Molly. If it isn't yours, whose baby can it be?"
"Miss Jillgall's."
Her puzzled face made this singular reply more funny still. The splashing of water on the other side of the door began again. "What is Miss Jillgall doing now?" I said.
"Washing the baby, miss. A week ago, she came in here, one morning; very pleasant and kind, I must own. She found me putting on the baby's things. She says: 'What a cherub!' which I took as a compliment. She says: 'I shall call again to-morrow.' She called again so early that she found the baby in his crib. 'You be a good soul,' she says, 'and go about your work, and leave the child to me.' I says: 'Yes, miss, but please to wait till I've made him fit to be seen.' She says: 'That's just what I mean to do myself.' I stared; and I think any other person would have done the same in my place. 'If there's one thing more than another I enjoy,' she says, 'it's making myself useful. Mrs. Molly, I've taken a fancy to your boy-baby,' she says, 'and I mean to make myself useful to him.' If you will believe me, Miss Jillgall has only let me have one opportunity of putting my own child tidy. She was late this morning, and I got my chance, and had the boy on my lap, drying him--when in she burst like a blast of wind, and snatched the baby away from me. 'This is your nasty temper,' she says; 'I declare I'm ashamed of you!' And there she is, with the door locked against me, washing the child all over again herself. Twice I've knocked, and asked her to let me in, and can't even get an answer. They do say there's luck in odd numbers; suppose I try again?" Mrs. Molly knocked, and the proverb proved to be true; she got an answer from Miss Jillgall at last: "If you don't be quiet and go away, you shan't have the baby back at all." Who could help it?--I burst out laughing. Miss Jillgall (as I supposed from the tone of her voice) took severe notice of this act of impropriety. "Who's that laughing?" she called out; "give yourself a name." I gave my name. The door was instantly thrown open with a bang. Papa's cousin appeared, in a disheveled state, with splashes of soap and water all over her. She held the child in one arm, and she threw the other arm round my neck. "Dearest Euneece, I have been longing to see you. How do you like Our baby?"
To the curious story of my introduction to Miss Jillgall, I ought perhaps to add that I have got to be friends with her already. I am the friend of anybody who amuses me. What will Helena say when she reads this?
CHAPTER XIX.
EUNICE'S DIARY.
When people are interested in some event that is coming, do they find the dull days, passed in waiting for it, days which they are not able to remember when they look back? This is my unfortunate case. Night after night, I have gone to bed without so much as opening my Journal. There was nothing worth writing about, nothing that I could recollect, until the postman came to-day. I ran downstairs, when I heard his ring at the bell, and stopped Maria on her way to the study. There, among papa's usual handful of letters, was a letter for me.
"DEAR MISS EUNICE:
. . . . . . .
"Yours ever truly."
I quote the passages in Philip's letter which most deeply interested me--I am his dear miss; and he is mine ever truly. The other part of the letter told me that he had been detained in London, and he lamented it. At the end was a delightful announcement that he was coming to me by the afternoon train. I ran upstairs to see how I looked in the glass.
My first feeling was regret. For the thousandth time, I was obliged to acknowledge that I was not as pretty as Helena. But this passed off. A cheering reflection occurred to me. Philip would not have found, in my sister's face, what seems to have interested him in my face. Besides, there is my figure.
The pity of it is that I am so ignorant about some things. If I had been allowed to read novels, I might (judging by what papa said against them in one of his sermons) have felt sure of my own attractions; I might even have understood what Philip really thought of me. However, my mind was quite unexpectedly set at ease on the subject of my figure. The manner in which it happened was so amusing--at least, so amusing to me--that I cannot resist mentioning it.
My sister and I are forbidden to read newspapers, as well as novels. But the teachers at the Girls' Scripture Class are too old to be treated in this way. When the morning lessons were over, one of them was reading the newspaper to the other, in the empty schoolroom; I being in the passage outside, putting on my cloak.
It was a report of "an application made to the magistrates by the lady of his worship the Mayor." Hearing this, I stopped to listen. The lady of his worship (what a funny way of describing a man's wife!) is reported to be a little too fond of notoriety, and to like hearing the sound of her own voice on public occasions. But this is only my writing; I had better get back to the report. "In her address to the magistrates, the Mayoress stated that she had seen a disgusting photograph in the shop window of a stationer, lately established in the town. She desired to bring this person within reach of the law, and to have all his copies of the shameless photograph destroyed. The usher of the court was thereupon sent to purchase the photograph."--On second thoughts, I prefer going back to my own writing again; it is so uninteresting to copy other people's writing. Two of the magistrates were doing justice. They looked at the photograph--and what did it represent? The famous statue called the Venus de' Medici! One of the magistrates took this discovery indignantly. He was shocked at the gross ignorance which could call the classic ideal of beauty and grace a disgusting work. The other one made polite allowances. He thought the lady was much to be pitied; she was evidently the innocent victim of a neglected education. Mrs. Mayor left the court in a rage, telling the justices she knew where to get law. "I shall expose Venus," she said, "to the Lord Chancellor."
When the Scripture Class had broken up for the day, duty ought to have taken me home. Curiosity led me astray--I mean, led me to the stationer's window.
There I found our two teachers, absorbed in the photograph; having got to the shop first by a short cut. They seemed to think I had taken a liberty whom I joined them. "We are here," they were careful to explain, "to get a lesson in the ideal of beauty and grace." There was quite a little crowd of townsfolk collected before the window. Some of them giggled; and some of them wondered whether it was taken from the life. For my own part, gratitude to Venus obliges me to own that she effected a great improvement in the state of my mind. She encouraged me. If that stumpy little creature--with no waist, and oh, such uncertain legs!--represented the ideal of beauty and grace, I had reason indeed to be satisfied with my own figure, and to think it quite possible that my sweetheart's favorable opinion of me was not ill-bestowed.