The Coming of Bill · Book II · Chapter 2 3 (2/2)

It was so obvious to Mrs. Porter and her companion, both from the evidence of their guilty consciences and the look of respectful reproach on Mamie’s face, that the sound of their voices had disturbed the child, that they were routed from the start.

“Oh, dear me! He is awake,” said the lady doctor.

“I am afraid we did not lower our voices,” added Mrs. Porter. “And yet William is usually such a sound sleeper. Perhaps we had better⁠—”

“Just so,” said the doctor.

“⁠—go downstairs while the nurse gets him off to sleep again.”

“Quite.”

The door closed behind them.

“Oh, Steve!” said Mamie.

The White Hope had gone to sleep again with the amazing speed of childhood, and Mamie was looking pityingly at the bedraggled object which had emerged cautiously from behind the waterproof.

“I got mine,” muttered Steve ruefully. “You ain’t got a towel anywhere, have you, Mame?”

Mamie produced a towel and watched him apologetically as he attempted to dry himself.

“I’m so sorry, Steve.”

“Cut it out. It was my fault. I oughtn’t to have been there. Say, it was a bit of luck the kid waking just then.”

“Yes,” said Mamie.

Observe the tricks that conscience plays us. If Mamie had told Steve what had caused William to wake he would certainly have been so charmed by her presence of mind, exerted on his behalf to save him from the warm fate which Mrs. Porter’s unconscious hand had been about to bring down upon him, that he would have forgotten his diffidence then and there and, as the poet has it, have eased his bosom of much perilous stuff.

But conscience would not allow Mamie to reveal the secret. Already she was suffering the pangs of remorse for having, in however good a cause, broken her idol’s rest with a push that might have given the poor lamb a headache. She could not confess the crime even to Steve.

And if Steve had had the pluck to tell Mamie that he loved her, as he stood before her dripping with the water which he had suffered in silence rather than betray her, she would have fallen into his arms. For Steve at that moment had all the glamour for her of the self-sacrificing hero of a moving-picture film. He had not actually risked death for her, perhaps, but he had taken a sudden cold shower-bath without a murmur⁠—all for her.

Mamie was thrilled. She looked at him with the gleaming eyes of devotion.

But Steve, just because he knew that he was wet and fancied that he must look ridiculous, held his peace.

And presently, his secret still locked in his bosom, and his collar sticking limply to his neck, he crept downstairs, avoiding the society of his fellow man, and slunk out into the night where, if there was no Mamie, there were, at any rate, dry clothes.