Page:Heavens!.djvu/34

 be back in a jiffy. Don’t jerk it about too much; that is not good for it.”

While she spoke, she thrust the white bundle into his arms, and ran to the kitchen. Friend Cvok, nearly out of his mind, walked to the window with the baby, and did all Miss Naninka had told him; but still the baby cried—cried worse than ever: The poor priest tried all he could to pacify it, till he was bathed in perspiration himself from his exertions. While all this crying went on, he was not able to bring the swarm of thoughts that crowded his bewildered brain into anything like order. At last the baby got somewhat quieter, and the thoughts of Cvok began to return home.

“Heavens!” he exclaimed to himself, “this is a nice piece of work for me! If anybody could make a picture of me nursing a baby, what a sight it would be!”

Any further cogitations were interrupted for this time by Naninka coming back into the parlour. In her right hand she held a candle, in the left a little pan of milk, and in her toothless mouth a teaspoon. How she ever managed to open or shut the door is a mystery. She put the things she brought upon the table, threw down some books from the first chair she could find, looked for a footstool somewhere in a corner, and, having thus prepared a comfortable seat for herself, she took the baby silently from the priest’s arms, and sat down with it at the table to feed it. Cvok planted himself beside her, with his hat on his head, which he had not remembered yet to take off, and with folded arms looked on curiously at all these famous preparations and doings.

The baby was hungry, and took the milk quite well from the spoon, without any spluttering.

“This must be some ravenous boy,” Naninka began.