PRUDENCE RECEIVES A SHOCK.
Miss Prudence Semaphore slept placidly. It was her nature to do
everything as placidly as possible. Nightmares rarely visited her. When
Miss Augusta was crosser than usual, or the latest man at 37,
Beaconsfield Gardens, on whom she tried to fix her easy affections,
showed that he had no thought of her, she sometimes wept herself to
sleep. Seldom, however, did she experience the discomfort of a _nuit
blanche_.
On this particular occasion she dreamt that she was flying through space
to Florida in search of the Fountain of Youth. Suddenly her wings failed
her. She fell like another Icarus down, down, down, awaking with a start
and a stifled gasp. She sat bolt upright in bed, and tried to think
where she was. The familiar room dimly seen, the light of the street
lamps, filtering through the Venetian blinds, the sound of passing cabs,
a neighbouring clock chiming three, all reassured her.
With a sigh of relief she turned over to sleep again, when a weird
wailing attracted her attention. Miss Prudence listened. Her heart beat
fast. The wailing seemed close at hand. Did it come from above or below?
Noises are proverbially difficult to locate. Miss Prudence subscribed to
“Borderland,” and a thousand unpleasant conjectures assailed her. There
was something unearthly, she fancied, in the cry, and though she
muttered “ridiculous,” the exclamation did not entirely restore her
presence of mind. So far, indeed, was the idea from being really
ridiculous to her, that, as the sound continued to rise and fall feebly,
Miss Prudence lay back in bed, and pulled the clothes over her head. She
could not be happy thus, however. Half suffocated, she emerged from time
to time to hear if it still continued. When at last it ceased, somewhat
tranquillised by the silence, she pulled down the blankets and began to
consider what the cause of disturbance could possibly be.
A solution flashed through her mind—the kitten! She remembered suddenly
that Mrs. Dumaresq had lately complained of a pet kitten that played
about the house having strayed into her room, and been locked up
accidentally in the wardrobe.
“The very thing! It must be the kitten,” thought Miss Prudence.
The wail, after a short interval, was renewed, and this time Miss
Prudence distinctly recognised the cry of a young cat.
Full of courage she jumped out of bed, struck a light, put on her
dressing-gown and slippers, and began to search for pussy.
She tried the wardrobe, the chest of drawers, looked under the bed and
up the chimney, but in vain. The creature was not to be found. As she
passed the door communicating with her sister’s room, it seemed to her
that the sound came from there.
She opened the door softly, and shading the light with one hand, gently
called “puss, puss, puss.” Nothing came. The cry, however, sounded
distinctly nearer, louder, and more human.
“Augusta! what is that noise? Augusta! are you awake?” said Miss
Prudence with renewed alarm.
There was no answer but a prolonged wail. Really frightened, Prudence
advanced into the room, holding the candle above her head. All was as
she had left it, except, except—Where was Augusta? The bed was empty.
The room was empty. Filled with an indefinable terror, Prudence advanced
to her sister’s bedside. Oh! horror! Augusta was gone, and in her place
lay—what? A little, shrivelled, red-faced baby, wailing feebly, a huge
night-cap fallen back off its bald head, a woman’s night-dress lying
round it in folds a world too wide.
“My God!” exclaimed poor Prudence, “what on earth is this? Am I going
mad? Where is Augusta?” Her distracted glance lighted on the broken
bottle, and a sudden gleam of intelligence lit up her brain. “Are you
Augusta?” she cried to the baby. The tearful baby seemed to make a
desperate but ineffectual effort to speak. It appeared to be on the
brink of convulsions. There was intelligence in its eye, however, and
her worst fears confirmed, poor Prudence dropped the candlestick on her
toes, and went into violent hysterics.
Fortunately for her, the room was at the end of a passage, removed from
the other sleeping apartments by an intervening bath room. Underneath it
was the now empty drawing-room, while overhead reposed the deaf Mrs.
Belcher. Thus and thus alone did her shrieks fail to rouse the
household. Every now and then she made an effort at self-control, but
again and again the grotesque horror of the situation overcame her.
It was dawn before she pulled herself together and faced her position.
With reflection came a burst of anger most unusual to the placid woman.
“Augusta,” she said sternly to the baby, which had ceased weeping, as if
frightened at its sister’s distress. “Augusta, do you understand me?”
The baby apparently tried to nod.
“Can’t you speak?”
The baby shook its head.
“It is no use, I suppose, in that case, asking how this terrible
misfortune has come about?”
The baby blinked speechlessly. It was not an engaging child. To
Prudence, much as she loved her sister, it seemed strange and absolutely
hateful.
“You little wretch!” she cried, over-mastered by her rising anger.
“Don’t you see the horrible position you have placed us both in? You
took too much. You must have been a nasty, greedy, selfish, foolish
thing to have swallowed up all that water, or this would never have
happened. Are you really my sister? How can I prove it? Who will believe
me? Perhaps the next thing will be that I shall be hanged for having
murdered her.” At this thought Prudence was for a moment on the verge of
fresh hysterics.
