“But she had a wicked thought,” sadly the Buddha replied. “When you were a baby, her only care was for you, and one day when she saw a little field-mouse happily playing, she so longed to have its gray, silky tail for a cord to tie your holiday coat, that her wish was thought murder.”
I closed the book with a half-smile, for I understood at once the wordless warning of my gentle, anxious mother; but my heart was full of loving gratitude as I bowed respectfully in the direction of Japan and resolved that my love for my baby should make me more thoughtful and tender toward all the world.
One of the first callers the baby had was our faithful black laundress, Minty. She had been washing for Mother for years, and, when I came, she accepted the additional burden of my queer clothes with kind good nature. She had never spoken of them as being different from others, but several times I noticed her examining them with interest, especially my white foot mittens. These were made of cotton or silk, with the great toe separated, as is the thumb of a hand mitten. When she came upstairs to see the baby, the nurse was holding the little one on her lap, and Minty squatted down by her side and began talking baby talk, cooing and clucking in the most motherly fashion.
Presently she looked up.
“Can I see her feet?” she asked.
“Certainly,” said the nurse, turning up the baby’s long dress and cuddling the little pink feet in her hand. “My lawsy me!” cried Minty in a tone of the greatest astonishment. “If they ain’t jus’ like ourn!”
“Of course,” said the surprised nurse. “What did you think?”
“Why, the stockin’s is double,” said Minty, almost in a tone of awe, “and I s’posed they wuz two-toed folks.”
