An unwonted peace hung over the Villa Elsinore, broken, however, at
frequent intervals, by clamorous lamentations suggestive of bewildered
bereavement. The Momebys had lost their infant child; hence the peace
which its absence entailed; they were looking for it in wild,
undisciplined fashion, giving tongue the whole time, which accounted
for the outcry which swept through house and garden whenever they
returned to try the home coverts anew. Clovis, who was temporarily and
unwillingly a paying guest at the villa, had been dozing in a hammock
at the far end of the garden when Mrs. Momeby had broken the news to
him.
"We've lost Baby," she screamed.
"Do you mean that it's dead, or stampeded, or that you staked it at
cards and lost it that way?" asked Clovis lazily.
"He was toddling about quite happily on the lawn," said Mrs. Momeby
tearfully, "and Arnold had just come in, and I was asking him what sort
of sauce he would like with the asparagus--"
"I hope he said hollandaise," interrupted Clovis, with a show of
quickened interest, "because if there's anything I hate--"
"And all of a sudden I missed Baby," continued Mrs. Momeby in a
shriller tone. "We've hunted high and low, in house and garden and
outside the gates, and he's nowhere to be seen."
"Is he anywhere to be heard?" asked Clovis; "if not, he must be at
least two miles away."
"But where? And how?" asked the distracted mother.
"Perhaps an eagle or a wild beast has carried him off," suggested
Clovis.
"There aren't eagles and wild beasts in Surrey," said Mrs. Momeby, but
a note of horror had crept into her voice.
"They escape now and then from travelling shows. Sometimes I think
they let them get loose for the sake of the advertisement. Think what a
sensational headline it would make in the local papers: 'Infant son of
prominent Nonconformist devoured by spotted hyaena.' Your husband
isn't a prominent Nonconformist, but his mother came of Wesleyan stock,
and you must allow the newspapers some latitude."
"But we should have found his remains," sobbed Mrs. Momeby.
"If the hyaena was really hungry and not merely toying with his food
there wouldn't be much in the way of remains. It would be like the
small-boy-and-apple story--there ain't going to be no core."
Mrs. Momeby turned away hastily to seek comfort and counsel in some
other direction. With the selfish absorption of young motherhood she
entirely disregarded Clovis's obvious anxiety about the asparagus
sauce. Before she had gone a yard, however, the click of the side gate
caused her to pull up sharp. Miss Gilpet, from the Villa Peterhof, had
come over to hear details of the bereavement. Clovis was already
rather bored with the story, but Mrs. Momeby was equipped with that
merciless faculty which finds as much joy in the ninetieth time of
telling as in the first.
"Arnold had just come in; he was complaining of rheumatism--"
"There are so many things to complain of in this household that it
would never have occurred to me to complain of rheumatism," murmured
Clovis.
"He was complaining of rheumatism," continued Mrs. Momeby, trying to
throw a chilling inflection into a voice that was already doing a good
deal of sobbing and talking at high pressure as well.
She was again interrupted.
"There is no such thing as rheumatism," said Miss Gilpet. She said it
with the conscious air of defiance that a waiter adopts in announcing
that the cheapest-priced claret in the wine-list is no more. She did
not proceed, however, to offer the alternative of some more expensive
malady, but denied the existence of them all.
Mrs. Momeby's temper began to shine out through her grief.
"I suppose you'll say next that Baby hasn't really disappeared."
"He has disappeared," conceded Miss Gilpet, "but only because you
haven't sufficient faith to find him. It's only lack of faith on your
part that prevents him from being restored to you safe and well."
"But if he's been eaten in the meantime by a hyaena and partly
digested," said Clovis, who clung affectionately to his wild beast
theory, "surely some ill-effects would be noticeable?"
Miss Gilpet was rather staggered by this complication of the question.
"I feel sure that a hyaena has not eaten him," she said lamely.
"The hyaena may be equally certain that it has. You see, it may have
just as much faith as you have, and more special knowledge as to the
present whereabouts of the baby."
Mrs. Momeby was in tears again. "If you have faith," she sobbed,
struck by a happy inspiration, "won't you find our little Erik for us?
I am sure you have powers that are denied to us."
