Two or three hours passed, and the household were all asleep; Cricket, in the intervals of her disturbed dreams, had fished her little charge up from her feet, and extricated her from an amazing tangle of sheets and blankets. She had awakened from an oppressive dream of drowning to find the baby sprawling over her chest, with both legs around her neck. She had patiently restored her each time to her own corner. At last, thoroughly tired out with this unaccustomed wakefulness and responsibility, she fell into a sleep much heavier than usual, regardless of Mosina’s continued antics.
At last a strange, new sound slowly penetrated her consciousness, and she gradually awakened to the fact that there had been a queer, wheezing noise close to her ear for some time. Still dazed with sleep; she lay bewildered for a moment or two, till it suddenly dawned on her that the queer noise came from the small atom at her side. Mosina was wheezing and choking in a way that became more alarming every moment.
“Eunice! Eunice!” cried Cricket, suddenly realising that something was seriously wrong; “for goodness sake, wake up! Something’s the matter with the baby!”
“In a moment,” answered Eunice, sleepily, thinking that she was being called to breakfast.
“Eunice, get up! Run for ’Liza! Baby’s dying!”
“What?” cried Eunice, startled into full wakefulness. “Oh, Cricket! What is it? What awful noises!”
“I don’t know what’s the matter,” said Cricket, feeling her way to the gas again. “Oh, do hurry! Here, you light it, and I’ll go.” And Cricket flew away barefooted.
In a moment she was back again, and directly after ’Liza appeared, in a trailing flannel wrapper and felt shoes.
“Croup!” she had exclaimed to herself, as she heard the wheezing noises away down-stairs. “A bad case, too,” she added to herself, as she entered the room.
Eunice had the gas lighted, and the two shivering, frightened little girls hung over the cot, where the baby lay fighting for breath, with that dreadful, whooping noise that mothers know and dread. Eliza came forward quickly; although she had not much head for any emergencies out of her own line, she was a good and efficient nurse where children’s ordinary ailments were concerned.
“Put on your dressing-gowns and slippers,” she ordered the children, she herself flying to the wash-stand, and wringing out a towel in cold water. “Run up-stairs, Miss Eunice, and wake Jane, and tell her to go for Dr. Townsend. Pass me a flannel petticoat out of your drawer, Cricket, please. I dasn’t wait to go to the nursery for things.”
The children flew on their respective orders, and in a twinkling Eliza had a cold compress on the baby’s chest, well protected by Cricket’s blue flannel petticoat.
Jane appeared a few moments later, ready to go for the doctor, and Marjorie, aroused by the voices and general commotion, came flying up-stairs.
“Them big, fat children always has croup dretful,” said Jane cheerfully. “Like as not she’ll die.”
“Die!” echoed ’Liza, scowling at her. “You get along, Jane Lackett, and bring that doctor, and tell him Doctor Ward’s away; and don’t let the grass grow under your feet, neither.”
“Oh, ’Liza, will she die?” whispered Cricket, clinging to Eliza’s hand.
“Oh, lawks! I guess not, honey; but she’s fair to middlin’ sick. Helen ain’t nothin’ to her. Never heard a worse wheezin’. S’pose she’s took a fine cold this morning, runnin’ round without any hat on.”
It was dreadful to the girls, who had never seen a bad attack of croup before, to stand there helplessly, and watch the little creature fighting for breath, every respiration coming with a long whoop that seemed to tear the little frame apart.
“Can’t you do anything, ’Liza?” begged Marjorie. “It’s dreadful to see her suffer so. Aren’t there any medicines to give her?”
“Yes, Miss Marjorie; there’s syrup of squills. It’s in your ma’s medicine chest. No; it’s all out, I know. I’ll give her some vaseline, if you’ll get some.”
“Make her eat that stuff!” exclaimed Cricket. “Why, it will choke her! Don’t do it. It’s cruel!”
But Eliza, unheeding, took a spoonful of vaseline, and opening the baby’s already gasping mouth still further, put the soft, slippery mass down the poor little throat.
Presently the doctor came, and to the children’s amazement, he nodded approvingly over the vaseline. Then he ordered them all off to bed.
“Go and finish the night in mamma’s bed, you and Cricket,” suggested Marjorie. “’Liza, I’ll be on the lookout for our children, since my room is next to theirs, and you must stay here. Is the baby very sick, doctor?”
“It’s a pretty bad attack, but nothing to be frightened about,” said the doctor cheerily. “But who in the world is the youngster?”
