Following upon the exit of his daughter came the realization to Wally
that something must be done about the "party." He turned to the group of
children, huddled together in horror, like butterflies in a rain storm.
Serious and large-eyed, they focussed their attention upon him, in the
apparent belief that, being a parent, he would be able to handle this
unprecedented situation. They ranged in age from three to six; they were
the children of his neighbours and life-long associates; and yet Wally
had the feeling that he was hemmed in by a pack of alert, curious little
animals.
"Well, children," he managed to say, "I'm sorry that Isabelle was such a
naughty girl at her own party, but she is only four years old, we must
remember, and I suppose she did not know any better."
"I'm free an' a half, an' I don't take off my cloves at a party,"
bragged one of the female infants.
"No, I'm sure you don't. It isn't done," said Wally, helplessly.
"She always spoils parties. I wanted not to have her at mine, but mother
made me," remarked Tommy Page.
"Hard luck, old man," said Wally.
"She always wants to boss everything," Margie Hunter complained.
"Are you going to whip her?" demanded another child.
"She will be punished, believe me," replied Wally, firmly. "But I think
we'd better call the party over."
"We can't go yet, the nurses and chauffeurs haven't come," Tommy
protested. "I'd like to hear her yell when she's licked."
"Our man will take you all home in the big station wagon, so get on your
hats," Wally ordered.
Fifteen minutes later the smallest child was packed in, with one of the
maids in command, and the motor slid off down the drive, leaving Wally
on the door step.
"Little beasts!" he remarked, feelingly.
In the hall he met Miss Wilder, still bearing marks of the late
excitement.
"I have put Isabelle to bed, Mr. Bryce. Mrs. Bryce says that you are to
prescribe her punishment."
Wally looked his misery.
"I don't want to punish her. Can't you manage it alone?" he said.
"No, I cannot. Isabelle needs the authority of her parents now and then
to back me up," said Miss Wilder, severely.
"Well, I'll have a talk with her."
"I think a severe spanking is what she needs."
"What do ye suppose ever put such an idea in her head?"
"You never know what she is going to do. She asked me about barbarians
when I was trying to induce her to get dressed for the party. I told her
some facts, just to occupy her mind."
"It occupied her mind all right," laughed Wally, who left Miss Wilder
with the idea that he thought the joke was at her expense. She
determined to give notice at once, and leave at the end of her month.
Wally went upstairs and turned his unaccustomed feet into the nursery.
He hesitated before he opened the door, but no sounds of repentant sobs
met his ear, so he went in. Isabelle, the picture of alert interest, sat
up in bed and eyed him.
"Have you come to punish me?" she asked.
"Something like that."
"Go ahead," said she.
He sat down on the edge of her bed and looked at her. Max was right;
she was no prize beauty, with her baby face like an old woman's, with
her nondescript features, her short brown hair. But her eyes were
disturbing--big dusky, wise eyes, with no effect of childishness.
"Look here, Isabelle, why do you act like this?" That was regular
parent-talk, so she made no answer.
"Here you are, four years old, and you can't behave at your own party,"
he continued.
"I hate parties."
"Well, but you have to have parties."
"Why?"
"Oh, all children do."
"Nasty things! I hate 'em all, except Patsy."
"Hate those nice little girls?"
"Yes!"--hotly.
"And those handsome boys?"
"Yes. They're ugly. Patsy is handsome."
"Why are you so crazy about this Patsy?"
"Because he always does what I say." Wally stifled a smile.
"But don't you know you mustn't take off your clothes before mixed
company?"
"But we were playing barbarian."
"Well, you shouldn't play that kind of game."
"Why not?"
"Because----" He floundered. "Now, look here, you must never take off
your clothes again."
"Not when I go to bed?"--with interest.
"I mean before people."
"Not before Miss Wilder, or Mary?"
"Don't be stupid," he exploded. "You know what I mean--before boys and
girls."
"Why not?"
"Because it isn't nice. Don't you know what modesty is?"
"No; what is it?"
"It's--it's--well, it's just that you mustn't show your body to people."
"Isn't my face my body?"
"That's different. Everybody shows his face." She considered that.
"If everybody showed their bodies it would be nice, wouldn't it?"
"No," Wally said, harshly, because he felt she was making a fool of him.
"But the barbarians never wore any clothes, and they were nice."
"That's different. They didn't know any better."
"Didn't they? Why didn't God tell them any better?"
"I don't know."
"Did Jesus wear clothes?" she inquired.
"Who?" he demanded, caught unawares.
"Jesus. You know, God's boy," she replied, earnestly.
"Of course he wore clothes," Wally protested.
"Why didn't he tell the barbarians?"
"O Lord, I don't know. This has got nothing to do with your performance
this afternoon," Wally urged, trying to get back to the subject and on
to solid ground.
"What kind of punishing are you going to do?" she inquired.
"I don't know," he admitted. "What do you think I ought to do?"
She thought about that with awakened interest.
"There's whipping, but I don't mind that."
"You don't?"
"No. There's shutting up, but that's fun. I play I'm a prisoner then."
"Are there any punishments you don't like?"
"Yes. Parties are punishment, and kindiegarden in winter is punishment."
"You think the party this afternoon was punishment, do you?"
"Yes."
"Who punished you?"
"Max."
"I wish you wouldn't call your mother 'Max.'"
"Why not?"
"Why do you call her that?"
"Because you do."
"I don't have to be respectful to her--I mean----"
"If you call her that, I'm going to," she said, dismissing that subject.
"You're being punished now, you know, being sent off to bed in broad
daylight."
"But I like it, when you talk to me."
He rose promptly.
"I'm not going to talk to you. Your punishment is that nobody will talk
to you for the rest of the day."
"All right"--cheerfully.
