Then one day Rose herself arrived in a beautiful car, arrayed in the very latest sport clothes and accompanied by a group of stylish friends.
Janice was sitting on the great wide side porch with a convalescent, supposed to be taking her for a walk, but the patient was openly interested in the beautiful car and the pretty ladies, and would linger, so there was nothing for Janice to do but linger also.
“That’s her, that’s the one they say the doctor is engaged to,” whispered one of the nurses in passing. “Her name is Rose. Isn’t she some baby-doll?”
Janice took one swift look at the limousine and knew that this was really what was the matter with all of her sorrowful nights and feverish days of hard work. It was this girl. And oh, she wasn’t the right girl for that wonderful doctor-friend of hers. She was just a spoiled beauty and would never help him on his way. They would never drive through perfumed spring bylanes and watch the marvelous sunsets and clouds. That girl would be bored by little white clouds like feathers drifting over a sea of ethereal blue.
Then she realized how unworthy her thoughts were and hastened to urge her patient to walk to the other end of the piazza. But as they slowly stepped along she could hear the other girls calling, “Rose, oh Rose, what time did you say you were going back?” So she was perfectly sure the nurse had been right in her identification. But her heart was heavy in spite of her best philosophy, until she remembered the Lord was looking after all this for her, and she need not worry.
Rose Bradford stayed almost all day and hindered the doctor a lot in his work. Her tones were eager and gushing, and she talked rather loud, and in a possessive way. Janice kept out of the way as much as possible, but she couldn’t help hearing and seeing a lot that went on. And even if she had not heard and seen herself, there were plenty of interested nurses to run and tell her. In fact, some of them felt it was rather interesting to tell her about this other girl and see how she would take it. But Janice held her faith between them and her heart, and tried to be serene.
Sterling looked worn and weary when they finally left, and wondered at himself. Somehow Rose Bradford’s eyes did not seem as beautiful as he had once thought, since he had come to know the quiet eyes of the girl whose life he had saved.
It had been the little probationer’s painful privilege to witness from her patient’s window the boisterous farewell when the visitors left. Something had gone wrong with the window blind and Janice had to lean far out to fix it, just as the Bradford car swept down the drive and out onto the highway. She had a full view of all the bright garments, and heard the sharply sweet voice of Rose as she called out a lot of languishing farewells, finally lifting a dainty hand to her lips and flinging a playful kiss to the winds as they drove away.
Sterling, drawn by some spiritual influence perhaps, lifted tired eyes to the window just in time to see the white face of the little probationer disappear from sight, and then the color came richly, annoyedly, back to his own face. He wished she had not witnessed that parting scene. And yet there was nothing about it that he could have helped.
The next time that Sterling went to the Martins’ house, he brought the sick man back with him and sent for Janice to help get him settled in his room.
She worked swiftly, with downcast eyes, and was glad when the head nurse came in and the doctor’s attention was turned away from her.
“By the way,” he said, as she was about to go to her duties in another direction, “I’ve been so busy here I forgot to tell you. We’re having a new patient on this floor. He comes this evening and ought to be here about now. I told Sam to meet the train. The corner room is ready for patients, isn’t it? Well, we’ll put him there for tonight at least. No, he’s not helpless. But he’s in a bad way and ought to be put to bed at once. It’s alcoholism. Manning is to be the nurse. Will you tell him to be here, ready, and will you see that a supper tray is prepared? Bring it right up. It will probably be needed at once. Something hot, coffee, soup, I think you understand.”
Janice bowed and hurried away. Just after the new patient arrived, she returned with the tray. The chauffeur who had brought the man was bringing in his luggage, the doctor was there with the male nurse, giving directions, and the patient stood angrily swaying in the middle of the room, straight in the path that led to the small table where Janice was expecting to put the tray. She paused, looked up at the patient, and then stood frozen with horror, the tray trembling in her frightened hands, her face as white as the cap she wore. There before her stood her dreaded brother-in-law, Herbert Stuart, glowering down at her with stormy eyes. Then, without warning, the tray fell from her nerveless fingers, and the little white nurse in her pretty blue uniform crumpled down in a heap at the feet of the patient.
It was all so silently, unobtrusively done, that only the tray with its muffled clatter as it thumped upon the thick rug called attention that way. And the silent probationer lay still as death, without even a quiver of her eyelids.
The doctor, with a stern white face, sprang forward instantly and gathered her up. He gave a quick look to the wild, dazed, drunken man who stood glaring angrily and muttering loud profanities about the way nurses behaved, frowning down upon the girl’s white face with startled eyes as if he were looking at a ghost.
With a hurried direction to the nurse the doctor strode away with Janice, carrying her to her own room, followed by another nurse.
As Sterling worked over the girl, he was trying to think what could have been the cause of her sudden collapse. It evidently had something to do with the patient, for he had seen her face when she first looked at him, and the sudden terror in her eyes was unmistakable. The man had supposedly come from New England—at least that was where he was registered as living at present, and not from anywhere near the region in which he had found the girl. Yet there must be some connection. As soon as she was able to talk calmly he must find out the whole situation. He could not have a mystery like this going on. Somehow he would have to make her tell him the whole trouble.
