out of it, -and it was dull grey with midnight cloud banks. On the cottage roof and -in the garden there were patches of pale light from the drenched moon, -but all the bush beyond was black as death. - -'Don't come in,' Dot said. - -She leaped down from her seat before Wooster could put down the reins to -open the gate and drive in. - -'She'll get wet,' the mother cried. - -But the white figure went hurrying up the drive, all its long silken -train down on the wet gravel. - -There was a lamp alight in the drawing room, and a circle of white from -it lay on a pool at the end of the verandah. But the long French windows -were closed. Dot beat on the window panes with wet fingers. - -'We may as well get home,' said the mother, seeing her safe. But Wooster -only picked up the reins. - -'Larrie!' the sharp whisper came through the rain to the gate; the -little metallic sound was made by her rings on the glass. - -Then the door opened and Larrie drew her into the room, the blind fell -down from its pin at the movement, and now there was only a bar of -light on the verandah. - -'It's very cold,' said the little mother with a shiver. And Wooster -turned his eyes away and drove her home. - -Dot went forward almost blindly towards Larrie, but he moved backwards, -and she took two more steps but he fell back again. The room was small -and he was against the wall now, but he put his arms behind him and -stood sideways; he knew she wanted to put her head on his breast and -cry. The attitudes would have looked almost comic, only something -prevented it. - -'I wasn't a success,' she said with a great sob. - -He did not speak or move a muscle. - -'Oh, I _am_ so miserable,' she said. Her arms went out towards the stiff -figure, but he moved again. - -'Larrie!' she cried, exceeding longing and misery in her voice. - -But he let the cry die away into the midnight silence and he let her -drop down on her knees by the sofa and sob her young heart out on the -piled cushions. He had frozen altogether during the hours of waiting. - -Once she looked up during her bitter weeping. - -'You are hard,' she said, 'cruel--like a rock, what can I do? I was -wrong, I am sorry, sorry, sorry, I didn't even succeed. I was too -miserable, oh, how cruel you are! what _can_ I do? I will do anything, -_anything_, oh, Larrie, Larrie, Larrie, don't be hard, when I'm down, -Larrie, and broken, and sorry, and miserable--oh, it is cruel, cruel.' -Her sobs choked her, there were wet warm patches on the green cushion, -her eyes were drenched, she was shivering with excitement and misery. -There was another great silence broken only by her passionate weeping. - -Then she lifted her head again. - -'I _can't_ bear it,' she said wildly, 'for God's sake, say something, -I shall go mad if you stand there like that any longer. How unmanly you -are!--oh, how cruel!--Larrie, kiss me. Oh, darling, darling, forgive -me--my husband, my darling, kiss me, kiss me, _kiss_ me!' - -The last words died away with almost a wail, for though he looked at her -all the time he did not move nearer to her and his eye took no softer -light. - -Then she dropped her head on the cushions again, with her arms flung -round them and he stood watching her, and away down in the East the -stars went out, and the sickly creeping light was the new dawn. - -When Dot stood up she was stiff, and chilled to the bone. She was no -longer sorry, all the aching for a loving word and kiss had gone, she -was only very very tired and very cold. She looked at Larrie with eyes -heavy and indifferent, if he had come and kissed her then she could not -have responded or warmed in the slightest degree. She drew her wrap -closer about her bare neck and arms and shivered again. - -'Well?' she said dully. - -But he went and brought a rug from the hall stand and put it around her -before he answered. - -'I think you had better go to bed now,' he said, 'we can talk -to-morrow.' - -'No, now,' she said. - -'It is very late,' he put back the blind and disclosed the grey -struggling dawn. 'It is four o'clock, to-morrow will do.' - -But she sat down on the sofa where the green cushion was quite dry -again. - -'If you have anything to say, say it now,' she said, 'it is too late for -bed now, what is it you are going to do?' - -There was a curious look of suffering on his face and in his eyes. - -'I think I had better go away,' he said. - -Dot only stared at him. - -'There seems no other way, I have thought of everything; there is -nothing else left.' - -'You mean separate?' she asked. - -He nodded. She bit her lip, but was surprised to find how easily she -kept calm. She waited for him to continue. - -'You could stay here--it needn't be talked of, your mother would look -after you. I'll go to Melbourne or Coolgardie or somewhere.' - -'For always, you mean?' - -'We could see, perhaps it would look differently afterwards--for the -present I mean--we can't go on living together, and I can't see anything -better to do.' - -Dot's eyes grew hard. 'If you go,' she said, 'I will never live with you -again. But I don't ask you not to go.' - -'Yes, it is the best thing,' he said, which answered his own thoughts -rather than fitted in with her words. - -She looked at him strangely. 