I WATCH AN INFANT
It was all very well for Frieda to tell Mrs. Milliken that, if I had no
objection to that baby, no one else could resent its presence. She
assumes too much. If I had really belonged to the order of vertebrates I
should have objected most strenuously, for its presence is disturbing.
It diverts my attention from literary effort. But of course, since I am
as spineless as a mollusk, I sought to accept this heaven-sent
visitation with due resignation. My endeavor to continue that story was
a most pitiful farce. Four times, in reading over a single page, I found
the word _baby_ inserted where I had meant to write _dog_ or one of the
few available synonyms. I wondered whether it was owing to lack of sleep
that my efforts failed and threw myself upon the bed, but my seeking for
balmy slumber was more ghastly than my attempt at literature. Never in
all my life had I been more arrantly wakeful. A desperate resolve came
to me and I flipped a quarter. Heads and I would sit down and play
solitaire; tails and I would take a boat to Coney Island, a place I
abhor. The coin rolled under the bed, and I was hunting clumsily for it
with a stick when a tremendous knock came at the door, followed by the
immediate entrance of the washerwoman's sister, whom I afterwards knew
as Eulalie Carpaux.
I explained my position, half under the bed, feeling that she had caught
me in an attitude lacking in dignity, but the good creature sympathized
with me and discovered my money at once, after which she insisted on
taking my whiskbroom and vigorously dusting my knees.
"I have come, Monsieur," she informed me, "to ask if your door may be
left open. The heat is terrible and the poor, dear lamb has perspiration
on her forehead. I know that currents of air are dangerous, but
suffocation is worse. What shall I do?"
"You will open as many doors as you please," I answered meekly.
"Thank you. One can see that Monsieur has a good heart, but then any
friend of Mademoiselle Frieda must be a good man. She is adorable and
uses a great deal of linen. May I ask who does Monsieur's washing?"
"A Chinaman," I answered shortly. "He scrubs it with cinders and irons
it with a nutmeg grater. I keep it in this closet on the floor."
"My sister," she informed me, "has four children and washes beautifully.
I am sure that if Monsieur allowed me to take his linen, he would be
greatly pleased."
"Take it," I said, and waved my hand to signify that the interview was
closed, whereupon she mopped her red face, joyfully, with her apron and
withdrew.
Here was a pretty kettle of fish. Immediately the most gorgeous ideas
for my story crowded my brain and the language came to me, beautiful and
touching. But the Murillo-woman's door was open and so was mine. Since
Eulalie had ventured to leave the room, it was most probable that her
charge was sleeping. The typewriter, of course, would awaken her at
once. Was that infant destined to deprive me of a living, to snatch the
bread from my mouth? But I reflected that temperatures of ninety in the
shade were inconstant phenomena. It would be but a temporary annoyance
and the best thing I could do, since I was driven out of house and home,
was to take my hat and go to the beach for a swim. The die was cast and
I moved to the door, but had to return to place a paperweight on loose
sheets littering my desk, whereupon my eyes fell on the old pack of
cards and I threw the hat upon the bed and began solitaire. My plans
often work out in such fashion. Ten minutes later I was electrified by a
cry, a tiny squeak that could hardly have disturbed Herod himself. But
it aroused my curiosity and I tiptoed along the hallway, suspecting that
the woman Eulalie might not be attending properly to her duties,
whatever they were. Everything was still again, and the unjustly
mistrusted party was rocking ponderously, with an amorphous bundle in
her lap. She smiled at me, graciously. Upon the bed I caught a glimpse
of wonderful chestnut hair touched by a thread of sunlight streaming
tenuously from the side of a lowered blind; also, I saw a rounded arm.
Eulalie put a fat finger to rubicund lips and I retired, cautiously.
