Leonie of the Jungle | Page 4

of cats on his blotting-paper.
CHAPTER III
"Against stupidity the very gods Themselves contend in
vain!"--Schiller.
"Let me see," he said slowly. "You have been in India I believe. I
wonder if you know anything about it!"
"I lived ten years in the Punjab." This information was given with the
intense self-satisfaction peculiar to the feminine Anglo-Indian. "With
my husband," was added after a rather damping silence, "who was
knighted for certain--er--work he did in the Indian Civil Service."
"That doesn't mean that you know anything about the country, Mam.
Leonie has been with you almost seven years, please correct me if I
make any mistake. She is seven this month you say. She was four
months old when she came over from India. Did her ayah come with
her, by the way? No! Had she been good to the baby--yes! yes! I know,
they always are, but these dreams indicate that the child has been badly
frightened some time or another!"
"But she _couldn't_ be frightened at four months," vacantly interrupted
Susan Hetth, who could not see the trend of the conversation, or the
need of the detailed interrogation. "She would be far too young!"
"Too young!" snapped Sir Jonathan. "Rubbish! Do you know why you
are afraid to-day of falling from a height?"

"No," replied Susan Hetth, cordially loathing the man, his methods, and
his manners.
"Because," he answered roughly, "you were frightened of falling from
your mother's or your nurse's arms when you were a few months old,
and the impression of height and fear made upon your baby mind is
still with you, _that's_ why!"
"The brute!" she thought, as she smiled the propitiatory smile of one
who is afraid and murmured, "How very interesting!"
"Is there anything else you can tell me about your little niece? no
matter how trivial a detail! Has she ever screamed for hours as she
screamed this morning? Does she get angry? I mean mad angry!"
"No!" replied the aunt. "From what her nurse and daily governess tell
me she seems to be remarkably sweet-tempered. You see I don't--I
haven't--I don't see much of her. I'm--I've--you see I have so many
friends over here!"
The man snorted.
"I must say," she continued, "I have never met a child so averse from
being kissed or being made a fuss of--she hates anyone to touch her,
even--even me, her mother, as you might say; but they say she is
tractable, and has never been known to lose her temper, or slap, or
scratch, as some children do--no! there is really nothing to tell about
her--of course she walks a bit in her sleep, at least so her Nannie says!"
The specialist's hand crashed on the table. "Good God, woman!" he
flung at her, "what in heaven's name are you modern women made of?
How long has she been walking in her sleep? Tell me all you know _at
once_--and remember it's your niece's brain and her future you are
talking about, so try and describe this sleep-walking with as much
interest and regard to detail as you would if you were talking about a
new dress. Why in heaven's name didn't you send her with the
nurse--the _servant_--instead of coming yourself--I might have learnt
something about the child then!"

It seemed that Leonie while still quite a baby had walked about the
night nursery in her sleep; that she had been found in the day nursery
and on the lower landing, but had always gone back to bed without
waking; that she muttered a lot of rubbish which the nurse could not
understand, and was always very tired next day. That now that she was
older she slept in a room by herself as she became unaccountably
restless and wide awake if anyone slept in the room with her. No! the
nurse had never noticed the hour or the date, or anything, and that was
really all, and "couldn't you give the child a dose of bromide."
Which sentence served to finish the history and to bring Sir Jonathan
with a bound from his chair.
"Bromide," he snarled, "bromide! Now, Lady Hetth, listen to me. There
is something more than nerves and a highly strung temperament in this.
Next week I want Nannie, not you, to bring the child here on a visit. I
know India and her religions as far as any Englishman dare say he
knows anything about that unfathomable country--yes! Mam!
religions--Hinduism--Brahminism--Buddhism--why, I've passed the
best part of my life trying to unravel certain physical and psychical
threads knotted up in India; but the years are slipping by, and time is
getting shorter and shorter, and but a tithe done out of all there is to do;
but thanks be, my boy has inherited my love for this work, and will