Page:The White Peacock, Lawrence, 1911.djvu/454

446 The mother’s dark eyes, and the baby’s large, hazel eyes looked at me serenely. The two were very calm, very complete and triumphant together. In their completeness was a security which made me feel alone and ineffectual. A woman who has her child in her arms is a tower of strength, a beautiful, unassailable tower of strength that may in its turn stand quietly dealing death.

I told Meg I would call again to see George. Two evenings later I asked Lettie to lend me a dog-cart to drive over to the “Hollies.” Leslie was away on one of his political jaunts, and she was restless. She proposed to go with me. She had called on Meg twice before in the new large home.

We started about six o’clock. The night was dark and muddy. Lettie wanted to call in Eberwich village, so she drove the long way round Selsby. The horse was walking through the gate of the “Hollies” at about seven o’clock. Meg was upstairs in the nursery, the maid told me, and George was in the dining-room getting baby to sleep.

“All right!” I said, “we will go in to him. Don’t bother to tell him.”

As we stood in the gloomy, square hall we heard the rumble of a rocking-chair, the stroke coming slow and heavy to the tune of “Henry Martin,” one of our Strelley Mill folk songs. Then, through the man’s heavily-accented singing floated the long, light crooning of the baby as she sang, in her quaint little fashion, a mischievous second to her father’s lullaby. He waxed a little louder; and without knowing why, we found ourselves smiling with piquant amusement. The baby grew louder too, till there was a shrill ring