Rose-Marie Gilpet was thoroughly sincere in her adherence to Christian
Science principles; whether she understood or correctly expounded them
the learned in such matters may best decide. In the present case she
was undoubtedly confronted with a great opportunity, and as she started
forth on her vague search she strenuously summoned to her aid every
scrap of faith that she possessed. She passed out into the bare and
open high road, followed by Mrs. Momeby's warning, "It's no use going
there, we've searched there a dozen times." But Rose-Marie's ears were
already deaf to all things save self-congratulation; for sitting in the
middle of the highway, playing contentedly with the dust and some faded
buttercups, was a white-pinafored baby with a mop of tow-coloured hair
tied over one temple with a pale-blue ribbon. Taking first the usual
feminine precaution of looking to see that no motor-car was on the
distant horizon, Rose-Marie dashed at the child and bore it, despite
its vigorous opposition, in through the portals of Elsinore. The
child's furious screams had already announced the fact of its
discovery, and the almost hysterical parents raced down the lawn to
meet their restored offspring. The aesthetic value of the scene was
marred in some degree by Rose-Marie's difficulty in holding the
struggling infant, which was borne wrong-end foremost towards the
agitated bosom of its family. "Our own little Erik come back to us,"
cried the Momebys in unison; as the child had rammed its fists tightly
into its eye-sockets and nothing could be seen of its face but a widely
gaping mouth, the recognition was in itself almost an act of faith.
"Is he glad to get back to Daddy and Mummy again?" crooned Mrs. Momeby;
the preference which the child was showing for its dust and buttercup
distractions was so marked that the question struck Clovis as being
unnecessarily tactless.
"Give him a ride on the roly-poly," suggested the father brilliantly,
as the howls continued with no sign of early abatement. In a moment
the child had been placed astride the big garden roller and a
preliminary tug was given to set it in motion. From the hollow depths
of the cylinder came an earsplitting roar, drowning even the vocal
efforts of the squalling baby, and immediately afterwards there crept
forth a white-pinafored infant with a mop of tow-coloured hair tied
over one temple with a pale blue ribbon. There was no mistaking either
the features or the lung-power of the new arrival.
"Our own little Erik," screamed Mrs. Momeby, pouncing on him and nearly
smothering him with kisses; "did he hide in the roly-poly to give us
all a big fright?"
This was the obvious explanation of the child's sudden disappearance
and equally abrupt discovery. There remained, however, the problem of
the interloping baby, which now sat whimpering on the lawn in a
disfavour as chilling as its previous popularity had been unwelcome.
The Momebys glared at it as though it had wormed its way into their
short-lived affections by heartless and unworthy pretences. Miss
Gilpet's face took on an ashen tinge as she stared helplessly at the
bunched-up figure that had been such a gladsome sight to her eyes a few
moments ago.
"When love is over, how little of love even the lover understands,"
quoted Clovis to himself.
Rose-Marie was the first to break the silence.
"If that is Erik you have in your arms, who is--that?"
"That, I think, is for you to explain," said Mrs. Momeby stiffly.
"Obviously," said Clovis, "it's a duplicate Erik that your powers of
faith called into being. The question is: What are you going to do
with him?"
The ashen pallor deepened in Rose-Marie's cheeks. Mrs. Momeby clutched
the genuine Erik closer to her side, as though she feared that her
uncanny neighbour might out of sheer pique turn him into a bowl of
gold-fish.
"I found him sitting in the middle of the road," said Rose-Marie weakly.
"You can't take him back and leave him there," said Clovis; "the
highway is meant for traffic, not to be used as a lumber-room for
disused miracles."
Rose-Marie wept. The proverb "Weep and you weep alone," broke down as
badly on application as most of its kind. Both babies were wailing
lugubriously, and the parent Momebys had scarcely recovered from their
earlier lachrymose condition. Clovis alone maintained an unruffled
cheerfulness.
"Must I keep him always?" asked Rose-Marie dolefully.
"Not always," said Clovis consolingly; "he can go into the Navy when
he's thirteen." Rose-Marie wept afresh.
"Of course," added Clovis, "there may be no end of a bother about his
birth certificate. You'll have to explain matters to the Admiralty,
and they're dreadfully hidebound."
It was rather a relief when a breathless nursemaid from the Villa
Charlottenburg over the way came running across the lawn to claim
little Percy, who had slipped out of the front gate and disappeared
like a twinkling from the high road.
And even then Clovis found it necessary to go in person to the kitchen
to make sure about the asparagus sauce.