Aunt Jane stood in the doorway a minute, smiling and looking down the long room. Presently from somewhere there came a piping cry:
"Aunt Jane's come!"
And then another cry—and another: "Aunt Jane's come! Aunt Jane's come!"
No one knew who had started the custom. But some child, some sunny morning, had broken out with it when Aunt Jane appeared. And the others had taken it up, as children will; and now it had become a happy part of the day's routine, as regular as the doctor's visit—or the night nurse's rounds.
"Aunt Jane's come—Aunt Jane's come!"
They broke off from picture-books or blocks, to look up and call out and pass the word along. Then they chanted it together.... And the newcomer in the ward, a boy lying with bandaged face and eyes halfclosed, turned a first curious, questioning look—to find the white-capped face smiling down at him.
At the top of the house, at either end of the long corridor—in Dr. Carmon's operating-room and here in the Children's Ward—Aunt Jane was not the implacable personage that ruled elsewhere in the hospital.
She beamed down the ward.
A dozen hands reached out to her and she smiled to them and nodded and scolded a little and fussed and drew them all into a happy sense that this was home—and Aunt Jane a kind of new and glorified mother for little children. All the sick ones and lame ones, and the bruised ones and bandaged ones were Aunt Jane's children— It did not seem like a hospital, as one looked down the sunny room, so much as a place where children were gathered in; pinched faces lighted up—for the first time in life, perhaps—with round, shrewd, loving smiles for Aunt Jane; delicate bandaged faces looked out at her wistfully and happily; and laughing, rosy ones turned to her.
There were no unhappy ones there. "Childrensuffer and don't know," was Aunt Jane's comment.
Sometimes as she stood among them she marvelled a little at the quiet unconscious force that ignored pain, or adjusted itself to twinges. Some child, with a look almost of impatience, would shift a bandaged leg or foot to an easier position, as it listened to the story she was telling or entered into some game of her contriving.
Sometimes it was a guessing game that was played by the whole ward at once—a kind of twenty questions, shouted at her as she came in, her hands held carefully behind her.... And, curiously, it was always some little one that guessed first; some feeble one, just beginning to take notice, that had a glimpse of Aunt Jane's broad back as she turned casually with a serene unconscious look, or moved a little and revealed the hidden thing behind her.
The whole ward was interested this morning in Jimmie Sullivan's new leg. It was a frame-leg that got in the way when he walked and tripped him up. He was a little proud of it, but more annoyed, as he came hurrying down the ward to meet her.
Aunt Jane adjusted her spectacles and looked.
"Well, well!" she said.
Jimmie glanced down at it, a little proud and abashed. "It can't walk," he admitted.
"Want me to carry you?" asked Aunt Jane.
"No, sir!" He slipped a proud hand into hers and stumbled happily and awkwardly along.
Aunt Jane moved toward a bed where a child lay strapped on his back, hands and feet and head held fast, only his eyes free to turn to her with a smile.
"How's Alec?" said Aunt Jane.
"All right," replied the child. "You going to tell a story?"
"Well—maybe. I don't know as I know any new stories," she said slowly. She considered it.
"Tell an old one," said the boy. "Any old story," he added with a grim smile under the crisscross bandages of the stiff face.
"Tell about the little red hen," piped a voice from the next bed.
"No—about billy-goat," from across the room.
"Tell about the old lady that runned away," came shrilling close at hand.
Aunt Jane put her hands over her ears. "I can't hear anything," she announced.
Their faces grew still and alert till she should move her hands a tiny crack and they could shout again: "Billy-goat!" "The little red hen!" "The lady that runned away!"
Jimmie Sullivan, half leaning against her, looked at them reproachfully. "She can't tell nuthin' while you make such a racket!" he said.
"She likes it!—She likes it!—Shedon't care!" They returned.
Aunt Jane looked at them and smiled. She took down her hands.
"Let me see—" She glanced from one bed to the other. "I am going to let Edna choose.... She can whisper it to me." She went to a bed across the room, Jimmie Sullivan's frame-leg clanking happily beside her, and bent to the pillow.
The girl lifted a thin arm and threw it about Aunt Jane's neck to draw her close.
Aunt Jane listened and lifted her head and smiled. "All right," she announced.