“What on earth am I to do? There you are, a baby to all intents and
purposes. My good gracious! what on earth shall I do with you? I cannot
keep you in this house. How can I explain? They won’t believe me—why, I
wouldn’t believe it myself if anyone told me. How shall I account for
your disappearance? and you can’t even speak to back me up if I tell the
truth. Not you! You’d see me hanged and never say a word”—which was
unjust, considering poor Augusta was not able to speak. Lashing herself
to fury, Prudence paced up and down the room, wringing her hands.
“Augusta! I always was a good sister to you, and bore with your tempers,
and divided everything with you; but now, you horrid, selfish, ugly
little thing, I declare I hate you. I’ll just wrap you up in a shawl,
and drop you somewhere. Oh, you lit—tle wr—r—retch, I should like to
shake you.”
Suiting the action to the word, Prudence pounced on the baby, and shook
it till its big cap fell quite off, and its head wobbled.
Augusta was terrified, and began to howl lustily. She was so small, so
helpless, that a certain revulsion of pity came over Prudence. She
ceased shaking, and tried to soothe her.
“There now! there now!” she exclaimed, exactly as if speaking to a real
baby, “don’t cry. I’ll see what can be done. I suppose you took an
overdose. Will you try and put up your hand if you did?”
The baby put up its hand.
“Does it hurt? do you feel bad?”
The baby shook its bald head, and made an ineffectual attempt to
demonstrate that its sufferings were chiefly mental.
“Now will you just be quiet and cease crying, and let me think it all
over. Try to go to sleep if you can. Perhaps some of it may wear off,
and you’ll be bigger by and bye.”
Tucking the baby up in bed, Prudence began restlessly to pace the room,
pausing now and again to look at the queer little creature that had
plunged her into such unexpected difficulties. In despair she thrust her
hands into her hair, and gnawed at her fingers. Finally she flung
herself into a chair by the window, and, staring blankly into the
street, tried to devise some means out of her dilemma. The more she
thought of it, the more serious and unpleasant did it appear. How
Augusta could have been so foolish as to finish the contents of the
bottle, how the bottle itself came to be broken, she could only imagine.
The result at any rate was sufficiently deplorable. Her sister had not
stopped at eight-and-thirty, nor eight-and-twenty, nor even eighteen, as
would have been natural and delightful, but had gone at a bound to about
eight days old.
“What a mercy,” thought Prudence, kind-hearted in the midst of her anger
and perplexity, “what a mercy that there were not a few drops more, or
what would have become of her!”
After long cogitation the lady who had hitherto been the younger Miss
Semaphore rose, went into her own room, dressed, bathed her swollen
eyelids, and smoothed her hair. Then she returned to her sister’s
bedside.
Augusta was wide awake, but she had ceased crying. It was only by her
eyes, big with intelligence, and looking weird and uncanny in her ugly
little red face, that Prudence saw reason still reigned within her
diminished body, A “queer child,” a “fairy changeling,” an “elfish
infant,” would be the terms applied to Miss Semaphore by anyone not in
the secret of her rejuvenescence.
“Augusta,” said Prudence solemnly, “I have thought it all out.
Immediately after breakfast I will go in search of this Mrs. Geldheraus,
and see if she cannot provide you with some—some antidote for this
horrible state of things. If she cannot, I don’t know what will become
of you. It is no use telling the truth to the people in this house. In
the first place it would be a very disagreeable matter to go into, and
make us seem very ridiculous. In the second they would not believe me.
My only chance, if I don’t succeed in getting something to cure you, is
to tell them to-day that you have had a letter summoning you to the
country on important business. I shall make excuses later for your
having had to hurry off to catch a train without saying good-bye to
anyone. Meantime I must hide you here somewhere in this room or in mine
until to-night, and knowing how much depends on it, I do implore you to
be quiet and not cry. If Mrs. Geldheraus fails me, I shall enquire
everywhere for some good, kind woman who will take care of you till you
grow a little older, for of course you must see how impossible it would
be for me to go about with a baby of your age. This evening, after
dinner, when it is dark, I will try to smuggle you out unobserved to the
woman, if I can find one suitable, then give warning, and go to some
quiet place where nobody knows us, and where I can perhaps have you back
to live with me. Now what do you think of my plan? Do you like it?”
Augusta evidently did not, for she shook her head as vehemently as she
could.
“Well,” said Prudence crossly, “if you don’t you needn’t. I can think of
nothing better, and you are not able to give me much help or advice. You
have only yourself to thank for having brought all this trouble on us.
I’m sure I never was so worried in my life.”
Augusta was perforce silent, but her eyes followed every movement of her
sister.
“Now,” continued Prudence, as the breakfast gong sounded, “I must go
downstairs. I shall say you have had a bad night, and desire no
breakfast. I shall lock the door of your room so that the housemaid may
not come in, and shall bring you up a cup of milk. I suppose that is the
proper thing for you. Can you eat anything solid?”
Augusta showed two rows of toothless gums. Milk evidently should be her
diet.
“Well, for goodness’ sake keep quiet. I will come back as soon as I
possibly can,” and with this farewell, Miss Prudence descended. Alas!
poor woman, dark as were her forebodings, she little knew what was to be
faced, nor how difficult she would find the execution of her simple and
excellent plan for the temporary concealment of Augusta.