Irma received it while they were out,
and all the trouble began again.
"I cannot think," said Mrs. Herriton, "what his motive
is in sending them."
Two years before, Philip would have said that the motive
was to give pleasure. Now he, like his mother, tried to
think of something sinister and subtle.
"Do you suppose that he guesses the situation--how
anxious we are to hush the scandal up?"
"That is quite possible. He knows that Irma will worry
us about the baby. Perhaps he hopes that we shall adopt it
to quiet her."
"Hopeful indeed."
"At the same time he has the chance of corrupting the
child's morals." She unlocked a drawer, took out the
post-card, and regarded it gravely. "He entreats her to
send the baby one," was her next remark.
"She might do it too!"
"I told her not to; but we must watch her carefully,
without, of course, appearing to be suspicious."
Philip was getting to enjoy his mother's diplomacy. He
did not think of his own morals and behaviour any more.
"Who's to watch her at school, though? She may bubble
out any moment."
"We can but trust to our influence," said Mrs. Herriton.
Irma did bubble out, that very day. She was proof
against a single post-card, not against two. A new little
brother is a valuable sentimental asset to a school-girl,
and her school was then passing through an acute phase of
baby-worship. Happy the girl who had her quiver full of
them, who kissed them when she left home in the morning, who
had the right to extricate them from mail-carts in the
interval, who dangled them at tea ere they retired to rest!
That one might sing the unwritten song of Miriam, blessed
above all school-girls, who was allowed to hide her baby
brother in a squashy place, where none but herself could
find him!
How could Irma keep silent when pretentious girls spoke
of baby cousins and baby visitors--she who had a baby
brother, who wrote her post-cards through his dear papa?
She had promised not to tell about him--she knew not why--and
she told.
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