United States or Lesotho ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
She established herself in the low chair by the fire downstairs. He played with Dossie as he watched her. And all the time, through all the play, his obscure instinct told him that she ought not to be there. It suggested that if he desired to preserve the integrity of the document, Winny and he must not be known to be alone in the house together. But it was a question of petticoats.
And as he captured Stanny by a miracle of dexterity, just in time, he realized, as if it had been some new and remarkable discovery, that his little son was dear to him. By slow stages, after many adventures and delays, they reached the managerie on the south side. "Oh, Daddy, Daddy, look at that funny bird!" Dossie tugged and shouted.
It was with him as he lay awake on his bed, shut in by the two cots; it, and the fear of forgetting to feed Baby, got into his dreams and troubled them; they watched by him in his sleep; they woke him early and were with him when he woke. Dossie woke too. He took her into his bed and played with her, and in playing he forgot his grief. A little before seven he got up and dressed.
They stood together for a moment, looking at the two children, at Dossie, all curled up and burrowing into her pillow, and at Baby, lying by Ranny's bed as a nursling lies by its mother. They were silent as the same thought tore at them.
"If it hadna been for the lid o' the water-barrel gien wey yon nicht, you michta been skelpin' Dossie's bairns the day an' your ain too." We a' took a hearty lauch at Ribekka's ootburst. "Eh, that was a pliskie," said Mistress Kenawee. "Dossie got a gey drookin' that nicht.
He signed to his son to sit near him. "How old are those children?" he said. "Dossie was five in March, and Stanny was three in April." "And they've been how long without their mother?" "It'll be three years next October." "Why don't you get rid of that woman?" said Mr. Ransome.
The child, perceiving pity somewhere and awed into submission, did her best, but her kiss barely brushed the sallow, waxen face. And as he felt her there Mr. Ransome opened his eyes suddenly and looked at her again, and Dossie, terrified, turned away and burst out crying. "She's shy. She's a silly little girl," said Ranny, as he led her away.
When he had washed up the breakfast things and the things that were left over from last night, he went upstairs and made his bed, clumsily. Then he went down again and tidied the sitting-room. In all this he was driven by his determination to leave nothing for Winny to do for him when she came. He went to and fro, with Dossie toddling after him and laughing. Upstairs, Baby laughed in his cot.
He lifted him and Dossie in and out of the trains as if they had been parcels labeled "Fragile, with Care." But he did it like a porter, a sulky porter who was tired of lifting things; and they might really have been somebody else's glass and china for all he seemed to care. Ranny was angry. He was angry with the little things for being there.
Word Of The Day