'When were you thinking of going?' - -'To-morrow,' he said, 'to-day, rather. There is no use in delaying--I -arranged everything to-night--last night.' - -'Very well,' Dot said, 'that is settled then.' She pulled the cloak up -tightly and rose, then she loosened it again and sat down. Her eyes were -cold, her lips very firm. - -'Remember,' she said 'this is final. I committed a fault--perhaps. I -cannot do more than ask your forgiveness. Do not think I shall be put -away and taken back at pleasure. Go--I would not put out my finger to -keep you, but never again so long as both of us live will I be your wife -in anything except name.' - -He sat down on the chair near the little writing table, the light was -full on his white face and lips. - -'I can only see a little way,' he said. 'Later--say in some months--we -will decide further: feelings change wonderfully, perhaps I shall look -at your act--differently; if we live together I can't; it would always -look the same. It is best, I can see. We _couldn't_ just go on living as -before. I couldn't, at least, so I will go, for a time at any rate, and -you--you will be glad to be alone I know.' - -'Yes, I shall be glad,' Dot said with great steadiness. - -Baby's portrait smiled at him from the stand on the table. - -'There is the child, of course,' he said heavily. - -Dot sprang up. Husband had been so far before child that she had -forgotten there was any one else in the world. But she remembered now. - -'He is mine,' she said, 'mine, of course, there is no question about -that. What are you thinking of? you can go if you like, but he is mine.' -Her eyes glittered. - -He had known this would be the worst difficulty; him she gave up -easily--gladly even, but the child she would fight for to the last. - -His anger came to white heat again. - -'_I_ shall keep the child,' he said slowly, 'he is mine equally, he will -be better with me.' - -Dot laughed hysterically. 'The mother always keeps it in these cases. I -believe you are going mad, Larrie.' - -'I believe I am,' he said very quietly. - -He pulled up the blind for want of anything else to do, and the dawn -struggled in and took away the brightness of the lamp. - -It was only this minute he had really meant to keep the child, his first -idea had been merely to go away and leave them, not altogether, perhaps -as he said, but until he could find life bearable again. - -But when he saw how quickly she consented and how her only care was to -keep the child, he told himself he would move heaven and hell before she -had it. - -'I shall keep it,' he repeated, 'it is not a question of a mother's -care, any nurse I get will know more about it than you do--I shall keep -it. You have chosen your life, you can go on the stage altogether if you -like, but I shall not let you have the child.' - -In all he said he would not degrade either of them by the mention of -Wooster's name, but there was nothing else in his thoughts, and only -everything else in the world in hers. - -A great weariness came to Dot, a weariness of all her present life. She -dropped her chin on her hands, and stared out at the pale, creeping -light. Her heart was quite cold, she did not seem to care about anything -in the world. She looked at Larrie and away again. A tiny darn on her -skirt caught her eye and she stared at it fixedly. - -It lifted all her tired thoughts back to the day it was made and pushed -the present out of sight. It was her wedding morning, and she had put on -the dress, she remembered she had said it was a 'holy' dress, it was so -purely white and billowy and beautiful. - -And she had dressed very early, for Larrie had been unorthodox enough to -want to see her before she came up the aisle to him. And when she saw -him coming up the path, looking oddly uncomfortable in his tall new hat -and frock coat, she had flown down the hall and into his arms. And at -the same minute the gate had clicked to admit a string of relations -eager to fall on the bride, and he had picked her up in his arms, -sweeping train and veil and all, and whisked her upstairs on to the -landing to have her to himself for the last few minutes before he had -her for ever. The darn had been necessary, because in the quick passage -up a fold had caught in a splinter in the bannisters, made by her -travelling trunk. - -To-night she saw Larrie looking at the mud on the hem. She imagined -herself without the darn, without the dress, without the wedding. - -It was eighteen months out of her life, that was all; all the wish she -had on earth just now was to wipe out that time and be a girl again. - -She had tried marriage, and it had been a failure for them both; Larrie -was right, the plan he offered was the best to be found; the vulgarity -and misery of publicity she could not have borne, but there was no -reason why they should not quietly set each other free, and go on their -separate ways again. - -There was the child of course. She knew nothing about law and supposed -Larrie had first right, since as she had often said to him the law -always gave the man the best of everything. And cold, utterly tired and -miserable as she was, she told herself she did not mind very much. She -could not put away those eighteen months as if they had never been, if -the child was always before her eyes to remind her of them. She -promised herself she would go to Italy or Germany with her mother and -give up her life to music, she had only failed through nervousness and -misery last night, the future was full of glorious possibilities. - -Larrie was speaking again, there was a look of judicial fairness in his -eyes. - -'Since we have both an equal right to him,' he said, 'we will draw lots -if you like.' - -'Very well,' she said coldly. - -'Will you let me make you some coffee first, you will be taking cold,' -he looked at her quite without anxiety. 