Page:The Gesture No 13 1911.djvu/4

 parents trying to soothe her and quieten her terrors. She could not even know that they were still with her. The everlasting darkness must have crushed her; the heavy, fearful silence have terrified her. The loneliness must have been unutterably dreadful. No adult could live through such an experience: madness or death would end it. Blackness-silence; and the only communication with life, the touch of ghostly hands.

Of her life till she came to Darlington l know nothing. But it must have been terrible indeed, despite all that affection could do. But at last she arrived at Darlington, and found that the hands in the darkness were different to the others she had known before.

In her arms was placed a little doll, and the hand that placed it there took her Own hand and made a sign on the fingers. It was the word "doll" in the finger language. To the little girl it meant nothing. Then the doll was taken away, only to be given back to her with the same sign. She felt it all over lovingly, and then something seemed to occur to her. She passed her hand over her own body, and smiled sadly. The doll was like herself.

Whenever the doll was placed in her arms the same Sign was made on her fingers by the ghostly hands. One day she groped, and, finding the mysterious hand, repeated the signs it had made to her on its fingers. The doll was immediately placed in her arms.

It was the first step in communication. The little scarred brain was stirred. That sign would always bring the doll. One day the hand in the dark passed her fingers over the nose of the doll, and then over her own nose, and gave another and different sign—n-o-s-e. She understood, and, feeling for her teacher's face, touched her nose and spelt it. Hair, mouth, ears, head, all followed in their turn; and slowly, very slowly indeed, little Alice learned the geography of her own head and face, and finally her body.

The brain that had been so sorely smitten became active once more. The little soul that longed for expression and company fastened on to these wonderful signs with eager avidity. She became frantic to learn more and more. But, in spite of all her eagerness, it was long, long, weary work for the teacher, and slow, slow travelling for the little girl. The gulf was so great, the messages so weak. She was given beads to thread, and the word "beads" spelt to her. When she spelt "beads" she got them.

But it must be remembered she was only a baby, although an unusually bright one. And every one of those words was an arbitrary sign which she had to remember, for she had no idea of the alphabet.

That was to come later, and would represent the completed bridge across the great gulf that lay between her and the inhabited world she had no idea of. Gradually she began to understand that she could make more signs than she had fingers, wrists and palms, and the fact appeared to puzzle her. Baffled nature, seeking always an outlet for expression, told her instinctively that there was some system in it all, and impelled her to search for it. She had used a key to unlock a little box, turned a handle to open a way through a wall—but she could not find the key her little soul was so hungry for, though every day, when she awoke from sleep and before she went to bed, her teacher taught her the alphabet on her fingers.

Very gradually it came home to her that all these signals which would bring her a doll, beads, food, a drink, an apple, and all the things she knew (remember, she only knew of the things she had touched), were all combinations of these signs that the mysterious and wonderfully wise hands taught her every time she awoke and went to bed. But it was the decisive discovery. After that it was merely a matter of application and time. She learned that doll and dog both commenced with the same signs, that the top of anything and the pot that held the flowers were the same signals or signs given in the opposite order. So she learned the alphabet and its wonderful use.

Then another and more wonderful thing (if possible) was revealed to her. The same omniscient hands gave her a piece of soft, smooth surfaced material, covered with a number of little raised dots. The first was a single dot, and the omniscient hands made the ﬁrst sign (A). Two dots, one above the other (B), were the second