How in the world could I have been bothering my head about a trumpery
and impossible dog? In that room Nature was making apologetic amends. A
woman had obeyed the law of God and man, which, like all other laws,
falls heaviest on the weak. She was being graciously permitted to forget
past misery and, perchance, dream of happier days to come, while David
Cole, scrub coiner of empty phrases, bemoaned the need of keeping quiet
for a few hours. I decided that I ought to be ashamed of myself. "The
Professor at the Breakfast Table" was at my hand and I took it up, the
volume opening spontaneously at the "Story of Iris," and I lost myself
in its delight.
An hour later came a light step, swiftly, and the little doctor
appeared. He is as tall as I, but looks so very young that he seems
small to me. He entered my room, cheerfully, looking as fresh and nice
as if rosy dreams had filled his night.
"Well! How are things wagging?" he inquired breezily.
He was fanning himself with his neat straw hat, and I asked him to sit
down for a moment.
"Sure! But only for a minute or two. I have a throat clinic to attend at
one o'clock. There's just time for this visit, then a bite at Childs'
and a skip to Bellevue."
I looked at my watch and found he had allowed himself just fifty minutes
for these various occupations.
"Don't let me detain you, my dear boy," I told him. "I--I just wanted to
say that I haven't the least idea whether--whether that young creature
in the other room has a cent to bless herself with. It seems to me--I
think that she should have every care, and I shall be glad if you will
consider me responsible--er--within the limits of a moderate income."
"Thanks," he said, "that's very kind of you."
His eyes strayed on my desk, and he pounced upon a copy of "The City's
Wrath."
"Tell you what," he said, "that's a tip-top book. I borrowed my mother's
copy and read it all night. The fellow who wrote it knows something
about the slender connection between body and soul, in this big city.
He's looked pretty deep into people's lives."
No compliments I ever received, with the exception of Frieda's, gave me
greater pleasure than the appreciation of this honest, strong lad.
"Will you kindly give me your full name?" I asked him.
"Thomas Lawrence Porter," he answered.
I took the volume and wrote it down on the first page, adding kindest
regards and my signature, and handed it to him, whereat he stared at me.
"D'ye mean to say you're the chap who wrote that book," he said, and
wrung my hand, painfully. "I'm proud to meet you. If you don't mind, I'd
like to come in some time and--and chat about things with you, any
evening when you're not busy. You know an awful lot about--about
people."
"My good friend," I told him, "don't permit youthful enthusiasm to run
away with you. But I shall be delighted to have you drop in. And now,
since your time is so limited, you had better go and see your patient."
He tucked his book under his arm and went down the hallway. After
remaining in the room for perhaps a quarter of an hour, he came out
again, cheerfully.
"Doing exceedingly well," he called to me. "By-by; see you again very
soon, I hope."
He vanished down the stairs, and I took up my book again, holding it in
one hand while I went to the windows, intending to draw down a blind
against the sunlight that was streaming in. The heat was entering in
gusts and, for a second, a sparrow sat on my window ledge with head
drooping, as if it were about to succumb. Then I drew down the blinds
and immediately let them up again, reflecting that in the room opposite
mine they were lowered for the sake of darkness and air and that my
action would lessen the latter. So I sponged off my cranium and panted.
It was being revealed to me that babies, whatever their other
qualifications, were exquisitely complicated nuisances.
Yet an Arab, I told myself, refuses to step on a piece of paper, lest
upon it might be written the name of the Deity, while some Hindoos carry
little brooms and sweep the path before them, that they may not tread
upon one of Buddha's creatures. Who knows whether divinity does not
leave its signature on every infant, and who can reasonably doubt that
infinite goodness possesses an equity in prospective men and women.
Shall I be less civil than a sand-washed Bedouin or the monk of a
Benares shrine? It behooves me to welcome a chance to acquire merit by
showing patience.
The book I held was as charming as ever, of course, but since I knew the
story by heart I dropped it on my knees and waged a losing fight against
a fly, which persisted in perching itself on my brow. Before me flitted
the idea that a skull-cap made of sticky fly-paper might be patentable
and sell by the million, combining protection and revenge; I must look
into the matter. Finally hunger troubled me and I decided to go out for
refreshment. Before my neighbor's door I stopped for an instant, my eyes
seeking to penetrate the dimness. Eulalie came to me at once and began
to whisper.
