Ahhh, Baby, there's an odd little stinker.. The youngest
ghost child and the most puzzling because nobody knows if Baby is a girl or boy nor is anyone brave or foolish
enough to find out.
By some miracle Baby manages on his or her own, which was a fortunate thing. You know how you'd feel if you came too close to a baby with a loaded nappy. Poowee!
See how most of Baby's thumb has vanished from sucking it down to the bone? That's what happens when one is a ghost who is fading away.
When the children were all alive, Baby was looked after by the Sisters in the workhouse who knew how to keep an unusual child content.
But now the ghost children are left to cope on their own.
Fortunately Baby manages to survive quite nicely on rat and bug visera, which is good as the others detest those parts, perferring the straight rat meat and bug antennae.
Unfortunately eating the guts of vermin affects Baby's insides that may explain why the others want to run for the hills.
On the positive side Baby can be used as a lethal weapon when necessary.
Baby enjoys the other children immensely but always seems to be lurking in the room one has to pass through and it's tricking when one has to hold one's breath. The children learned quick and cheerful is best. So when scurrying past they take a deep breath, make funny faces and sing this silly ditty between gasps. Baby loves it:
Be cordial to Baby,
hum a cheery tune,
sing a merry song,
do not tarry long,
or you will smell the pong,
carry on, carry on and quickly be gone!'
That always leaves Baby giggling with glee.
Not all the children avoid Baby. Molly sings lullabies, such as this one.
Toby makes up nursery tales and Tinker rocks Baby's cradle with his curly-whirly tentacles - extended from across the room, of course. Baby soon falls asleep, happy and content.
Not much bothers Baby at all. Baby is a survivor. Baby is Baby.
As already mentioned, Baby can cause quite a stink which can sometimes be advantageous.
Annabel's nightmare movie 'The Bogey Monster of Ravensbreath Castle', tells just how handy Baby can be as a weapon, even though in that case it was only a dream.
Baby sorted that hideous monster.
Tinker, by the way, with his hideous tentacle fist, is very good at getting the children out of jams, which you will one day read in their book. He would reel out the coils and twist and turn them and take care of business. Saving a ghost orphan or fixing a drain pipe was all in a day's work for Tinker the fix-it boy.
There is much more to Baby's story and will be told in time.
The ghost children's