The room was so still you could hear a pin drop. A nurse passing the lower end of the ward, with a dish in her hand, paused and looked down the quiet room. Every eye was fastened expectantly on the motherly figure moving serenely about.... It crossed to the side of the room and adjusted the skylight shade and brought a big rocker and placed it in the middle of the room under the skylight and put a low chair for Jimmie Sullivan, and another beside it for the child that was limping slowly across to her.... A girl in a wheeled chair propelled herself swiftly down the ward and came to a stop as close to the big rocker as she could get.
Aunt Jane glanced slowly about the ward—at the expectant faces looking at her from every bed.
"Now, the rest of you stay where you are!" she said severely.
They laughed and adjusted themselves, and then they were quiet again, watching her intently.
She sat down in the big chair and rocked a little.
"Let me see—" She sat smiling thoughtfully;the smile ran along the pillows—waiting.
"Once when I was a little girl——"
The pillows nestled a little and sighed happily and settled down; and Aunt Jane's voice went on with the tale and the nurse at the end of the ward passed out with her dish. The door swung to behind her.
The great sunny room was left to happiness and to Aunt Jane and to the children and: "Once when I was a little girl."
In Suite A, Herman Medfield had eaten the last of his breakfast. It might almost be said that, sitting in the window with the paper spread before him and the sun shining in, he had enjoyed his breakfast.... It was a long time since Herman Medfield had eaten a complete breakfast served in the ordinary way. The road to the House of Mercy was strewn with a vast wreckage of fads and hopes and breakfast foods. There were long vegetarian streaks that excluded milk and eggs; and gusts of Fletcherizing—chewing wind hopefully and patiently; and there were wide negative deserts—forbidden fruits—no starches-and-sweets together, no sweets-and-acids, no potato-and-meat, no proteids-and-carbons. A long, weary, hopeless watching and coaxing of gastric juices, and infinite patience and cunning toward the vagaries of indigestion. He had "rolled the stomach gently," and he had lain with "apillow under his back and head down." He had become a finical, peripatetic amphitheatre of constant, cautious experiment and investigation. And it had brought him at last to Suite A and the sunny window.
And now in a breath, it seemed, in the Berkeley House of Mercy Aunt Jane's touch had broken the habit of years. He felt like a very small boy, who has been taken up and set down gently in his chair—and told to eat his breakfast and keep still.
He had thrown caution to the winds and had eaten like a hungry human being. He had drunk great swallows of the delicious brown coffee—with cream and sugar in it—without a thought of diluted gastric juice, or secretions, or fads, or fermentations.... He felt almost well as he ate the last of his toast and read his paper and basked in the sunny quiet. And behind it all was a sense of security and protection; no telephone could get at him, no clicking of the tape could reach his ear and set his tired brain to work.
So he had finished his breakfast and read his paper and had been almost happy.
But now he had read the paper throughthree times, gleaning last scanty bits of news; he had opened the elaborate writing-desk across the room and investigated the neat assortment of pens and blotters and paper and ink—each sheet with its neatly stamped heading of the House of Mercy; and he was feeling a little bored.
He stood looking down at the desk and fingering the keys in his pocket. Then he went over and stood by the window and looked out, and turned away and paced the room once or twice, fingering absently at the keys in his pocket. He wondered whether perhaps his breakfast had not been a little heavy, after all—two eggs for a man who had been dieting!
And all the time his restless fingers—whether thrust deep in the pockets of his black velvet coat, or twisting a little as he walked, or jingling the keys—were rolling imaginary cigarettes and reaching toward a swiftly struck match—and the fragrant in-drawn breath of smoke.
It had not occurred to him when Dr. Carmon had told him that he would probably have to undergo an operation and that hemust have him at the House of Mercy for a few days to watch the case—it had not occurred to Herman Medfield that he would be a prisoner in the House of Mercy.
