i am that very hag

Bellflowers

A normal day

She moved her tongue. ‘I have a tooth, I think,’ she said, ‘with a point that cuts me.’ ‘Let me see,’ I said. I took her to the window and she stood with her face in my hands and let me feel about her gum. I found the pointed tooth almost at once. [...] She looked at me, then opened her mouth again and I put the thimble on my finger and rubbed at the pointed tooth until the point was taken off. I had seen Mrs Sucksby do it many times, with infants.— Of course, infants rather wriggle about. Maud stood very still, her pink lips parted, her face put back, her eyes at first closed then open and gazing at me, her cheek with a flush upon it. Her throat lifted and sank, as she swallowed. My hand grew wet, from the damp of her breaths. I rubbed, then felt with my thumb. She swallowed again. Her eyelids fluttered, and she caught my eye.