'I can make up a fire in the -kitchen in five minutes.' - -'No,' she said, 'get some paper. There are some backs of letters in the -blotter.' - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -A QUESTION OF OWNERSHIP - - 'And laid her face between her hands - And wept (I heard her tears).' - - -'See, they are ready,' Larrie said. He had folded the slips of paper up -into two little square pieces. 'Will you draw or shall I?' - -'What have you put on them?' Dot asked. - -'L and D,' he said. - -'You could have put baby on one and left the other blank,' she said, -'and then I could have drawn one and left the other.' She gained half -a minute by the statement. - -'It comes to the same,' he said, and held them out to her on the -Japanese pen tray. - -But she looked at the little pieces as if they had been dynamite; a -faint colour stole up into her cheeks, her eyes dilated. - -'Draw,' he said. - -She put out her hand and drew it back again trembling like a leaf and -empty. - -'Wait a minute,' she said with a little gasp. She covered her eyes for -a second, then, suspiciously, 'how do I know you have not marked one so -you may know it?' - -'If you draw it will make no difference,' he answered patiently. - -She put out her hand again and touched them, first one and then the -other. - -'I _know_ I shall draw the wrong one,' she said in a choking voice, she -turned them over and examined them with pitiful criticism. - -'What did you make this one narrower than the other for?' - -'Is it?' he said and looked. - -His hand was not trembling at all, but in his heart there was a great -aching for his little son. - -'I think I had better draw and have done with it.' - -The quick movement of her hand again showed her trust in him was not all -it might have been--her fingers closed and unclosed round the wider -piece. Her cheeks were burning, her breath coming in little quick pants. - -'Get it over, Dot,' he said very gently. - -She shut her eyes, her hand groped forward, her face grew very white. -Then she unclosed her fingers and showed both little slips lying in her -palm. - -'I _won't_ do it that way,' she said with sudden passion, 'as if he were -a cushion in a bazaar, or a lottery ticket. You ought to be ashamed of -yourself, Larrie.' She tore the paper into a hundred fragments and -looked at him with wide, angry eyes. - -'But how shall we decide?' he said heavily. He put the little tray back -on the table and mechanically replaced the pens and paper knife, the -darning needle and broken bit of coral he had emptied from it a few -minutes ago. - -'He shall decide himself,' she said. She got up and went towards the -door. 'Write two more pieces of paper, and he shall draw.' - -Larrie wrote L and D again with a heavy J nib, and again folded them up; -then he followed his wife. - -She was standing by the cot in an inner room looking down at the little -sleep-flushed face. One little curled up hand was flung out on the -counterpane, the other, with a thumb still wet, was drooped just below -his chin. Damp little rings of hair lay on his forehead, his lips were -apart, his long eyelashes motionless. Larrie came in on tip-toe. - -'You can't wake him,' he said in a low voice. - -She shook her head, there was almost a fierce look in her eyes. - -'What will you do then?' he asked. And 'Wait,' she returned. - -He brought a wicker chair to the bedside for her, a stiff-backed one for -himself. - -They sat and watched in utter silence till the sun kissed the grey dawn -white. Then the child stirred, flung off the blanket, sighed--and slept -again. Dot had gone pale as death, and even Larrie's heart had beaten -faster. But they composed themselves again, and watched without -speaking. And blue was born in the sky, and the white tossed itself into -cloud shapes that a wind drove over the sky to the west. Away at the -back a gate banged, there was a sound of the contact of a tin and milk -jug on the verandah. Then the gate fell to again. - -Baby uncurled his hands, sighed and changed his cuddled-up side position -for one flat on his back. Then he opened his eyes. - -'Are you ready?' Larrie said in rather a thick voice. - -But Dot looked at him indignantly. 'Wait till he is awake and knows what -he is doing,' she said. - -He was laughing up at them, holding up his arms. There was some soft fur -at his mother's neck that he was convinced would be good to eat, he had -a desire also to pull the crisp curls on his father's head. - -'Goo--goo--goo,' he said, with an impatient kick and an adorable smile. - -How white Dot was! How Larrie's hand trembled as he picked up the tray! - -'He is awake now,' he said in a low voice. - -'Let them be quite even,' Dot returned, with an agitated look, 'of -course he will take the nearest one.' - -Larrie arranged them with mathematical precision, then put the tray near -the little baby hands. For one wild second, Dot looked away, she could -not have watched, then a low, mirthless laugh from Larrie recalled her -eyes. - -The child had taken the two without a moment's hesitation, and stuffed -them instantly into his little open hungry mouth. - -The diversion occupied some little time for both knew that paper was bad -for infantile digestion, but the touch of humour about it did not strike -either, or divert them from the tragedy they were bent upon. - -'How _are_ we to settle it?' Larrie said wearily. - -Dot lifted the child suddenly up on the pillow,--there was a look of -resolution in her eyes. - -'We will both hold out our arms,' she said, 'whomever he goes to shall -have him; it is the fairest way.' - -They bent down to the little fellow, father and mother, with faces that -would whiten, and arms that trembled despite themselves. - -'Come,' they both said. - -One little roseleaf hand buried itself in Larrie's curls, one clutched -the fur at Dot's neck. - -'Come,' they said again, and this time there was a desperate look in -Dot's eyes. - -He looked gravely from one to the other and loosened his hold of their -separate persons. There was a thoughtful expression in his eyes though -his lips smiled. He half turned to Dot, and the intense look of her -mouth relaxed faintly. But then suddenly he stretched out his arms and -with a rapturous little leap flung himself at Larrie. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -A LITTLE DIPLOMAT - - 'Alas to be as we have been, - And to be as we are to-day.' - - -For a few days life was a confused tangle; then to prevent themselves -going mad, each assiduously tried to pick out the beginning of a new -thread to follow. - -Dot was up at the house, she had the little sitting-room and bedroom of -her girlhood again, and she had sent to Sydney for a parcel of new -music. - -Strange wisdom came to the little anxious mother. That it was really a -serious quarrel this time she could not help acknowledging, and at first -could hardly restrain herself from flying down to the cottage and -upbraiding Larrie vigorously. But then again she knew her child had -been to blame as well, and felt that interference just at the present -stage of things would work harm. A little time apart she told herself, -would do them both good, so she remained strictly neutral, and though -her heart ached sometimes at the sight of Dot's unhappy eyes and -carefully smiling lips, she made no obvious attempt to bring about a -reconciliation. She did not even throw cold water upon Dot's wild plans -that embraced an instantaneous sale of the house and a voyage to Italy. - -Dot had all the trunks and portmanteaus in the house carried into her -bedroom, and began to pack her own and her mother's favourite -possessions into them. - -'This might be useful on board,' she would say, putting in a huge -workbasket or writing desk, or 'You would miss this, even in Italy,' -taking down an old print of the Madonna and Child that had hung in her -mother's bedroom as long as she could remember. - -The family solicitor was visited. Dot was to come in to about £3000 by -the terms of her father's will when she was twenty-one. She arranged for -a sufficient advance of it to take her mother and herself to Italy. - -'You will like to go, of course,' she said to her mother, 'you are -losing your spirits staying in this wretched place year after year. -Travel is just what you need, isn't it now, small woman?' - -The mother acquiesced; she would like the voyage very much, but she -could not be ready quite as soon as Dot wished. She must have six weeks -at least to settle about the house and different business matters. - -Dot chafed at the delay, she had wanted to take passages in a boat that -went the very next week, and to leave any arrangements to the solicitor, -but the mother for once held her own. - -The cottage was to be let, but until a tenant was found, Larrie was -compelled to stay there with the baby and Peggie who had thrown in her -fortunes with the child, and regarded her master and mistress as being -for the time of unsound mind. She treated Larrie with cold severity, -and no words could express the scorn she felt for the absent Dot. But on -the baby, she lavished all the tenderness of her nature, and told it -half-a-dozen times a day that it was a poor deserted lamb, and if she -was the law she would handcuff 'them two' so fast together they could -not move apart the rest of their lives. - -The third day of Dot's residence at the house, Mr Wooster came. He had -called at the cottage, but Peggie had informed him her mistress was up -at the house. So he turned his steps uphill. Dot talked a great deal and -seemed in an excited mood, but he had no suspicion of the real state of -affairs, and merely thought she was spending the afternoon at her -mother's. - -But he was staying in the district again for his health, and when he -came the next evening with a promised book for the little mother, she -was there again. - -She was sitting at a table with a quantity of paper books and maps -spread out before her. - -'I am deciding which way to go home,' she said, in answer to his -questioning glance, 'you have often said I ought to study in Italy.' - -He thought she was doing it for a pleasant mental recreation and only -smiled. - -'We go in about a month. Did not mother tell you?' she said, and -followed up a dotted line through the Red Sea with a careful pen. - -He looked the surprise he felt. So friendly had he become with Dot and -the little mother, that he felt quite hurt to be so tardily informed. - -'Mr Armitage is fortunate to be able to get away,' was all he said and -there was a little stiffness in his voice. - -Dot went slowly overland from Brindisi to Calais, then she looked up. - -'No, he is not fortunate,' she said, 'for he cannot get away at all. I -am going alone--at least, mother and I are going.' - -'And your little boy of course?' - -Dot yawned