He stepped impatiently to the window and looked out again and shrugged his shoulders.... It was all very well to have an operation—very likely he did need something of the sort.... But this coming beforehand and being shut up by himself—while his machinery was going, full tilt—all this fuss was ridiculous!... Down in the yard a maid was hanging out clothes; he watched her strong arms lift the wet sheets and swing them to the line; the wind blew her hair a little.... It was more than likely it was largely for effect—this having him come beforehand and shutting him up like a prisoner in a cell, and taking away his tobacco—it was more than likely that it was all for effect. Herman Medfield knew most things that could be known about advertising and about the value of advertising methods.... It might very well be a good card for the hospital and for Dr. Carmon to have him there, and to get the advertising that would come from havingit known. The reporters were sure to get hold of it.... It flitted across his mind that there might be an interview.... It was years since Herman Medfield had granted an interview. But even a reporter would relieve the monotony a little. He glanced at his watch and felt a little cheered at the thought of the reporter.
Then something occurred to him. He wondered whether the efficient Person, who seemed to have charge of the Berkeley House of Mercy, wouldallowhim to see a reporter!... He had eaten his breakfast—and, on the whole, he felt better for it—the eggs seemed to be taking care of themselves after all.... He foresaw that for the next three or four weeks he was not going to do what he chose, but what the Person thought best for him. Then his sense of humor came to the rescue. He recalled the cap strings—and smiled.
It would not be such bad sport, matching one's wits against the cap strings.... But there was still the morning to get through!
He wandered across and stopped again by the elaborate writing-desk and looked at it. He might write to some one. He sat downand drew a sheet of paper toward him and looked at the neatly cut inscription across the top—"The Berkeley House of Mercy"—his prison cell, he thought grimly. His fingers reached out for a half-smoked cigar—and drew back and smoothed the paper thoughtfully and took up the pen and dipped it in the ink and waited.
He would write to Julian. He had not written to Julian in his own handwriting—not since the boy was a pupil at Exeter—that was ten years ago.... He was his own secretary those days.
He wrote: "My dear Julian." Then he waited. He was seeing Julian as he used to look when he was at Exeter; he had been such a fresh, clear-faced boy; he had been proud of him—and Julian's mother.... The millionaire was living over those first days of life together—the time when Julian was born—he had not thought of it for years—all her pretty ways in the house—and the garden he had made for her, and her coming to meet him when he came from the office at night.... And then the days when she had seemed to fade like a flower and theyhad carried her out of the house—and there had been no one but the boy to come running to meet him when he came home— But the boy had hurt him and he had sent him away ... and the loneliness since.... The empty house at night, and the great void spaces of life that opened on every side. He had thrown gold into them—and he had reached out for more gold—great heaped-up masses of gold and bonds and thrifty investments; and the gold had mounted higher every year—till it seemed to shut him off from every one.... No one came to him now except for money—or about money. Even Julian hardly wrote except to ask for a check or to acknowledge one. And he only knew the boy's address through his bankers.... It was somewhere on the Riviera, the last time. He dipped the pen again in the ink.
There was a knock at the door and he turned. It was Miss Canfield, the nurse who had been assigned him. She carried a long, light box. She held it out.
"Some flowers for you."
He reached up his hand, half pleased. Hehad not expected any one would send flowers to him.
She undid the wrapper and handed him the box.... On the top lay a card edged in black. He put on his eye-glasses and took it up.
"Mrs. Cawein——"
His face fell a little. She was his partner's wife—his late partner's widow, that is—she had a right to send flowers to him, of course—if she chose.
He set the box down on the desk and took up his pen. The nurse brought a large vase and placed it beside him and arranged the flowers. They were huge yellow roses, with long stems and crisp leaves—a kind of salmon-pink yellow. Herman Medfield glanced at them grudgingly. It seemed to him they were a singularly displeasing color. He had not supposed there were any roses of that shade of yellow! He grew roses himself, and he knew something about them. He shrugged his shoulder a little toward them and took up the pen.
"Put them somewhere else," he said irritably.
A little clear color flushed up in her face. "Would you like them on the table?" she asked.
"Yes—please."
She removed the vase and placed it on the table across the room and went out.
He stared at the heading on the paper: "My dear Julian." After all, what was there he could say to the boy? He could tell him he was in a hospital. But that might seem weak—as if he wanted sympathy—because he was down.... Herman Medfield never asked for sympathy; his heart was especially hard toward men who did. They were always the devils who were down and out—that asked for sympathy—and hoped to get some of his money to waste—as they had wasted their own. He would give hundreds to a man who stood up to him—when he would not give a dollar to the one that whined.
