David and I had a tremendous adventure. It was this, he passed the night
with me. We had often talked of it as a possible thing, and at last Mary
consented to our having it.
The adventure began with David's coming to me at the unwonted hour of
six P.M., carrying what looked like a packet of sandwiches, but proved
to be his requisites for the night done up in a neat paper parcel. We
were both so excited that, at the moment of greeting, neither of us
could be apposite to the occasion in words, so we communicated our
feelings by signs; as thus, David half sat down in a place where there
was no chair, which is his favourite preparation for being emphatic, and
is borrowed, I think, from the frogs, and we then made the extraordinary
faces which mean, “What a tremendous adventure!”
We were to do all the important things precisely as they are done every
evening at his own home, and so I am in a puzzle to know how it was such
an adventure to David. But I have now said enough to show you what an
adventure it was to me.
For a little while we played with my two medals, and, with the delicacy
of a sleeping companion, David abstained on this occasion from asking
why one of them was not a Victoria Cross. He is very troubled because I
never won the Victoria Cross, for it lowers his status in the Gardens.
He never says in the Gardens that I won it, but he fights any boy of
his year who says I didn't. Their fighting consists of challenging each
other.
At twenty-five past six I turned on the hot water in the bath, and
covertly swallowed a small glass of brandy. I then said, “Half-past
six; time for little boys to be in bed.” I said it in the matter-of-fact
voice of one made free of the company of parents, as if I had said it
often before, and would have to say it often again, and as if there was
nothing particularly delicious to me in hearing myself say it. I tried
to say it in that way.
And David was deceived. To my exceeding joy he stamped his little foot,
and was so naughty that, in gratitude, I gave him five minutes with a
matchbox. Matches, which he drops on the floor when lighted, are the
greatest treat you can give David; indeed, I think his private heaven is
a place with a roaring bonfire.
Then I placed my hand carelessly on his shoulder, like one a trifle
bored by the dull routine of putting my little boys to bed, and
conducted him to the night nursery, which had lately been my private
chamber. There was an extra bed in it tonight, very near my own,
but differently shaped, and scarcely less conspicuous was the new
mantel-shelf ornament: a tumbler of milk, with a biscuit on top of it,
and a chocolate riding on the biscuit. To enter the room without seeing
the tumbler at once was impossible. I had tried it several times,
and David saw and promptly did his frog business, the while, with an
indescribable emotion, I produced a night-light from my pocket and
planted it in a saucer on the wash-stand.
David watched my preparations with distasteful levity, but anon made a
noble amend by abruptly offering me his foot as if he had no longer
use for it, and I knew by intuition that he expected me to take off his
boots. I took them off with all the coolness of an old hand, and then
I placed him on my knee and removed his blouse. This was a delightful
experience, but I think I remained wonderfully calm until I came
somewhat too suddenly to his little braces, which agitated me
profoundly.