with discernible difficulty. - -'Oh,' she said lightly, 'children block the road to success, besides I -must leave him as compensation to my husband while I hunt for fame.' - -He was too amazed to speak. Larrie had struck him as certainly the one -other man in the world capable of fully appreciating the worshipfulness -of this dear little girl. And to hear he was content to part with her -like this after only eighteen months! - -He felt a sudden contempt for Larrie and an overwhelming sorrow for -himself; what a very sweet little child she was with those soft flushed -cheeks and wide darkening eyes! And to think there was a lifetime of -hunger for one man because he could never touch one of those soft, -boyish curls, and the other who had all of her, held her so lightly. - -'I suppose you think it is a mad quest after my failure,' she said, -finding him silent. - -But he disclaimed that. He was as assured of her ultimate success as -ever, and knew that it was only through nervousness that she had failed -to win immediate recognition. As it was, several of the best critics -had spoken of her hopefully. - -'No, you will succeed of course,' he said, quietly. He did not look at -her, he was thinking, wondering whether he should be able to do without -travelling too when Australia no longer held her. - -Then he wished hair shirts were sold by modern mercers, and thanked God -she was going. He talked cheerfully of the route, advised the best -places for study, the best masters, offered letters of introduction, and -all manner of things. - -The talk stimulated Dot, her eyes and cheeks grew bright; two hours ago -the ache at her heart had been intolerable, but the thought of Italy and -music was easing it greatly. - -From her corner, her needle in a wee muslin pinafore, the little mother -looked at them with troubled brows. This kind of thing was inimical to -the baby, to Larrie, to all of them, she almost wished her little girl -had been born without music in her soul. Then something made her catch -her breath and pale suddenly under the brown of her skin. She had seen -and interpreted the look of strange wistfulness in Sullivan Wooster's -eyes, and it made her heart grow cold. Dot looking up from her plans met -his earnest gaze, and for some inexplicable reason blushed; the little -mother in the corner said 'God' below her breath--she was not a woman of -strong expressions, but her thoughts had leapt to terrible -possibilities. - -When Wooster rose to go, she went downstairs with him; they had been all -the evening in Dot's little sitting room. - -'You want me?' he said half way down the hall, for her large eyes were -speaking. They went into the drawing-room and he waited for her to -speak, hat in hand. - -'I do not think this place is good for you,' she said gently. - -He looked down at the little fragile woman, her worn, lined face and -great sad eyes were infinitely beautiful to him. - -'No place ever agreed with me better,' he said, puzzled. - -Her lips grew severe. - -'It does not agree with you,' she said very quietly. - -Then he understood what the anxious eyes were saying, and was -inexpressibly shocked that she should have guessed what he hardly -allowed himself to know. For a moment he could find no words, he stood -before her with bent head and paling face, then he looked up and saw -grief and tenderness were in her face as well as anxiety. Terrible -though the thing was, the little brown faced woman whom the waves of -life had so buffeted, was sorry for him, her eyes grew humid, she put -out her thin, tiny hand. - -'It is not good for you,' she repeated very softly. - -He lifted the hand to his lips and kissed it reverently. - -'No,' he said, 'it is not good for me. I will go.' - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -DOT GOES BABY-LIFTING - - 'Me do you leave aghast - With the memories we amassed?' - - -Dot had picked up a book in morocco covers. It was lying on the sitting -room table with a dozen others and she took it at random. The little -mother was persisting in bringing the conversation round to the baby -this evening, for the new fear in her heart would not allow her to let -things take their own course any longer. She dwelt on his hair, the -funny little habit he had of drawing in his lips, the dimple that dented -one little cheek just below the left eye. - -So Dot took up a book to show she was too much occupied for -conversation, but her lips were trembling. They had hitherto eschewed -this subject entirely. - -The book might easily have been any of the twelve others, but it -happened to be Browning. She turned over the leaves, then, as that -mechanical action did not quieten the little mother, she was forced to -read. - -And the very words Larrie had marked for her once quite years ago when -they had only been engaged and used to play at quarreling! It was a -finger nail mark and ran along one whole verse. - - 'Love, if you knew the light - That your soul casts in my sight, - How I look to you - For the good and true. - And the beauteous and the right, - Bear with a moment's spite - When a mere mote threats the white.' - -A great tear splashed down upon it. Dot wiped it off with a hasty hand, -she was angry because the coldness and bitterness around her heart were -melting. But two more fell, and two again, a host of little sweet -recollections of their married and unmarried life came thronging -unbidden. How could she bear life if on every hand episodes of the