He dipped the pen again and wrote rapidly—a mere note, telling the boy that he was away from home for a while—under the doctor's orders, nothing serious, nothing to worry any one; he should be around again in a fewdays. He signed it grimly and hunted up the banker's address and directed and sealed it.... That was done! He pushed the letter from him. He was tired. He wanted a cigar.
There was a quick knock at the door. Dr. Carmon had finished his operation and made his round of visits in the hospital and he was doing Suite A.
Herman Medfield greeted him with relief. "Come in," he said. "Come in and sit down.... I am sorry I cannot offer you a cigar," he added with a little humorous sigh.
The doctor sat down. "Hard work, is it?"
He drew his chair in front of Herman Medfield, leaning forward a little, with his elbows on his knees.
"Find it hard, do you?" he asked pleasantly.
"I've known easier things," replied Herman Medfield dryly.
The doctor regarded him without comment. He reached out a hand to his pulse and took out his watch and sat with bent head a minute. Then he slipped the watch back into his pocket and stood up.
"I'd like to put you on that couch a few minutes," he said. "That's right—over there." He rolled up the window-shades and moved the couch nearer to the window. Herman Medfield lay down, half grudgingly.
"Now, if you will relax and breathe easily—" The doctor's face had grown absorbed. He seemed not to see Herman Medfield, but something that might have been an abstraction—theessence, or spirit, of Medfield. And while he gazed at this Medfield abstraction, Dr. Carmon's hands were busy. They thumped the liver and sounded the heart and pounded the back of Herman Medfield with quick, absorbed movements that left no depth unsounded.
"Um-m!" he said at last.
And then—"Ah!"
He straightened his back and beamed down on Herman Medfield from behind the spectacles.
"All right—am I?" asked Medfield.
"You'll be all right—in three or four days," responded Dr. Carmon, with his round, successful diagnosis smile.
"You won't have to operate?" Medfield's face lighted.
"Operate—? Oh—! Yes—I shall operate." The doctor spoke absently. It was the tone of one to whom it could never occur not to operate. "I shall operate. It's fine!"
"Better than you thought?" asked Medfield hopefully.
The doctor's absent-minded gaze broke. He smiled. "Worse! Much worse than Ithought. You could not live three months—as you are."
Herman Medfield sat up.
Dr. Carmon surveyed him proudly. "And in three months you'll be a new man—made over—top to toe!"
"When do you operate?" asked Medfield a little dryly.
"Um—this is Wednesday? Yes—about Friday, then." He got up. "There is something I want you to do meantime." He rang for the nurse and called for a roll of bandage.
When she brought it, he asked her to send Aunt Jane to Suite A.
"Do you know where she is?" he asked.
"In the Children's Ward, I think," said Miss Canfield.
"Very well. Ask her to come. I want her to have special charge of this brace for me."
He turned back to the window. "Now, if I may have you here. I want to take measurements, please."
The man stood straight as a tailor's dummy while the surgeon's hands flitted over and around him. The tall figure outlined againstthe window had a singular grace and charm; and the short, square one moving jerkily around it, taking measurements and jotting down figures had an added absurdity from the contrast.... Now, Dr. Carmon was on his hands and knees on the floor; and now, stretching tiptoe to pass a tape-measure over the tall, thin shoulders of the aristocratic figure.
It was thus that Aunt Jane saw the two men as she opened the door. She stood for a moment in the doorway. Then she closed the door and came in.
But between the opening of the door and the closing it, she had seen for the first time Dr. Carmon as he really was—a homely and grotesque and brusque little man. It added, perhaps, a touch of severity to the expression of the round face and its crisp cap strings.
He looked up quickly from his thumb that marked a place on the tape-measure, and glanced from one to the other.
"You know Mr. Medfield?" he said.
"I met Mr. Medfield when he came—yesterday," said Aunt Jane safely.
"Yes, we have become acquainted," rejoinedHerman Medfield, with a little polite gesture of the hand.
Aunt Jane's face was non-committal.
Dr. Carmon turned to it. "I want a brace made—for temporary use. Here are the measurements. Be sure to give it plenty of room here—and here." He drew a few lines and jotted down the figures and handed the paper to her.
She received it in silence.
The millionaire stood at his ease, smiling at her. He did not look like a man condemned to die in three months. His eye was keen and there was a little line of firmness under the smile of his lips.
