The day broke gray and dull. The clouds hung
heavily, and there was a rawness in the air that suggested
snow. A woman servant came into a room in which
a child was sleeping and drew the curtains. She
glanced mechanically at the house opposite, a stucco
house with a portico, and went to the child’s
bed.
“Wake up, Philip,” she said.
She pulled down the bed-clothes, took him in her arms,
and carried him downstairs. He was only half
awake.
“Your mother wants you,” she said.
She opened the door of a room on the floor below and
took the child over to a bed in which a woman was
lying. It was his mother. She stretched out
her arms, and the child nestled by her side. He
did not ask why he had been awakened. The woman
kissed his eyes, and with thin, small hands felt the
warm body through his white flannel nightgown.
She pressed him closer to herself.
“Are you sleepy, darling?” she said.
Her voice was so weak that it seemed to come already
from a great distance. The child did not answer,
but smiled comfortably. He was very happy in
the large, warm bed, with those soft arms about him.
He tried to make himself smaller still as he cuddled
up against his mother, and he kissed her sleepily.
In a moment he closed his eyes and was fast asleep.
The doctor came forwards and stood by the bed-side.
“Oh, don’t take him away yet,” she
moaned.
The doctor, without answering, looked at her gravely.
Knowing she would not be allowed to keep the child
much longer, the woman kissed him again; and she passed
her hand down his body till she came to his feet; she
held the right foot in her hand and felt the five
small toes; and then slowly passed her hand over the
left one. She gave a sob.
“What’s the matter?” said the doctor.
“You’re tired.”
She shook her head, unable to speak, and the tears
rolled down her cheeks. The doctor bent down.
“Let me take him.”
She was too weak to resist his wish, and she gave
the child up. The doctor handed him back to his
nurse.
“You’d better put him back in his own
bed.”
“Very well, sir.” The little boy,
still sleeping, was taken away. His mother sobbed
now broken-heartedly.
“What will happen to him, poor child?”
The monthly nurse tried to quiet her, and presently,
from exhaustion, the crying ceased. The doctor
walked to a table on the other side of the room, upon
which, under a towel, lay the body of a still-born
child. He lifted the towel and looked. He
was hidden from the bed by a screen, but the woman
guessed what he was doing.
“Was it a girl or a boy?” she whispered
to the nurse.
“Another boy.”
The woman did not answer. In a moment the child’s
nurse came back. She approached the bed.
“Master Philip never woke up,” she said.
There was a pause. Then the doctor felt his patient’s
pulse once more.