dead -days were going to rise up in this way? - -Dear tender eyes watched her from the corner. - -'He looked ill, my darling,--as if he had not slept or eaten for a -week,--I saw him at the station--' the soft voice paused for a minute. - -'It is nothing to me,' was the cold, piteous answer. - -'He hadn't his obstinate look at all,--when he saw me he looked suddenly -as if he was going to cry, then he turned round and walked up the road -again quickly.' - -Dot saw his face, the quick softening of his mouth and eyes. She could -hear his very footsteps going away. - -'I shall never forgive him while I live,' she said, but she had crept -round to the chair in the dim corner and was feeling for her mother's -arms. - -They drew her down, down,--two women were rocking and crying just out of -the reach of the lamplight. - -Half an hour later they were hurrying down the hill to the cottage. -Dot's eyes were tender, the great peace of forgiving was in her heart; -she was going to her husband, the one man in the world who was all her -own and God-given,--between them what question could there be of pride? - -Two hundred yards from the gate she stopped, there was a fallen tree -worn smooth with years of sitting upon. - -'Wait here, little mother,' she said; 'let me go alone. Then we will -come back and fetch you.' - -She pressed on by herself, a tender smile parted her lips. Larrie thin -and sleepless! Larrie aching for the touch of her hand--Larrie whose -love was so desperate he could not help being cruel! - -She crushed herself through the broken palings at the bottom of the bush -paddock, then she crept along in the shadow of the trees, up through -the garden till voices floated down to her and stopped her. Laughter -came from the verandah and smoke, and there were two decanters on a -little table, with a flickering lamp. - -Larrie was entertaining two bachelor friends and was holding a pipe with -one side of his mouth, and with the other telling a late witticism of a -Supreme Court judge. The men had come up about taking the cottage, and -almost suspected a domestic crisis; Larrie's forced spirits deceived no -one but Dot in the shadow of the pepper trees. - -She felt frozen with shame and horror. This was the man she would have -humbled herself for! She turned to go back in silence the way she had -come. But on the verandah there was a sudden movement; someone had -discovered it was half-past eight, and being a Thursday evening the last -train went down in eight minutes. They had their hats and sticks in ten -seconds, and were halfway down the path. Larrie went with them. - -'I'll see you safe in,' he said, 'we'll have to run for it.' His shadow -fell at Dot's feet, then raced him down the road leading to the station. - -Dot breathed freely once more, then with steady steps she went up the -path and round the verandah to Peggie's window. - -The woman was on her knees by the bedside, reading the _Bulletin_ by -candlelight. She always abstracted it from the dining-room on Thursdays, -the moment Larrie laid it down, for she had a strange passion for -political caricatures, though to her knowledge she had never seen a -Member of Parliament in her life. To-night she was convulsed over a -minister of the crown portrayed in an eye-glass and ballet skirts. - -Dot crept in through the back door and went on tiptoe down the hall to -the second room there. She made a warm bundle of the baby with the cot -blankets and a New Zealand rug, then she went out into the hall again, -holding it close to her happy breast. Larrie had left the front door -just ajar, so she stole out noiselessly and walked down the path to the -gate. - -The next minute she was fleeing up the road again to her mother, the -burden in her arms the lightest thing in the world. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - -THE WHEEL IN THE BRAIN - - 'Mine, mine--not yours, - It is not yours but mine,--give me the child' - - -It was half-an-hour before Larrie came back and found the tossed, empty -cot. He strode out of the house again, and up the hill in a fury of -passion. - -Out of the train into which he had seen his friends, Wooster had stepped -and gone at quick speed, straight up the road leading to the house. -Larrie was not to know it was intended for the last visit of a lifetime. -He resisted the inclination to follow and slay him outright, and went -home instead--to find Dot had been there and taken away the child. - -A second jealousy sprang up in his heart, jealousy of his own little -baby son. He could imagine the pass to which Dot had come, imagine the -heart hungerness that had prompted this. But it was all for the -child--none of the aching and longing had been for himself. The front -door of the house was open, he went straight through the hall and -upstairs two steps at a time to the sitting-room. - -Dot was sitting rocking alone in the firelight; the little mother had -gone to a sudden case of illness in a cottage near, and Wooster had -taken her. - -The child's little soft head lay against her breast, she held both its -bare little feet in her hand. There were tear-wet places on her cheeks, -and the eyes that looked down on the child were full of tenderness, but -her lips were rather tightly closed. She could not forget the verandah, -and Larrie's burst of laughter. - -He strode across the room. - -'Give me the child,' he said. - -Her arms closed tightly round it. - -'He is mine, mine,' she said. - -'Give him to me,' he