"I want to see my lawyer," he said. "I will go to my office in the morning. There are things to arrange."
Dr. Carmon paused abruptly. "I thought you attended to all that before you came." His tone was brusque. "I told you——"
"I did not understand," said the millionaire quietly. "I did not think you knew." He looked at him.
"Well—of course—if you have to—" Dr. Carmon's gaze was reluctant and his browpuckered itself.... Standing beside the millionaire and looking up at him with the puckered forehead, he may have seemed an awkward and fussy and ineffectual little man.
"He can't go!" It was Aunt Jane's voice, prompt and decisive—and the two men turned and looked at her.
"He can't go," she repeated calmly. "He's got to have this on." She motioned to the paper she held in her hand. "He's got to have it on right away and go to bed."
"But—" said Herman Medfield.
"You can't go to bed and go to an office, too," replied Aunt Jane firmly.
The millionaire looked at her. His glance travelled to Dr. Carmon's face. There was the merest hint of a twinkle behind the round professional glasses, and Herman Medfield regarded it.
"Do I understand that this isyourorder?" he asked politely.
"It's better for you—not—to wait," admitted Dr. Carmon slowly.
"You mean I'm taking chances?"
"Yes."
The millionaire's glance fell. "Very well.I shall do as you say, of course." He moved a little away and sat down.
Aunt Jane's glance followed him—the look in it changed subtly. Something that had been in it up in the Children's Ward came back.
"You can have your lawyer here," she said almost kindly. "We've got plenty of pens and paper and ink. And you can tell him all you want to without going to any office, I guess. Now I'll go get this made for you; and you be ready to have it on when I come back."
She opened the door and went out.
The two men looked at each other like two boys—and smiled. Both boys had had mothers. Herman Medfield's mother had worn a cap, an aristocratic affair of ribbons and lace that had little relation to the clear-starched whiteness of Aunt Jane's muslin strings; Dr. Carmon's mother had never known what it was to cover her smooth-parted hair under a cap—she had been a hard-working woman and far removed from Mrs. Oliver Medfield's way of life. But the two men, as they watched Aunt Jane disappear, had a sudden common sense of motherly protection and wisdom; and they smiled across toeach other in almost shamefaced understanding.
"It reallyisbetter not to wait—" said the doctor, half apologetically: "Itmightbe all right. But we're taking chances enough as it is—without that."
The professional look had come back to his face. He was looking absently before him at something unseen.
It was the sixth day, and Edith Dalton was doing well—the wound was doing well. As for the woman, she lay with indifferent eyes looking at the white wall of her room and waiting recovery. The only time that the look in the eyes changed was when Aunt Jane appeared in the doorway for a moment, or sat by her bed. Then it would deepen to a question and flicker toward hope.
"Doing well?" Aunt Jane would say. "They give you good things to eat, don't they?"
The woman smiled faintly. "Yes."
"That's right. Eat and sleep. And hope don't hurt—a little of it."
"Aunt Jane?" The voice had a sharp note. The invalid was resting against the pillows that had been raised on the bed.
"Yes?" Aunt Jane turned back.
"Hasn't he been to see me—once—myhusband?" There was a shamed, half-imperious note in the words.
Aunt Jane sat down comfortably by the bed and looked at her. Then she shook her head chidingly.... "I've never seen a sick person yet that wasn't unreasonable," she said.
The woman's face relaxed. "I know," she said apologetically, "but when one is sick the days are long."
"You told me, that was four-five days ago," said Aunt Jane, "that you didn't want to see him or hear his name mentioned. At least, that's what I understood."
The woman was not looking at her.
"So when he's been here, time and again—three times a day, some days—I've told him you couldn't see anybody—not even your husband.... I thought that was what you wanted."
"Yes," said the woman faintly.
Aunt Jane nodded. "And now you're acting hurt and keeping yourself from getting well."
The woman flushed a little. "I don't think I am."
"Yes, you are," said Aunt Jane comfortably. "Of course it don't make any real difference. You'll get well sometime.... Only it seems foolish. Well, I must be going on my rounds. Keep up good courage." She stood up and moved toward the door.
"Aunt Jane."
"Yes."
"You haven't time to stop a few minutes?"
"Why, yes. I've got plenty of time, if you want me. There's two operations this morning, but everything's ready."