While Marjorie explained, Eunice and Cricket crept off to mamma’s room, and tucked themselves into her wide bed, feeling as if they had been through a lifetime’s experience since nine o’clock that night. How delightfully peaceful and care-free it seemed to settle down without anyone to look after but themselves.
“Really, Cricket, it may sound funny to you,” said Eunice, squeezing her sister, “but I feel as if I had had babies in my bed for years. It actually seems funny not to feel her squirming around.”
“And I’m very sure, for my part, that adopting babies is not what it’s cracked up to be,” returned Cricket, decidedly. “Eunice, don’t let us adopt her, even if her mother doesn’t come for her. Mamma can, if she wants to, or papa can find somebody else to. I think we have enough children, anyway.”
“She would take a lot of time,” asserted Eunice.
“Yes; and think of dressing her every morning!” added Cricket.
“And having her sleep with us, and kicking us black and blue every night!” said Eunice feelingly.
“Yes, and keeping us awake. Wonder how the poor little thing is.”
“The doctor and ’Liza will take care of her. Listen, Cricket! There’s the clock actually striking two o’clock! Mercy! were we ever awake so late before?”
“Never. I feel forty-six years older than I did last night, don’t you, Eunice?”
But a grunt was Eunice’s only answer, and Cricket speedily followed her to the Land o’ Nod.
The doctor and Eliza had a busy hour over the baby, and at the end of that time it was sleeping quietly, and the night was finished in peace and quiet.
It was very fortunate that Eliza was the most patient, long-suffering nurse imaginable, for she accepted Mosina as a temporary inmate of the nursery the next day as a matter of course, and looked after her as carefully as after the other children. Jane made another visit to the police station, after breakfast, but only brought back the information that no lost child had yet been reported.
Papa returned about luncheon time, and to his great amazement, was presented to the new member of his family.
“We thought at first we’d like to adopt her, but we’ve come to the conclusion we don’t care much about it,” confessed Eunice frankly, at the end of her tale; “at least, we don’t if she has to sleep with us.”
“Because, papa,” chimed in Cricket, “you see, she’s the restlessest, squirmiest child you ever saw. Oh, yes; she looks mild enough now, but if you felt her wiggle just one night, you’d believe it.”
“You both of you look as if you had been on a prolonged spree,” said Doctor Ward, pinching the rather pale cheeks of his two ex-philanthropists. “Never mind, I’ll look out for the baby. Somebody will be sure to turn up for her.”
And somebody did. About seven o’clock that evening, the somebody marched up the steps and rang the bell furiously. It was a distracted little Dutch woman, who in broken English demanded her baby. Mosina was brought down, but after the first little gurgle of pleasure at seeing her mother, sucked her thumb as placidly as ever, while her mother hugged and kissed her rapturously, pouring forth a stream of mingled Dutch and English. It was some time before she was calm enough to explain the situation.
She went out to work by the day, when she could, and, when she was at work, would often leave the baby at her married sister’s for two days at a time, as the sister lived at a distance, and she would sometimes be too tired to go for her at night. The day before, she had taken her there as usual. However, the little thing must have slipped out and run after her, and the sister thought the mother had taken her, after all. She had to go to work at a place on the other side of the city for two days, and so had not gone for the child the night before, thinking, of course, she was safe, as usual. She was wild with terror when she went there and found that her sister thought she had the child with her. They went immediately to a police station, and soon had the necessary information of the baby’s whereabouts.
The little Dutch mother was overwhelmed with gratitude at the kindness and care her baby had received. She said that the little thing often had croup, and very bad attacks, too.
Mamma, who had returned from Marbury just before dinner, began to talk quietly to the excited little woman, and learned her story. It was very short and very simple. They had come over to this country two years before, and did well till her husband was killed by an accident a few months previous. She spoke so little English that it was hard for her to get work, and their little savings slipped away quickly. Now she was anxious for all the work by the day she could get.
Mrs. Ward listened sympathisingly, promised to speak to her friends about her, and gave her a bundle of Kenneth’s clothes to take home, besides the ones that Mosina was then arrayed in.
“So you don’t want to go into the orphan asylum business?” said papa, pulling Cricket’s curls, when the excitement was all over, and Mosina and her mother had departed, laden down with bundles.
“I think I might like it,” said Cricket, meditatively, “if only I didn’t have to sleep with the orphans.”