A Place Called Bliss by Ruth Glover Page B

teethin’ when I see it!”
    Sophia picked up the dark bottle the doctor had left and read from its enscrolled label: “Useful and a sure cure for any form of diarrhea, cholera morbus, cholera infantum, sour stomach, etc.”
    Sophia blanched. The diagnosis was worse than she had thought. “This sounds worse by far than teething.”
    “Well, if it is, we’re prepared,” Kezzie said grimly, pointing to more bottles on the table beside her, which she had obviously set aside.
    Picking one up, Sophia read, “‘Cures toothache, faceache, neuralgia.’ It seems,” she said faintly, “that we are prepared for anything. Surely something will work.”
    The door opened, and Tessie slipped in with a pan of milky looking water in which a cloth soaked. She raised big eyes to Mrs. Hugh and Kezzie.
    “What’s all this about, Tessie?” Sophia asked.
    “It’s a disinfectant, Mum. Doctor’s orders. We’re to use it on everything. It will purify the air, remove all f . . . f . . . foul odors, and destroy pests of all kinds.”
    “Heavens, let me see the container, Tessie.”
    Tessie set the pan down and withdrew a pint can from the pocket of her voluminous apron.
    Squinting, Sophia read, “‘Can be used to disinfect drains, sinks, gullies, urinals, water closets, farmyards and buildings, chicken pens, rabbit hutches, birdcages, cattle trucks, slaughter-houses, ash barrels, garbage cans—’” As she read, Sophia’s voice rose in pitch until it finally trailed off on a squeak.
    “And,” Tessie added with relish, obviously having read the instructions before readying the mixture, “it destroys fleas on dogs and other animals, lice on chickens, cures mange, and protects from the torment of flies, mosquitoes, gnats, and . . .” Tessie’s memory faltered.
    “This concoction,” Sophia said, astonished, “would make a million dollars, I should think, if the inventor took it to the Territories. Mary and Angus write of the terrible mosquitoes there . . . worse than here, if such a thing could be.”
    “So thick,” Kezzie said, nodding, “that a bay horse looks yellow all covered with them, Mary says.”
    “So,” Sophia asked with a sigh, “what do you suggest, Kezzie?”
    “I’ll bathe the wee bairn in cool water, Mrs. Hugh. That will bring the fever doon. And I’ll not gi’ her any milk for twenty-four hours. We’ll start there.”
    Sophia hung worriedly over the rocker and its occupants.
    “I’ll take care o’ her just like she’s my very own.” Kezzie spoke with a quiet confidence that did more to allay Sophia’s anxiety than anything the doctor had prescribed.
    With relief and guilt mixed, Sophia left the nursery and the child snuffling into the old nurse’s shoulder, not hearing Kezzie’s muttered, “I’ll no hae that doctor bleedin’ this bairn if I can help it!”
    Several of Kezzie’s low-voiced comments were heard, however, in the following days when Sophia slipped unannounced into the nursery to bend over the sleeping child, to take her at times into her arms and rock her. But Margaret, perversely, seemed restless in her mother’s arms and only settled down when the comfortable, known arms of Kezzie were around her. That, in itself, may have accounted for the small worm of jealousy that began to eat at Sophia.
    Coming in quietly one afternoon Sophia heard the soft tones of the old nurse as she crooned a lullaby of her own making to the infant. “Whoosh, whoosh,” she soothed. “Whoosh, wee angel, whoosh.”
    The intimacy of the scene and the sound quite took Sophia aback. With rather more roughness than courtesy she took the baby and, in spite of Margaret’s squalled displeasure, rocked far too grimly for far too long.
    Another time Sophia burst in on her husband’s solitude with such emotion that Hugh’s frown indicated it was uncalled for in civilized people.
    “The child is improving, is she not?” he asked before Sophia had a chance to speak, and giving her the clue to