WARCHESTER,
St. Andrew's Parish House,
August 12th.
Yesterday it rained. And then the telephone rang, and some incoherent
person mumbled an address out in the furthest suburb. It was North
Baxter Court. You never saw that--a row of yellow houses with the
door-sills level to the mud and ashes of the alley, and swarms of
children who stare and whisper, "Here's the 'Father.'" Number 7 1/2
was marked with a membraneous croup sign--the usual lie to avoid strict
quarantine and still get anti-toxin at the free dispensary; the room
was unspeakable--shut windows and a crowd of people. A woman, young,
sat rocking back and forth, half smothering a baby in her arms. Nobody
spoke. It took time to get the windows open and persuade the woman to
lay the child on the bed in the corner. There wasn't anything else to
use, so I fanned the baby with my straw hat--until, finally, it got
away from North Baxter Court forever. Which was as it should be. Then
tumult. Probably you are not in a position to know that few spectacles
are more hideous than the unrestrained grief of the poor. The things
they said and did--it was unhuman, indecent. I can't describe it. As
I was leaving, after a pretty bad half hour, I met the doctor at the
door--one of these half-drunken quacks who live on the ignorant. That
child died of diphtheria. I knew it, and he admitted it. The funeral
was this breathless morning, with details that may not be written down.