"Bobby could walk part of the time. Kensington is fortunately flat.
Miss Harding, I--I am very grateful. It's most awfully good of you to
worry about such perfect strangers. If you _will_ relieve my wife for a
few days, I shall be most awfully grateful!"
So it was arranged. I danced a jig of joy when I went back to my room,
and caught sight of my elderly reflection doing it in the glass, and
laughed till I cried. My work had begun. The thin end of the wedge had
wormed its way in. Now to push forward.
Mrs Manners has another malady besides her cough. It's an obscure
disease, but I have diagnosed it as "chronic inflammation of the
conscience". For four long years she has been kept incessantly at work,
looking after house and children, and has been unable to have one
undisturbed hour, either by day or by night. Now, when she gets the
chance, her conscience is horrified at the prospect. The first time I
took the children for their afternoon walk I found, on my return, that
she had used the time to turn out a cupboard, and looked more tired than
ever. The next day I sent the maid downstairs to settle the children in
the perambulator, when I produced a hot-water bottle from under my coat,
and had a heart to heart talk with her there and then.
"Mrs Manners, I am going to take you into your bedroom, tuck you up
under the quilt, give you this hot-water bottle to cuddle, pull down the
blinds, and leave you to rest there till we come in."
She positively shook with horror.
"Oh, Miss Harding, I _can't_. It is quite impossible! All that time?
If you knew all I have to do. There is another cupboard--"
"Mrs Manners, if you think I am taking charge of the children out of
consideration for your cupboards, you are mistaken. I am doing it so
that you may rest. A bargain is a bargain, and you are not playing
fair. Now, are you coming, or are you not?"
She came, not daring to refuse, but protesting all the way.
"Well, if I must--For a little time. For half an hour. I couldn't
_possibly_ rest more than half an hour."
"You've got to try. If I'm on duty for two hours, so are you. Don't
dare to move from this bed till I give you leave."
It was pathetic to see her thin little face peering at me over the edge
of the eider-down, quite dazed, if you please, at the idea of a two
hours' rest! I felt as happy as a grig as I ran downstairs; happier
still when we re-entered the flat two hours later, and not a sound came
from behind that closed door. I undressed the children, and the maid
tiptoed in with their tea with the air of a conspirator in a dark and
stealthy plot.
"Not a sound out of her since you left! Poor thing! First chance of a
bit of peace and quietness she's had for many a long day."
"Well, Mary, you and I are going to give her plenty more!" I said
graciously, and Mary made me a slice of buttered toast on the spot to
seal the partnership.
Tea was over when the door opened, and a sleepy, flushed face peeped
round the door to look at the clock. When she saw the hands pointing to
five, she looked as guilty as if she had robbed the bank.
Oh, it's a glorious thing to be able to help other people! It gives one
a warm, glowey feeling about the heart which comes in no other way.
These last days I have just lived for the moment when I could tuck that
poor little woman in her cosy bed, and the other moment when I saw her
rested, freshened face on rising. Even at the end of one week she
looked a different creature, and felt it too.
"Actually, dear Miss Harding, I begin to feel as if I--I should like a
new hat!" she said to me one day over tea. "Do you know the feeling? I
think it is the best sign of convalescence a woman could have. For
months, almost for years, I have not cared what I wore. Something to
cover my head--that was all that was needed. To be always tired--
deadly, hopelessly tired--takes the spirit out of one."
"No one should go on being too tired. It's very wrong to allow it."
She looked at me; a long look, affectionate, grateful, reproachfully
amused.
"My dear, you live alone, and you have two maids. Evidently--excuse
me--you have a comfortable income. My husband's business has been
steadily falling off for the last two years. It is not his fault; he
works like a horse; no man could have done more, but circumstances have
been against him. We keep one maid, who washes, bakes, and cooks, while
I tend the babies, make their clothes and my own, knit, and mend, and
patch, and darn, take the children out, bathe them, put them to bed,
attend to them through the night, do the housekeeping by day, and
struggle over the bills when they are in bed. Bobby is three years and
a half old, and has had bronchitis and measles. Baby is eleven months,
and cuts her teeth with croup. Between them came the little one who
died. And then you sit there and tell me I ought not to be tired!"
"I beg your pardon. I'm sorry. I spoke without thinking. You are
quite right--I know nothing about it. People who preach to others very
often don't. Forgive me!"
"Don't be so penitent! It is really almost a relief to meet a woman who
_doesn't_ understand. All my friends are in pretty much the same case
as myself, and they haven't got"--she stretched out her hand and timidly
patted my arm--"my kind neighbour to help. Miss Harding, I think you
must have been a fascinating girl!"
"Oh, I was!" I said warmly, and then made haste to change the
conversation. "What about that hat? I'm quite a good amateur milliner.
Look out your oddments and let me see what I can do."