"Would Monsieur be so very kind as to remain here for a few moments and
watch?" she said. "I am going to run over to my sister's and tell her to
buy a chicken and make broth. It will be very good for our poor, dear
lady. In ten minutes I will be back."
Man's freedom of action is apparently a mere academic concept.
Theoretically, I was entirely at liberty to refuse, to look down upon
this woman from the superior height of my alleged intellectuality and
inform her that my soul craved for an immediate glass of iced tea and
some poached eggs on toast. I could have asserted that I did not purpose
to allow myself to be bulldozed by an infant seven hours and ten minutes
old. As a matter of fact, I was helpless and consented, Eulalie shaking
the stairs during her cautious, down-ward progress. It was with some of
the feelings of an apprentice in the art of lion-taming that I entered
the room. Would the proceeding be tranquil and dignified, or accompanied
by roars?
I sat down upon the rocker just vacated by Eulalie and gazed on the
horsehair sofa as if the package resting on it were explosive, with a
fuse alight. I had feared that it would be thrust upon my lap, but it is
likely that my competency had been justifiably suspected. I dared not
move the chair, fearing to make a noise, and could see nothing of the
white arms or the Murillo face. Suddenly, an orgy of steam-whistling
began, rousing my apprehensions while recalling workers to their
factories. It proved but a false alarm and stillness prevailed in the
top-floor back, for at least three minutes, when the dreaded wail
arose.
"Please, Eulalie," came a husky, low voice. "Give me my baby."
It was then that my already damp brow began to stream. She wanted her
baby and wouldn't be happy till she got it. My duty, I realized, was to
go to the sofa and pick up the animated and noisy parcel. It would then
have to be conveyed to the bed! Nervously, I prepared to obey.
"Eulalie has gone out for a few minutes," I explained, in the subdued
tones I deemed suitable to a sickroom. "Here--here is the bundle. I
think it wriggles."
"Thank you ever so much and--and please turn him the other way--yes,
those are the feet. And would you pull up the shade a little bit, I
think I would have more air."
I raised the thing, letting in a flood of light, and feasted my eyes in
utter liberty. Poor child, she must have a cold, for she suffers from
hoarseness. She paid little more heed to me than did the ancient Roman
ladies to the slaves they refused to recognize as men. I realized my
small importance when she tenderly pushed aside the little folds and
revealed diminutive features over which she sighed, contentedly, while I
drew my chair a little nearer to the bed. Since a Murillo was on free
exhibition, I might as well gaze upon it and admire. That faint little
wailing had stopped at once.
"Don't you think he is ever so good and well-behaved?" she asked me,
after a while.
I assented, forbearing to tell her that his existence had not yet been
sufficiently long to prove him entirely free from all taint of original
sin.
"It's such a comfort," she assured me.
Already, by the saintly grace of a mother's heart, she was endowing her
offspring with all the virtues. The wondrous optics of motherhood
revealed beauty, wisdom, good intent, the promise of great things to
come, all concentrated in this tabloid form of man. So mote it be!
The tiny head rested on her outstretched rounded arm and she closed her
eyes once more. The plentiful chestnut hair had been braided tight and
pinned at the top of her head.
"I wish Gordon McGrath could see her," I told myself. "No, Frieda
wouldn't do the picture justice. She would seek to improve on Nature's
handiwork; she would etherealize it, make it so dainty that it would
become poetry instead of the beautiful plain language the universal
mother sometimes speaks. Gordon would paint something that lived and
breathed. He would draw real flesh and blood, recognizing that truth
unadorned is often very splendid."