cried again. - -She sprang to the door her eyes gleaming, her hands holding the little -soft body with desperate firmness. But he was before her, he looked down -at her with white face, and eyes blazing with scorn. - -'You are not fit to hold him,' he said. - -She was moving across to the second door clasping her burden -convulsively. - -'I will die before you shall have him,' she said passionately. - -'No you will not,' he said. - -His words came slowly, there was a horrible note in his voice, 'There -is--your lover, you know.' - -She turned and looked at him, incredulous horror in her wide eyes, her -arms loosened their hold a little, she went a step towards him. But the -light of madness in his eyes increased, he tore the child from her arms, -and carried it away with him out into the night. - - * * * * * - -He went slowly down the hill he had come up in such wild haste. He had -not felt the night wind before, but now it blew chillily on his burning -forehead and quietened the fever in his blood. He took off his coat and -wrapped it round the child, which lay warm and sleepy and quiet against -his shoulder all the way. - -There had seemed to be a strange wheel working in his brain lately, it -had gone at a maddening rate during his short interview with Dot. But -something in the great hush of the grey-blue night stopped it for a time -and a sudden calmness and power of reasoning came to him once more. - -When he reached the cottage he put the child down again in the cot and -covered it up warmly. Then he walked about staring at his misery. He -knew it had grown utterly past bearing. Everything in the place spoke of -Dot, spoke loudly and insistently, the silent piano, the dead flowers in -the vases, the foolish little red watering pot on the verandah nail, the -small garden boots in the hall corner with the red clay of the roads -dried on the heels. When he poured out his coffee at breakfast time he -shuddered because he saw beside him the little dear bright face that was -not there--when he helped himself to an egg he could not eat it, because -the stand held only two, instead of the by custom sacred three. - -That was the warm old jacket on the second hall peg that she always -slipped on, to sit outside with him for his smoke, the big poppy trimmed -hat beside it, still kept the shape of her head in its crown. He could -not get away from it all. His eyes too refused to give up the picture of -her they had seen to-night, the tender innocent face, the pure eyes, the -trembling lips. Half-past ten brought the very end of his endurance, his -bitterness and his unbelief. - -It had taken all these six days for his brain to grow clear and healthy -again; with the lifting of the strange cloud came the sudden horror of -the thing he had done, a shame at the shame he had heaped on her. He -found responsibilities that were his, he remembered the tenderness and -watchfulness and love which her eighteen years demanded, he saw with -lightning clearness that it had been sheer insanity that had distorted a -simple friendship and shamed them both. - -He took up his hat to go out again. He would go and beseech her -forgiveness though he told himself of course, she could not possibly -give it. Still he would entreat her. - -Then the strange wheel began again in his head, and as he walked a new -hot swinging sensation there, made him almost unconscious of what was -going on for minutes together. He took off his hat and went on blindly, -there were two shrinking figures in the shadow by the fence but he did -not heed them. - -He knew quite well now what was going to happen to him, he was getting -that same brain fever again, he had had two years ago; it accounted for -everything. - -He found a strange comfort in the knowledge. He was going to Dot--by the -time he got to the lights and voices of the house he knew his senses -would have gone and his illness come upon him, his danger would touch -her little tender heart and she would forgive. He even saw a vision of -his convalescence and white beautiful days beyond. - -Then he came to the lights and people of the house, and before the -little mother could speak a word, the danger came upon him and the need -of forgiveness. - - - - -CHAPTER XV - -SULLIVAN WOOSTER, GENTLEMAN - - 'Feel where my life broke off from thine - How fresh the splinters keep, and fine, - Only a touch and we combine.' - - -Dot felt the emptiness of her arms. Then she remembered the bitterness -and horror of her humiliation. - -To nearly all human beings there come during the course of life some -moments of complete madness and irresponsibility--Dot's came upon her -now. - -She was on her knees by the window; sometimes she beat her head against -the wood-work--wild tears were coursing down her cheeks, sobs of -impotent anger choked her. - -Wooster came up the staircase alone, the little mother had sent him to -say good-bye, and to tell Dot she could not leave the sick woman for an -hour. The sitting room door was open. - -'Great heavens!' he said, and sprang to her side in alarm, 'you are -ill--God!--what is the matter with you?' - -Her sobs ceased, she turned her head and regarded him strangely, her -eyes wet and brilliant seemed to pierce him. Then she laughed the most -terrible little laugh in the world. 