"I can tell you," said Angelica. "I know her quite well by sight. She is
living with Nurse Griffiths, in Honeysuckle Cottage, on Dr. Galbraith's
estate. Nurse Griffiths told us he brought her there one day in his
carriage very ill, and she has been there ever since. He always gets angry
and snaps at you if he's bothered about anybody who's ill or unfortunate,
and Diavolo and I met him that day coming away from the cottage, and he
spoke to us so shortly we were sure there was something bad the matter, so
we went to see what it was, and Nurse Griffiths said she was French. I've
not been there since, but I expect it's the same girl. Shall we stop and
see? We pass the end of the lane where the cottage is."
Edith agreed eagerly. She said it would be a relief to her mind to know
that the girl was well cared for and happy.
"Oh, everybody is well cared for and happy on Dr. Galbraith's estate,"
said Angelica. "His tenants worship him. And they would rather be abused
by him than complimented by anybody else."
The cottage, covered with the honeysuckle from which it took its name,
stood in a large old-fashioned garden, at the edge of a fir plantation,
which sheltered it from the northeast wind at the back, and filled the air
about it with balsamic fragrance.
Edith and Angelica left the carriage at the end of the lane and walked up.
"What a lovely spot!" Edith exclaimed. "On a still bright day like this it
makes one realize what the Saints meant by 'holy calm,' I think I should
like to live in such a place, and never hear another echo from the outside
world."
"I suppose you would just like to add dear Mosley to the establishment,"
Angelica suggested.
Edith's heart contracted. She had not thought of her husband, and now when
she did it was with a pang, because she could not include him in her idea
of Eden.
The French girl was standing at the door of the cottage with a child in
her arms.
"Is Nurse Griffiths in?" Angelica asked.
Edith looked at the child. It should have been running about by that time,
but it was small and rickety, with bones that bent beneath its weight,
slight as it was. Edith had looked at it first with some interest, but its
unhealthy appearance repelled her. She managed, however, to speak to the
girl about it kindly.
"What is your baby's name?" she asked.
"Mosley Menteith," was the answer.
For a moment it seemed to Edith as if all the world were blotted out, and
then again the hum of bees, the chirrup of birds, the fall of a fir-cone,
the call of the cock-pheasant in the wood sounded obtrusively, making the
girl's voice as she continued speaking appear far off and indistinct.
"I called him after his father, then, didn't I?" she was saying to the
baby in good English, but with a French accent. "And he's to grow up, and
be a big strong fellow and beat his father, isn't he, for he's a bad, bad
man!"
Nurse Griffiths hearing voices in the porch came out.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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