At this time I bethought myself of the baby's father. The man was over
there, taking his part in the greatest tragedy ever enacted. At this
very moment, perhaps, he was engaged in destroying life and knew nothing
of this little son. I pitied him. Ye Gods! But for the strength and
insolence of some of the mighty ones of this earth he would have been in
this room, and I should have been quietly engaged in consuming poached
eggs. He would have been appeasing the hunger of his eyes and the
longing of his soul with the sight of the picture now before me, in the
solemn happiness that must surely come to a man at such a time. A
feeling of chilliness came over me as I inopportunely remembered an
interview I had some months ago with a fellow called Hawkins. I was in
his office downtown when the telephone rang, and he took down the
receiver.
"A son," he called back. "Good enough! I was afraid it might be another
girl!"
Then he dictated a short letter to his stenographer and calmly picked up
his hat.
"Come along, Cole," he said. "They tell me I have a boy. Let's go out
and have a highball."
Knowing Hawkins as I do, I am certain he would have had the drink
anyway. This new-born offspring of his merely served him as a peg
whereon to hang the responsibility for his tipple. The great and
wonderful news really affected him little.
But why was I thinking of such monsters? The father of this little baby,
I am sure, must be a decent and normal man. He would have come in,
hatless and breathless, and thrown himself upon his knees to worship and
adore. The very first clumsy touch upon the tiny cheek would have sent a
thrill through him, and tears would have welled up in his eyes!
Such were my thoughts when I remembered that, as a delver in fiction, it
was probably becoming my second nature to exaggerate a little. To me,
after all, a recent father was perhaps like the mule whose story had
brought the check. My notions in regard to them were of pure
imagination, and I only knew them as potentially picturesque ingredients
of literary concoctions. Yet, on further reflection, I conceded to
myself the right to imagine newly made fathers as I saw fit. Millions of
them are produced every year and among them must be some counterparts of
my special conception of the type.
I was thus comforting myself when I heard a familiar wheezy breathing on
the stairs. It was Frieda, who presently irrupted into the room.
"David," she commanded, "you go right out and have something to eat. I'm
sure you are starving. I will stay here till that woman comes back. I
left her at the corner, carrying a fowl to her sister's, and she told me
I would find you here."
She deposited voluminous parcels on the sofa, handled the infant with
absolute confidence in her ability, and waved me out of the room. Some
men are born meek and lowly, while others become monarchs and janitors;
my place was to obey, after I had caught the smile suddenly come to the
Murillo-woman's pale features. Frieda, I know, sees more affectionate
grins than any one in Greater New York. Her presence suffices to make
them sprout and grow. Mrs. Dupont had also smiled at me, true enough,
but I think it was but a ray of sunshine really intended for the baby,
and I had found myself in the same general direction and intercepted a
trivial beam of it.
Downstairs, Mrs. Milliken met me with a frown, but her features relaxed
when I handed her my week's rental and board, which I seldom partake of.
Seeing her in such a happy disposition, I hastened to the door.
"I'm going upstairs to take a look at it," she announced gloomily.
I thanked Providence that Frieda was on guard and felt that I had no
cause for worry. The landlady, after all, is undeniably a woman and I
believe she is the erstwhile mother of several. Her asperity must surely
be smoothed down by the sight of the baby's face.
As I put my hand upon the door, the old lady appeared.
"How is that baby?" she shouted, putting a hard-rubber contrivance to
her ear.
"Doing splendidly and endowed with all the virtues," I clamored in the
instrument.
"I'd give him sugared water for it," she responded severely.
I rushed out. Dr. Porter had strictly forbidden the stuff, calling it a
fount of potential colic. I must say that I felt a sneaking sympathy
with the old lady's view. Why refuse a bit of sweetness to a tiny
infant, perhaps destined to taste little of it in afterlife? But,
fortunately, the realization of my ineptitude came uppermost. That
silly, romantic tendency of mine was leading me to think more of future
privations than immediate pains in a diminutive stomach. I wondered
whether I should ever become a practical member of society. The doctor's
orders must and shall be obeyed, or my name is not David Cole!