"Look here," he said, "I'll tell you what you'll do. You come down these steps with me, there aren't but three of them, you see, and we'll just step in here a moment. I don't know what house it is, but I guess it'll be all right. Oh, yes, you can take him out; he is safe, you know. Come on, youngsters."
Before Delia could protest he had pressed the button, and a man in livery was opening the door.
"We've just escaped a nasty accident out here," said the little doctor easily. "You were probably looking out of the window? Yes. Well, this young woman is a sort of a patient of mine—Dr. Gibbs, West Forty-ninth Street—and though she's very plucky and perfectly uninjured, I want her to rest a moment in the hall here and have a drink of water, if your mistress doesn't object. Just take up this card and explain the circumstances, and"—his hand went into his pocket a moment—"that's about all. Sit down, my dear."
The man took in at a glance the neat uniform of the nurse, the General's smart, if diminutive, apparel, and the unmistakable though somewhat ruffled exterior of Miss Honey.
"Very well, sir," he said politely, taking the card. "It will be all right, sir, I'm sure. Thank you, sir. Sit down, please. It will be all right. I will tell Madame Nicola."
"Well, well, so this is Madame Nicola's!" The little doctor looked around him appreciatively, as the servant ran up the stairs.
"I wish I could stay with you, chickens, but I'm late for an appointment as it is. I must rush along. Now, mind you, stay here half an hour, Delia, and sit down. You're no trouble at all, and Madame Nicola knows who I am—if she remembers. I sprayed her throat once, if I'm not mistaken—she was on a tour, at Pittsburg. She'll take care of you." He opened the door. "You're a good girl, you biggest one," he added, nodding at Caroline. "You do as you're told. Good-by."
The door shut, and Caroline, Miss Honey and Delia looked at each other in a daze. Tears filled Delia's eyes, but she controlled her voice, and only said huskily, "Come here, Miss Honey, and let me brush you off—you look dreadful. Let me take your handkerchief. Did it—were you—are you hurt, dear?"
"No, but you pushed me awful hard, Delia, and a nasty big man grabbed me and tore my guimpe—see! I wish you'd told me what you were going to do," began Miss Honey irritably.
"And you gave me a big kick—it was me he grabbed—look at my cheek!" Caroline's lips began to twitch; she felt hideously tired, suddenly.
"Children, children, don't quarrel. General, darling, won't you sit still, please? You hurt Delia's knees, and you feel so heavy. Oh, I wish we were all home!"
The man in livery came down the stairs. "Will you step up, Madame says, and she has something for you up there. I'll take the baby," as Delia's eyes measured the climb. "Lord, I won't drop her—I've got two o' my own. 'Bout a year, isn't she?"
"He's a boy," panted Delia, as she rested her weight on the rail, "and he's only eight months last week," with a proud smile at the General's massive proportions.
"Well, he is a buster, isn't he? Here is the nurse, Madame, and the children. The doctor has gone."
Caroline stretched her eyes wide and abandoned herself to a frank inspection of her surroundings. For this she must be pardoned, as every square inch of the dark, deep-colored room had been taken bodily from Italian palaces of the most unimpeachable Renaissance variety. With quick intuition, she immediately recognized a background for many a tale of courts and kings hitherto unpictured to herself, and smiled with pleasure at the Princess who advanced, most royally clad in long shell pink, lace-clouded draperies, to meet them.
"You are the brave nurse my maid told me about," said the Princess; "she saw it all. You ought to be very proud of your quick wits. I have some sherry for you, and you must lie down a little and then I will send you home."
Delia blushed and sank into a high carved chair, the General staring curiously about him. "It wasn't anything at all," she said, awkwardly, "if I could have a drink—"
Caroline checked the Princess as she moved toward a wonderful colored decanter with wee sparkling tumblers like curved bits of rainbow grouped about it.
"She means a drink of water," she explained politely. "She only drinks water—sometimes a little tea, but most usu'lly water."
"The sherry will do her more good, I think," the Princess returned, noticing Caroline for the first time, apparently, her hand on the decanter.
At this point Miss Honey descended from a throne of faded wine-colored velvet, and addressed the Princess with her most impressive and explanatory manner.
"It won't do you any good at all to pour that out," she began, with her curious little air of delivering a set address, prepared in private some time before, "and I'll tell you why. Delia knew a nurse once that drank some beer, and the baby got burned, and she never would drink anything if you gave her a million dollars. Besides, it makes her sick."
The Princess looked amused and turned to a maid who appeared at that moment with apron strings rivalling Caroline's.
"Get me a glass of water, please," she said, "and what may I give you—milk, perhaps? I don't know very well what children drink."
"Thank you, we'd like some water, too," Miss Honey returned primly, "we had some soda-water, strawberry, once to-day."
Caroline cocked her head to one side and tried to remember what the lady's voice made her think of; she scowled in vain while Delia drank her water and smiled her thanks at the maid. Suddenly it came to her. It was not like a person talking at all, it was like a person singing. Up and down her voice traveled, loud and soft; it was quite pleasant to hear it.
"Do you feel better now? I am very glad. Bring in that reclining chair, Ellis, from my room; these great seats are rather stiff," said the Princess, and Delia, protesting, was made comfortable in a large curved lounging basket, with the General, contentedly putting his clothespin through its paces, in her arm.
"How old is it?" the Princess inquired, after an interval of silence, during which Miss Honey and Caroline regarded her with a placid interest, and Delia stroked the General's hair, from which she had taken the absurd lace cap.
"He's eight months, Madam, last week—eight months and ten days, really."
"That's not very old, now, is it?" pursued the lady. "I suppose they don't know very much, do they, so young?"
"Indeed he does, though," Delia protested, "You'll be surprised. Just watch him, now. Look at Delia, darlin'; where's Delia?"
The General withdrew his lingering gaze from the clothespin, and turned his blue eyes wonderingly up to her. The corner of his mouth trembled, widened, his eyelids crinkled, and then he smiled delightfully, straight into the eyes of the nurse, stretched up a wavering pink hand, and patted her cheek. A soft, gurgling monosyllable, difficult of classification but easy to interpret, escaped him.
The Princess smiled appreciatively, and moved with a stately, long step toward them.
"That was very pretty," she said, but Delia did not hear her.
"My baby, my own baby!" she murmured with a shiver, and hiding her face in the General's neck she sobbed aloud.
Miss Honey, shocked and embarrassed, twisted her feet nervously and looked at the inlaid floor. Caroline shared these feelings, but though she turned red, she spoke sturdily.
"I guess Delia feels bad," she suggested shyly, "when she thinks about—about what happened, you know. She don't cry usu'lly."
The Princess smiled again, this time directly at Caroline, who fairly blinked in the radiance. With her long brown eyes still holding Caroline's round ones, she patted Delia's shoulder kindly, and both the children saw her chin tremble.
The General, smothered in that sudden hug, whimpered a little and kicked out wildly with his fat white-stockinged legs. Seen from the rear he had the appearance of a neat, if excited,