Sterling knew very little of the new patient, but he had taken an instant dislike to his face. Even allowing for the dissipated life he must have lived, he had the look of one who was utterly selfish and almost cruel, who would stop at nothing to gain his own will. But if he was the secret of the girl’s fear, what possible relationship could there have been between them? Not her fiancé. No, that was unthinkable! He was not old enough to be her father. Her brother, perhaps, but how could a brother hold such a power over his sister that would put terror like that into her eyes? They did not resemble one another in the least. But of course brothers and sisters did not always look alike. Husband? He shuddered at the thought. Poor little girl, if she were in any way tied to this drunken beast of a man!
Suddenly she opened her eyes and looked vaguely around the room then up into the doctor’s eyes with a question in her own, and then with returning memory there came that awful fear again, followed instantly by concealment. She was not going to explain that fear either.
“What happened? Did I fall?” she asked fearsomely. “Did I drop something?”
The doctor gave her a reassuring smile and bent to speak quietly so the nurse would not hear.
“Did something frighten you, child?” he asked gently.
“Oh? No, I guess not. I must have been a little tired. It’s been a warm day,” she said evasively. “I stayed overtime with the little lame girl in the east corridor. I’m so ashamed!”
It was a simple enough explanation, and at another time he would have accepted it without a question. But now his eyes were keen with anxiety for her. He was sure she had not given the right reason for her disturbed state.
“You don’t need to worry,” he said gently. “It’s all right. I am sure you have been working too hard. But now don’t think anything more about it. Just lie still and rest. Sometime tomorrow, or when you feel really strong again, come to my office and we will talk it over. I want you to know that I am your friend and you need not be afrai
d of anything or anybody. Now, go to sleep. It will be all right when you wake up.”
He stepped over to the nurse and gave directions that the room was to be kept absolutely quiet and that the probationer be allowed to sleep as long as she would. Then he turned toward Janice again and flashed her a reassuring smile. Janice, watching him with those wide eyes that still held fright in their depths, answered with a look of gratitude, and then the old reserve dropped down like a veil over her face.
He went away to his office, but all evening his mind hovered over the thought of the girl and tried to plan what he could do for her relief.
Meanwhile Janice lay wide awake, staring up at the ceiling in the dim light that came through the transom, her heart beating wildly, as she tried to think what she should do.
The fact was startling. Her enemy was under the same roof with her! So much she remembered plainly. Whether he had recognized her or not in his befuddled state, she wasn’t sure. All had gone blank with her after her first look at him. The same Herbert, only more selfish perhaps, more bestial, heavy eyes, thick sensuous lips, devilishly handsome even in his stupid, drunken state. If he saw her he would use his villainous tongue to tell awful lies about her the way he had sometimes done with Louise. She could not stay here! It would be impossible to keep out of his sight. She must get away at once. He was, of course, the new patient. She recalled the doctor’s word, “Alcoholism!” Then he must be trying to stop drinking again, or to get over a terrible spree. Perhaps this was the very place he had been twice before.
And Dr. Sterling would find out. He had probably found out already that her fainting was connected to the stranger. She must not stay here another hour. Her enemy and the jealous nurses together would make it impossible. It would only make trouble for the doctor if he tried to protect her. She must go! But how? “Oh God! I can’t plan, I’m so frightened! Please help me. Please show me what to do!” she prayed.
And then, like an answer to that petition, came the sound of an ambulance driven to the side entrance. She knew it had been ordered to take a nurse who was convalescing from a slight illness to the train for a little visit home to her mother, to rest for a few days before returning to her duties. Dare she try and get Sam to help her away?
She sprang from her bed, weak and trembling as she was, and, locking her door, slipped a few necessities into a little overnight bag that a grateful patient had given her, fastened her uniform that she had been wearing all day, adjusted her white cap, and, snatching up a dark blue cape that was a part of her nurse’s outfit, softly stole out of her room.
Her rubber-soled shoes made no sound as she went down the quiet hall and out the side door where she knew Sam must be sitting in his ambulance.
Walking down the stone steps briskly, she spoke in a low, decided voice to the supine Sam.
“Sam, you’re to take me just as quickly as you can to the Junction station to catch the express. Quick! There isn’t a minute to lose!”
Sam sat up, astonished.
“But I was to wait here for Nurse Wiley. She’s going home, and she’s going to take the local from Enderby. Those are the orders from the head nurse.”
“Yes, I know,” said Janice with dignity, climbing hastily into the back of the ambulance, “but you’re to take me first to the Junction. I must catch that train. You’ll get back in time for Miss Wiley.”
She closed the door of the ambulance, sat back, and was relieved to hear Sam starting his engine. Was she really going to get away as easily as this? Oh God, was this the way You wanted me to go? Are You keeping me now? Shall I ever be safe again?
And back on the side porch they came out with Nurse Wiley, looking for Sam and the ambulance.
“Now where in the name of sense do you suppose that Sam has gone?” asked Nurse Ray. “I told him to be right here in plenty of time so you wouldn’t have to hurry getting in.”