"You'll just lie here, all alone."
"Oh, no," she corrected him, "my playmates will be here, and God's
always around."
"No playmates shall come in here," he reiterated.
"But you can't keep Dorothy and Reginald out, because they're just
pretend," she defied him.
Wally knew he was beaten. He had never felt so futile in his life. She
sat there with her straight little back, her wise eyes fixed on him, and
he wished he were well out of the room.
"I hope you will lie here and think of what I have said to you," he
remarked sonorously. "I'm surprised at you, Isabelle," he added sternly.
He rose and hurried toward the door.
"Good night, Wally," she said pleasantly, and smiled at him.
It is not too much to say that Wally fled. He sought out his wife, who
was dressing for dinner.
"Well, did you whip her?" she inquired.
He evaded that.
"I've had a good talk with her"--firmly.
She turned her face over her shoulder at him, and laughed.
"Terrified her, no doubt."
"Where on earth does she get her ideas?"
"Not from me,--" indifferently.
"She's--she's uncanny, that kid."
"Hurry and dress, we're dining at the club. I wish you the joy of your
job," she added, as he left her.
A day or two later, when Wally came out of the bath house on the way to
swim, he encountered his daughter on the beach.
"I'll swim with you, Wally," she said.
"No, thanks. I'm going to the raft."
"So am I," she answered.
He looked at her and laughed. She looked like a Kewpie in her abbreviated
bathing suit, with water wings fastened to her back. She walked rapidly
into the sea, and, perforce, he followed. Miss Wilder shouted orders in
vain from the shore. The tide was running in, and nearly high, so she was
over her depth in a second, but she paddled out toward the distant raft,
her head well out of the water, thanks to her wings. Much amused, Wally
swam beside her into deep water.
"It was a great surprise to me, the day I found I could swim," she said.
"It must have been," he laughed.
"It was a pleasant day," she added.
"It is deep here," he said, to test her.
"I know it. Don't you put your hands on me, Wally. I don't want to be
touched," she admonished him.
"Aren't you afraid?"
"No."
In due time they reached the raft. The youngster was winded, but
undaunted. Bryce watched her with real admiration. Here was a dare-devil
courage he vastly respected. He was timid and cautious himself.
"Throw me off the raft, Wally; I like to splash," she ordered.
"You're crazy," he said.
"No. Mr. Page threw me off the club raft, when I asked him to."
"Better not let me catch him at it. You sit still and get your breath
and then we'll start back."
He dived off the raft and instantly she followed him. He caught her by
the arm, strangling and coughing.
"You little devil," he said; "you'll drown."
"No, I won't. Let go, Wally; I won't be helped."
He headed her for shore, by pretending to race her, and once on land he
urged Miss Wilder to watch her every minute, lest she swim for the raft
alone.
But this adventure had fixed Isabelle on her father's mind. He thought
about her a good deal, and laughed at the thought. She certainly was a
sport, and she was nobody's fool. He wondered if other children were
like her, and began to watch them. He asked their fathers about them,
but the fathers never knew. They always said: "I don't see much of the
kids; too busy," or: "That's Mabel's job (or Kate's or Mary's)."
He could not seem to remember seeing much of his father when he was a
boy, save on state occasions when his parent was called upon to
administer extra stiff punishment. He wondered if the other mothers knew
more about their youngsters than Max did about hers? But when he asked
them at the club, or on the golf course, they looked surprised and said:
"I don't know anything about them, Wally; the governess looks after
them."
It evidently wasn't the thing, in their set, to bother about children.
So he did not get much help from his friends in the difficult situation
in which Max had placed him. She stood by her determination to leave the
child to him, with irritating completeness. She even refused to give
advice or help.
Of course, he could leave well enough alone, let Miss Wilder blunder
along with her somehow. That was evidently the way the rest of them did.
He had almost decided upon this course, when he met Isabelle, standing
on the pony's bare back, making him run, while poor Miss Wilder panted
behind, protesting at every step.
It brought him to a resolution. The kid ought to have a younger woman to
look after her, one who could swim and ride and take some interest in
her sports. If she was going to leap head first into every danger, she
needed a girl to stand by, and leap in after her, if necessary.
It took him several days to get up his nerve to dismiss Miss Wilder, but
in the end, she met him half way. She said she could not stand the
strain, that she had aged ten years in the two months she had been in
charge of his daughter.
"She is a very remarkable child, Mr. Bryce, and she needs very special
treatment."
"I suppose that is it. I will give you a month's extra salary, Miss
Wilder, so you may take a rest. I know you need it."
The next morning he bustled into Mrs. Bryce's room, where she was taking
her breakfast in bed.
"Mercy, Wally, are you sick?" she inquired; "it's barely nine o'clock."
"I've got to go to town."
"Town, this hot day?"
"Yes. I fired old Wilder and I've got to get a new victim for our
offspring. Where do you get 'em?"
"Poor Wally," laughed his wife. "I advertise, or go to teachers'
agencies, or any old way. Telephone in, and they'll send you something."
"No; I'm going to get a young one."
"And pretty, I suppose."
"Don't be an idiot."
He turned as the door opened and Isabelle came in. She was booted and
hatted.
"Good morning, Max," she said, sweetly.
"Morning. Where are you going?"
"To town, with Wally."
"What?"
"Well, I thought I'd better take her. She has to live with 'em, you
know, and she has ideas on the subject."
Mrs. Bryce laughed aloud.
"You two!" she exclaimed.
"Come on, Wally," urged Isabelle, taking her father by the hand.
"Which car are you using?" inquired Max.
"She prefers the train," he explained.
This brought another outburst of mirth.
"My word, Wally! You're becoming a wonderful parent!" exclaimed Mrs.
Bryce; and they fled before her laughter.