Marjorie tried to appear unconscious of all his antics. When she could
not avoid looking at him she stared at him coldly, but that did not seem
to dishearten him. Even a cold glance filled him with joy, and once,
when she was preparing a little cry and had screwed her face into the
prescribed shape, he grasped the attendant by the arm and exclaimed:
“She's smiling! Isn't she smiling?” Marjorie was quite ashamed, he was
so idiotically ecstatic. She learned later that he was her father, and
that for some reason fathers have a right to do that sort of thing. In
fact, it is rather nice when one gets used to it.
But the great day was the day of her mother's coming. The nurse had
prepared Mar jorie for it. “Little girl, your mother is coming to-day.”
Marjorie watched closely for her mother all that day. She scanned the
faces that came and went, picking out those she thought might be her
mother, but she could not be sure, for they all passed by. All the faces
she chose were kind young faces, and she was rather surprised when her
mother finally came. She did not recognize her for quite a while.
A tall lady came to the incubator in company with the nurse. She
examined the incubator carefully, and asked a great many questions
about temperature, the sanitation, alimentation and digestion and other
scientific things. She examined the record chart carefully, and asked
the nurse if Marjorie's weight was not increasing less than the proper
average, and when the nurse assured her that Marjorie was surpassing the
average she objected to that and said that she had no desire for her to
grow so rapidly she would be soft and pulpy. Then she examined the nurse
carefully and critically regarding her experience with babies, and
all the while she made notes in a small memorandum book. She copied
everything on the record chart, and asked to have Marjorie weighed, and
put the weight down in the little memorandum book.
“I wish to be very careful and exact,” she said, “for I am her mother,
and if I do not look after these things no one will,” and Marjorie knew
this was her mother. She waited patiently for the preliminaries to be
completed so that the real mother business could begin, but her mother
must have been very busy that day, for she went away without being
really introduced to Marjorie.
Marjorie was disappointed. She had become used to being regarded as
an entertainment for the faces that passed by, and she had become
accustomed to have the incubator people regard her as a Case--a most
interesting Case, to be sure, but still a Case--but she did not like to
have her mother look upon her merely as a Statistic.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account