“Oh, why don’t that doctor come! Mortimer, this room is too warm. This room is certainly too warm. Turn off the register-quick!”
I shut it off, glancing at the thermometer at the same time, and wondering to myself if 70 was too warm for a sick child.
The coachman arrived from down-town now with the news that our physician was ill and confined to his bed. Mrs. McWilliams turned a dead eye upon me, and said in a dead voice:
“There is a Providence in it. It is foreordained. He never was sick before. Never. We have not been living as we ought to live, Mortimer. Time and time again I have told you so. Now you see the result. Our child will never get well. Be thankful if you can forgive yourself; I never can forgive myself.”
I said, without intent to hurt, but with heedless choice of words, that I could not see that we had been living such an abandoned life.
“Mortimer! Do you want to bring the judgment upon Baby, too!”
Then she began to cry, but suddenly exclaimed:
“The doctor must have sent medicines!”
I said:
“Certainly. They are here. I was only waiting for you to give me a chance.”
“Well do give them to me! Don’t you know that every moment is precious now? But what was the use in sending medicines, when he knows that the disease is incurable?”
I said that while there was life there was hope.
“Hope! Mortimer, you know no more what you are talking about than the child unborn. If you would – As I live, the directions say give one teaspoonful once an hour! Once an hour! – as if we had a whole year before us to save the child in! Mortimer, please hurry. Give the poor perishing thing a tablespoonful, and try to be quick!”
“Why, my dear, a tablespoonful might—”
“Don’t drive me frantic!. There, there, there, my precious, my own; it’s nasty bitter stuff, but it’s good for Nelly – good for mother’s precious darling; and it will make her well. There, there, there, put the little head on mamma’s breast and go to sleep, and pretty soon – oh, I know she can’t live till morning! Mortimer, a tablespoonful every half-hour will – Oh, the child needs belladonna, too; I know she does – and aconite. Get them, Mortimer. Now do let me have my way. You know nothing about these things.”
We now went to bed, placing the crib close to my wife’s pillow. All this turmoil had worn upon me, and within two minutes I was something more than half asleep. Mrs. McWilliams roused me:
“Darling, is that register turned on?”
“No.”
“I thought as much. Please turn it on at once. This room is cold.”
I turned it on, and presently fell asleep again. I was aroused once more:
“Dearie, would you mind moving the crib to your side of the bed? It is nearer the register.”
I moved it, but had a collision with the rug and woke up the child. I dozed off once more, while my wife quieted the sufferer. But in a little while these words came murmuring remotely through the fog of my drowsiness:
“Mortimer, if we only had some goose grease – will you ring?”
I climbed dreamily out, and stepped on a cat, which responded with a protest and would have got a convincing kick for it if a chair had not got it instead.
“Now, Mortimer, why do you want to turn up the gas and wake up the child again?”
“Because I want to see how much I am hurt, Caroline.”
“Well, look at the chair, too – I have no doubt it is ruined. Poor cat, suppose you had—”
