The Easter Egg
by Saki
[pen name of Hector Hugh Munro, who was killed by a sniper during
World War One; published 1911]
It was distinctly hard lines for Lady Barbara, who came of good
fighting stock, and was one of the bravest women of her
generation, that her son should be so undisguisedly a coward.
Whatever good qualities Lester Slaggby may have possessed, and he
was in some respects charming, courage could certainly never be
imputed to him. As a child he had suffered from childish
timidity, as a boy from unboyish funk, and as a youth he had
exchanged unreasoning fears for others which were more formidable
from the fact of having a carefully-thought-out basis. He was
frankly afraid of animals, nervous with firearms, and never
crossed the Channel without mentally comparing the numerical
proportion of life belts to passengers. On horseback he seemed to
require as many hands as a Hindu god, at least four for clutching
the reins, and two more for patting the horse soothingly on the
neck. Lady Barbara no longer pretended not to see her son's
prevailing weakness; with her usual courage she faced the
knowledge of it squarely, and, mother-like, loved him none the
less.
Continental travel, anywhere away from the great tourist tracks,
was a favoured hobby with Lady Barbara, and Lester joined her as
often as possible. Eastertide usually found her at Knobaltheim,
an upland township in one of those small princedoms that make
inconspicuous freckles on the map of Central Europe.
A long-standing acquaintanceship with the reigning family made
her a personage of due importance in the eyes of her old friend
the Burgomaster, and she was anxiously consulted by that worthy
on the momentous occasion when the Prince made known his
intention of coming in person to open a sanatorium outside the
town. All the usual items in a programme of welcome, some of them
fatuous and commonplace, others quaint and charming, had been
arranged for, but the Burgomaster hoped that the resourceful
English lady might have something new and tasteful to suggest in
the way of loyal greeting. The Prince was known to the outside
world, if at all, as an old-fashioned reactionary, combating
modern progress, as it were, with a wooden sword; to his own
people he was known as a kindly old gentleman with a certain
endearing stateliness which had nothing of standoffishness about
it. Knobaltheim was anxious to do its best. Lady Barbara
discussed the matter with Lester and one or two acquaintances in
her little hotel, but ideas were difficult to come by.
"Might I suggest something to the Gnoedige Frau?" asked a sallow
high-cheekboned lady to whom the Englishwoman had spoken once or
twice, and whom she had set down in her mind as probably a
Southern Slav.
"Might I suggest something for the Reception Fest?" she went on,
with a certain shy eagerness. "Our little child here, our baby,
we will dress him in little white coat, with small wings, as an
Easter angel, and he will carry a large white Easter egg, and
inside shall be a basket of plover eggs, of which the Prince is
so fond, and he shall give it to his Highness as Easter offering.
It is so pretty an idea; we have seen it done once in Styria."
Lady Barbara looked dubiously at the proposed Easter angel, a
fair, wooden-faced child of about four years old. She had noticed
it the day before in the hotel, and wondered rather how such a
tow-headed child could belong to such a dark- visaged couple as
the woman and her husband; probably, she thought, an adopted
baby, especially as the couple were not young.
"Of course Gnoedige Frau will escort the little child up to the
Prince," pursued the woman; "but he will be quite good, and do as
he is told."
"We haf some pluffers' eggs shall come fresh from Wien," said the
husband.
The small child and Lady Barbara seemed equally unenthusiastic
about the pretty idea; Lester was openly discouraging, but when
the Burgomaster heard of it he was enchanted. The combination of
sentiment and plovers' eggs appealed strongly to his Teutonic
mind.
On the eventful day the Easter angel, really quite prettily and
quaintly dressed, was a centre of kindly interest to he gala
crowd marshalled to receive his Highness. The mother was
unobtrusive and less fussy than most parents would have been
under the circumstances, merely stipulating that she should place
the Easter egg herself in the arms that had been carefully
schooled how to hold the precious burden. Then Lady Barbara moved
forward, the child marching stolidly and with grim determination
at her side. It had been promised cakes and sweeties galore if it
gave the egg well and truly to the kind old gentleman who was
waiting to receive it. Lester had tried to convey to it privately
that horrible smackings would attend any failure in its share of
the proceedings, but it is doubtful if his German caused more
than an immediate distress. Lady Barbara had thoughtfully
provided herself with an emergency supply of chocolate
sweetmeats; children may sometimes be timeservers, but they do
not encourage long accounts. As they approached nearer to the
princely dais Lady Barbara stood discreetly aside, and the
stolid-faced infant walked forward alone, with staggering but
steadfast gait. encouraged by a murmur of elderly approval.
Lester, standing in the front row of the onlookers, turned to
scan the crowd for the beaming faces of the happy parents. In a
side-road which led to the railway station he saw a cab; entering
the cab with every appearance of furtive haste were the dark-
visaged couple who had been so plausibly eager for the "pretty
idea." The sharpened instinct of cowardice lit up the situation
to him in one swift flash. The blood roared and surged to his
head as though thousands of floodgates had been opened in his
veins and arteries, and his brain was the common sluice in which
all the torrents met. He saw nothing but a blur around him. Then
the blood ebbed away in quick waves, till his very heart seemed
drained and empty, and he stood nervelessly, helplessly, dumbly
watching the child, bearing its accursed burden with slow,
relentless steps nearer and nearer to the group that waited
sheep-like to receive him. A fascinated curiosity compelled
Lester to turn his head towards the fugitives; the cab had
started at hot pace in the direction of the station.
The next moment Lester was running, running faster than any of
those present had ever seen a man run, and - he was not running
away. For that stray fraction of his life some unwonted impulse
beset him, some hint of the stock he came from, and he ran
unflinchingly towards danger. He stooped and clutched at the
Easter egg as one tries to scoop up the ball in Rugby football.
What he meant to do with it he had not considered, the thing was
to get it. But the child had been promised cakes and sweetmeats
if it safely gave the egg into the hands of the kindly old
gentleman; it uttered no scream but it held to its charge with
limpet grip. Lester sank to his knees, tugging savagely at the
tightly clasped burden, and angry cries rose from the scandalized
onlookers. A questioning, threatening ring formed round him, then
shrank back in recoil as he shrieked out one hideous word. Lady
Barbara heard the word and saw the crowd race away like scattered
sheep, saw the Prince forcibly hustled away by his attendants;
also she saw her son lying prone in an agony of overmastering
terror, his spasm of daring shattered by the child's unexpected
resistance, still clutching frantically, as though for safety, at
that white-satin gew-gaw, unable to crawl even from its deadly
neighbourhood, able only to scream and scream and scream. In her
brain she was dimly conscious of balancing, or striving to
balance, the abject shame which had him now in thrall against the
one compelling act of courage which had flung him grandly and
madly on to the point of danger. It was only for the fraction of
a minute that she stood watching the two entangled figures, the
infant with its woodenly obstinate face and body tense with
dogged resistance, and the boy limp and already nearly dead with
a terror that almost stifled his screams; and over them the long
gala streamers flapping gaily in the sunshine. She never forgot
the scene; but then, it was the last she ever saw.
Lady Barbara carries her scarred face with its sightless eyes as
bravely as ever in the world, but at Eastertide her friends are
careful to keep from her ears any mention of the children's
Easter symbol.
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