“Oh, there’s plenty of time. I’ll run out to the garage and call him,” said Brynie.
But the ambulance, with Janice inside, disappeared down the highway in the darkness.
And in his pleasant room, enemy number one was calling loudly for a drink and cursing his new nurse, and the place, and all the doctors and nurses.
Chapter 7
Martha Spicer felt that it was good to get down in the heart of the city again and enter the old store. She felt as if she had been away from it for a year, though it had really been only a few days. Many of the old clerks looked at her and smiled, and some of those who didn’t know her so well hardly realized that she had really gone. There was something strange about it though, going around in her old aisles, watching another woman in her place facing a stout old gaudy purchaser who was insisting on returning some silk underwear after it had been worn.
She had been away only a little over a week and yet she felt superior freedom when she looked about on their tired faces, watched the flying hands putting up goods and stacking boxes for the night. Another day was almost done and they were nearly free again to live their own lives for a few hours. She knew exactly how they felt. She had always felt so. And now she was out of it all. Had she actually dared to be restive and unhappy in the house and with the fortune that had made her freedom possible? She was a fool and an ingrate.
There was a smile on her face as she walked among her former workers. They turned weary eyes of surprise after her as she passed from their midst.
“Well, my word! Did you get on to the smile?” called one salesgirl to another as she smoothed rumpled stockings into their boxes.
“Sure I did! What do you think of that? Isn’t that the limit? Spice Box smiling? I never expected to see that. I didn’t suppose she could smile. She musta found a silk lining to her nest. Well, I don’t blame her. If I could get out of this dump, I’d smile, too, wouldn’t you, Nannie?”
“Sure I would,” answered Nannie, patting the bunch of curls over her forehead to make sure they were engaging as she saw a young man coming down the aisle, headed her way.
And yet both of these girls had fairly agonized to get these jobs less than a year ago!
“What you going to do? Join a reading circle?” asked an insolent boy at the book department when Martha asked for her Roman history. He hadn’t forgotten how Martha Spicer had once called him down for having a bit of fun when he ought to have been working. He remembered her biting sarcasm.
The color rose in Martha’s cheeks and she almost opened her mouth to make a sharp answer, but as he grinned at her, some motion or a look on his lips reminded her of Ronald just after he had turned on his heel to “beat it” and given that fearful whistle. Then she remembered he was only three or four years older than Ronald and closed her lips. After all, she was no longer connected with the store and had no right to speak. She lifted her eyes to the young man’s face. He was white and thin, with dark shadows under his eyes. He didn’t have Ronald’s ruddy color. She recalled that this boy was supporting a widowed mother and had to struggle to make both ends meet. Suddenly a miracle happened in her heart, and she smiled up at him as if he were a comrade.
“I don’t know but I shall, Albert,” she said. “I haven’t quite decided what I will do. I’d like to have you come and see me sometime if you are ever anywhere around near me.”
Albert’s face was a study of wonder.
“Gee! I will!” he answered heartily. “That’ll be great! I’ll come to supper sometime. May I?”
It was like Albert to invite himself, but it was not like Martha to answer with a smile and say, “Do!” cordially and give him another smile as she took her package and went her way.
It was strange, she thought, but that boy Ronald seemed to be in the back of her thoughts all day and to change the look of everybody. Was it the boy-charm that the article in the paper had talked about? Whatever it was, it made the going back to the little brick house not half so desolate as it had been before.
And there would be her new picture and the candlesticks and Ronald and Ernestine. She ac
tually felt a warmth in her heart for the cat! It was astonishing!
She paused at a counter near the door where they were selling pictures at reduced rates, and there was a picture of a bullfight! And right beside it a splendid etching of a great stealthy lion stealing along the jungle. Something told her those pictures belonged with the Colosseum and the brass candlesticks. They were framed in dull brass beading.
All the way home she blamed herself for having spent good money for useless junk. She did not know they were well-executed masterpieces of great artisits, but in spite of her self-reproaches, she felt an exultation that she had them.
There were chops for supper that night, two of them, and a roasted potato. Ernestine had a chop to herself and sat with her tail curled around her feet, chewing away contentedly.
After the dishes were washed Martha went eagerly to the Roman history. The glistening new binding intrigued her, and her solitude did not seem half so forlorn now that she had something to do.
It was eleven o’clock when she finally closed her book and decided she ought to go to bed. Not that it mattered so much when she didn’t have to hurry off to the store in the morning, but still she felt as if she had been self-indulgent.
She went to bed with the pleasant reflection that tomorrow’s delivery wagon would bring those pictures, and she would have something to show Ronald as well as something to tell him about the Colosseum. But would he come without a lure of gingerbread? Of course it wouldn’t do to offer gingerbread again so soon. She must think up some errand for him to do for her.
But she did not have to lure Ronald with gingerbread. He appeared at the kitchen door promptly the next morning with a cheery whistle and an impudent boy-knock, the kind that seems to imply that he owns the place and expects you to open at once.
He bore over his shoulder a great branch of dogwood blossoms, which he had arisen early that morning to get, and handed them to her quite casually.