He looked at me so intently and so feelingly while I snuggled the pink ball up to me and kissed it, that it was rather disconcerting. To change the subject, I went straight to the point.
"Tom," I said, "I want to ask you about baby"s name."
"Oh, call it anything you like," he answered.
"But you ought to name her," I told him.
He was silent a moment; then he turned and walked away to the window again. I thought that he might be considering the name, but when he came back abruptly he said:--
"Ruth, I can"t pretend with you. I haven"t any love for that child. I wish it weren"t here to remind me of what I would give anything to have forgotten. If I have any feeling for it, it is pity that the poor little wretch had to be chucked into the world, and shame that I should have any responsibility about it."
I told him he would come to love her some time; that she was after all his daughter, and so sweet he couldn"t help being fond of her.
"If I ever endure her," he said, almost doggedly, "it will be on your account."
"Nonsense, Tom," I retorted, as briskly as I could when I wanted to cry, "you"ll be fond of her because you can"t help it. See, she has your eyes, and her hair is going to be like yours."
He laughed with a trace of his old buoyant spirit.
"What idiocy!" was his reply. "Her eyes are any color you like, and she has only about six hairs on her head anyway."
I denied this indignantly, partly because it was not true, and partly, I am afraid, with feminine guile, to divert him. We fell for a moment almost into the oldtime boy-and-girl tone of long ago, and only baby in my arms reminded us of what had come between.
"Well," I said at last, "it is evident that you are not worthy to give this nice little, dear little, superfine little girl a name; so I shall do it myself. I shall call her Thomasine."
"What an outlandish name!"
"It is your own, so you needn"t abuse it. Do you agree?"
"I don"t see how I can help myself, for you can call her anything you like."
"Of course I shall," I told him; "but I thought you should be consulted."
He shrugged his shoulders with a laugh.
"Having made up your mind," he said, "you ask my advice."
"I shouldn"t think of consulting you till I had made up my mind," was my retort. "Now I want you to give her her name."
"Give it to her how?"
"Her name is to be Thomasine," I repeated.
"It is an absurd name," Tom commented.
"That"s as it may be," was all I would answer, "but that"s what she"s to be called. You"re to kiss her, and"--
He looked at me with a sudden flush. He had never, I am sure, so much as touched his child with the tip of his finger, much less caressed her.
The proposition took him completely by surprise, and evidently disconcerted him. I did not give him time to consider. I made my tone and manner as light as I could, and hurried on.
"You are to kiss her and say, "I name you Thomasine." I suppose that really you ought to say "thee," but that seems rather theatrical for us plain folk."
He hesitated a second, and then he bent over baby in my arms.
"I name you Thomasine," he said, and just brushed her forehead with his lips. Then he looked at me solemnly. "You will keep her?" he said.
"Yes," I promised.
So baby is named, and Tom must have felt that she belongs really to him, however he may shrink from her.
May 3. I have had a dreadful call from Mrs. Webbe. She came over in the middle of the forenoon, and the moment I saw her determined expression I felt sure something painful was to happen.
"Good-morning," she said abruptly; "I have come after my son"s infant."
"What?" I responded, my wits scattering like chickens before a hawk.
"I have come after my son"s infant," she repeated. "We are obliged to you for taking care of it; but I won"t trouble you with it any longer."
I told her I was to keep baby always. She looked at me with tightening lips.
"I don"t want to have disagreeable words with you, Ruth," she said, "but you must know we could never allow such a thing."
I asked her why.
"You must know," she said, "you are not fit to be trusted with an immortal soul."
I fear that I unmeaningly let the shadow of a smile show as I said,--
"But baby is so young"--
"This is no laughing matter," she interrupted with asperity, "even if the child is young. I must do my duty to her from the very beginning. Of course it will be a cross for me, but I hope I shall bear it like a Christian."
Something in her voice and manner exasperated me almost beyond endurance. I could not help remembering the day Mrs. Webbe came to the Brownrig house, and I am much afraid I was anything but conciliatory in my tone when I answered.
"Mrs. Webbe," I said to her, "if you cared for baby, and wanted to love her, I might perhaps think of giving her up, though I am very fond of her, dear little thing."
Mrs. Webbe"s keen black eyes snapped at me.
"I dare say you look at it in that way," she retorted. "That"s just it.
It"s just the sort of worldliness that would ruin the child. It"s come into the world with sin and shame enough to bear, and you"d never help it to grace to bear it."
The words were not entirely clear, yet I had little doubt of their meaning. The baby, however, was after all her own flesh and blood, and I was secretly glad that to strengthen me in my resolve to keep Thomasine I had my promise to the dead mother and to Tom.
"But, Mrs. Webbe," I said as gently as I could, "don"t you think the fact that baby has no mother, and must bear that, will make her need love more?"
"She"ll need bracing up," was the emphatic rejoinder, "and that"s just what she won"t get here. I don"t want her. It"s a cross for me to look at her, and realize we"ve got to own a brat with Brownrig blood in her.
I"m only trying to do my duty. Where"s that baby going to get any religious training from you, Ruth Privet?"