Married women -- Fiction; Mothers and daughters -- Fiction
“Oh, Bosh! you and your romantic fancies! Come along indoors and have
a game of billiards. I’ll give you twenty up! There will be no more
songs,--see, she has turned down the light.”
“All right, I see,” agreed the man of sentiment, as he reluctantly
followed his challenger.
The morning after this incident, a letter from Frances Lumley not only
distracted Letty’s thoughts, but carried her away from Maythorne. The
stimulating news, which was in the postscript, said:
“I have just heard that little Cara and her new nurse have gone to
Folkestone. The child had measles, but is now quite well; however,
Doctor Griffen ordered sea air and change. Last time I saw her she
was prettier than ever, and looked like a _little angel_.”
Within five minutes Cara’s mother was whirling over the pages of an A
B C. She too would go to Folkestone and see her baby at all hazards.
A new nurse--what a chance! She wired for rooms at one of the hotels,
packed up her boxes, paid her bill, and the following day effected
an early departure, arriving at Folkestone the same evening. Here at
least, she would be breathing the same air as her darling.
An early hour the next morning found Mrs. Glyn on the Leas, and as
the month happened to be July these were crowded. For two whole days,
among nurses and perambulators, she sought in vain for Cara. At last,
in a block near the band shelter, she descried her treasure--attended
by a buxom nurse, with a gaudy magazine tucked under her arm; Letty
hovered around, or paced to and fro, till at last nurse and pram moved
slowly away, and she, following at a discreet distance, discovered that
they lodged in rooms not far from her own hotel. Her next move was to
endeavour to make the nurse’s acquaintance, and this she accomplished
by sitting beside her on a bench overlooking the sea, and offering
timid remarks about the weather, and admiration of the sleeping child.
The nurse (with visions of Sharsley to support her) was inclined to be
haughty and stand-off, but when she had scrutinised the young lady, and
her well-cut costume, her pretty hat, and good new gloves, she thawed
so far as to admit that the ‘weather was a treat,’ and to accept the
loan of an illustrated paper.
Letty, as she gazed at her sleeping child, was so overcome with
emotion, that she was impelled to get up suddenly, and walk away; but
presently returned as the moth to the candle, and with a steady voice
informed the nurse, that “she was fond of children, and that the little
girl reminded her of someone.”
“There is one o’clock striking,” said nurse, “and that reminds _me_
that it’s time for our dinner! Here’s your paper, miss, and thank you.”
“Oh, please keep it, I don’t want it back! I have any quantity of
magazines, and books.”
“I do love reading, and specially magazines; but I can’t well leave
this child to go and buy things--you see, I’m single-handed.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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