'Why, you do love me after all!' she -said. - -He fell back against the wall, utterly undone, his eyes seemed the only -living part of him. - -'I didn't believe him,' she continued in the same tone. - -'Who?' his lips said, after a long pause. - -'Larrie.' - -'My God!' he cried. - -He could hardly breathe, the figure kneeling by the window was only a -confused blur to him. - -The choking sobs began again. - -He walked up and down, wildly. - -'Where is your child?' he said, stopping at the end of the room. - -She sobbed, and laughed and choked. - -'He took it, he has taken everything, and isn't it queer, I don't care -in the very least?' - -He stayed at the end of the room, the table and several chairs between -them. - -'He thinks I love you?' he said. - -'Oh yes.' - -She began to beat her head again. - -'Stop--how can you--for God's sake, stop!' he was at her side, trying to -draw her from the cruel wood. - -'I believe you love me as much as he did at first,' she said--he was -offering her a handkerchief for the little bleeding wound on her head, -and had to look at her--'Don't you?' - -'My God, _no_,' he burst out, 'what are you dreaming of?' - -'Oh, but you do,' she cried, and laughed again. - -He had moved her from the wall and she could not beat her head. She got -up from her knees, and went nearer to him. - -'I wish you would take me away,' she said. - -'Remember you have a husband,' he answered, very coldly. - -There was a scarlet colour on her cheeks, a very fire in her eyes. - -'No, I have not, he has cast me off, I have no one, no one, oh, you -_might_ take me away,' her voice broke into a cry. - -'Where?' he said, and trembled violently. - -'Anywhere, _anywhere_, just so I can never, never see him again as long -as I live.' - -He moved towards her, all his strength had gone, he was shaking like a -leaf. A minute ago he had been one of the best men on God's earth. Now, -the suddenness and awfulness of the temptation swept everything away for -the time but overmastering love for this woman. He put out his hand. - -'Come,' he whispered. - -Two minutes later they were fleeing together down the long Red Road that -Larrie was coming up. - -They passed him half way, he was carrying his hat, and going straight -forward, not looking to right or left. - -The meeting only added fuel to Dot's fire. - -'Hurry,' she cried, pressing on breathlessly, 'hurry.' - -When they neared the cottage she was limping wretchedly. He stopped -suddenly and looked down at her little house shoes. - -'The heel has come off,' she said dismayedly. - -It was really a catastrophe, for they were to have gone two miles -further, and then tried to get a conveyance of some sort. - -'Perhaps I could walk without them,' she said, and slipped one off, 'Oh, -do come on.' - -There was a light burning in the dining-room window of the cottage. - -'Couldn't you go in and get a pair?' he asked, but she shuddered and -shook her head. - -'I am afraid,' she said--'of Peggie.' - -'Sit down here then,' he said, and found her a seat on some piled wood -by the roadside. 'I will try to take the other heel off.' - -Dot smothered an exclamation. - -Peggie herself was leaning over the little side gate fifty yards away, -and the figure of the district butcher was discernible on the footpath. - -'You could go in yourself,' he whispered, 'and get wraps as well.' - -'I am afraid,' she said again, and looked at the lamplight with strange -eyes. 'There's a pair in the hall stand box.' - -He opened the gate very quietly and went over the grass; she saw him -push open the half closed front door, and go into the hall. - -Peggie's voice came over the garden beds. - -'Get out with you,' she was saying to her lover. Dot watched her with -frightened eyes, for no quick shadow fell on the lighted patch near the -door. - -How long he was! Perhaps he could not find the shoes, perhaps Larrie had -flung them out. It might be he was looking for another wrap for her. - -'Ga'rn,' said Peggie, 'I'm goin' in.' - -But Dot trembled needlessly, she did not move. The frilled curtain blew -through the drawing-room window in its old accustomed way; the broken -wistaria lattice swayed and creaked as it had done for months. Something -rose in Dot's throat, the wildness died out of her eyes. - -Then the long shadow fell on the lighted patch, and he came across the -grass again, straight over the mignonette bed and Larrie's primroses. - -She shivered violently, a sick feeling of fear came over her. He was -speaking to her, bending down to her, she could not see his face in the -darkness, but she knew he was holding something in his arms. He put it -gently down on her knees. How warm it was, how soft, how very small! -Such a little pitiful cry of broken sleep it gave! - -'Oh, God bless you!' she said, 'God bless you!' There came a rush of -warm, relieving, grateful tears. - -'Oh, God bless you!' she said again. But he had gone. - - -THE END - - - - -Transcriber's notes: - - -Inconsistent hyphenation (indiarubber/india-rubber, roseleaf/rose-leaf, -tiptoe/tip-toe, weatherboard/weather-board, workbasket/work-basket) -retained. - -Inconsistent spelling of Laurence/Lawrence has been retained. - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Story of a Baby, by Ethel Turner - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF A BABY *** - -***** This file should be named 53864-8.txt or 53864-8.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/3/8/6/53864/ - -Produced by David Wilson and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive/American Libraries.) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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