"Two operations?" The woman's lips grew white.
"One's a man with five children. Got to lose his leg.... His wife's plucky. She's gone right to work earning money. But she's coming this morning to be with him for the operation. She says he'll stand it better. I guess she's right. They seem pretty close together.... That's the only thing I really envy in this world," said Aunt Jane slowly, ... "having a husband that loves you and cares." She sat quietly watching the locust leaves outside the window. They shimmered in the light.
The woman raised a hand. "You don't understand," she said.
"Like enough not," said Aunt Jane. "It's hard work understanding other folks' feelings. I don't more'n half understand mine.... I suppose you were kind of disappointed in him...?
"I don't know—" The words faltered.
"They be, mostly."
"Is every one unhappily married?" the voice flashed at her.
"Well, I didn't say just that. But most of 'em find it different from what they expected—men being men.... Women are women, too. I'll have to go now. It's time for the man, and she'll be waiting in the parlor. I told her to wait there." She rose slowly. "You don't want to see him, if he should happen to come to-day?"
"No." The lips trembled a little and closed over the word.
"All right," said Aunt Jane soothingly. "Take plenty of time to get well. He can wait. He's a good kind to wait, I can see that." She had drifted out.
The woman's eyes followed her eagerlywith a question in them. She put up her hands to cover them. "Yes," she said softly, "he can wait."
As Aunt Jane opened the waiting-room door the man sprang to his feet. He was radiant with a look of courage, and his eyes glowed as he came toward her.
She shook her head, smiling a little. Then she turned to a young woman waiting by the door. She was strong and fresh and a look of purpose gleamed in her face. Aunt Jane looked at her approvingly. "Go down to Room 20, Mrs. Patton, on the left-hand side. I've told Dr. Carmon you're to be there. It's all right."
As the young woman left the room she turned to him again.
"Won't she see me?" he asked.
"Have patience three or four days more," she said slowly. "She'll be wanting to see you before long now."
"How do you know?" He reached out a hand.
"I don't know, but I seem to feel it in my bones. She's most well.... She's well all through."
And she left him standing there, a glad light in his eyes, while she went down the corridor to the man waiting in Room 20.
In Herman Medfield's room, the night-light was carefully shaded. Through the dimness one guessed rather than saw the figure lying straight on the high bed, motionless under the blanket, and the night nurse standing beside it. The nurse bent a little toward the figure and listened. Through the half-opened window a breeze came in, swaying the curtains, and the night-light cast reaching, moving shadows across the ceiling and along the bed.
The figure on the bed stirred a little and moaned, and the nurse spoke softly. There was no response—only an inarticulate sigh, and quickened breath for a moment, and rigid silence again. The nurse touched the clothes gently, straightening them, and returned to her chair by the table. The light fell on her face, the fresh face with clear features and half-reddish hair gathered up under its white cap. She sat bending forward, her hands relaxed in her lap. The breezefrom the window came in and mixed with the shadows and crept through the room toward the bed.
A thoroughly successful operation, Dr. Carmon had said. But he had been in twice since to look at the motionless figure, and the nurse sitting by the table had careful instructions to call him at any moment.... The operation had been a success, but who knew what subtle forces had been attacked, perhaps overthrown, in those sharp, fierce minutes in the operating-room while the knife was at work? Dr. Carmon knew that he could cut clean and quick and sure; he knew that he could follow a nerve almost as a dog follows a scent, without fear or flinching; but it was something within the nerves, the unseen, unguessed something—that was life itself—that might undo his work and leave him helpless.... He could only look at the silent figure and repeat again his careful instructions and go away and leave it to the power that no man understands, and no man can help or hinder.
The curtains moved in the breeze; and the nurse rose now and then as the night woreon and went to the bed and waited a minute and returned to her chair. Then some movement in the room—something unseen, drew her and she went again to the bed. She moved the light so that it fell, half-shaded, on the pillow, and bent forward and looked. Her hand sought the wrist under the blanket and held it a minute and she lifted her face and turned the light quickly away.
She was moving toward the door—but it had swung softly back into the shadowy room, and Aunt Jane was nodding to her and smiling—with a subdued half-gesture toward the bed.
"I'll take him now," she said in her low voice.
"Shall I call Dr. Carmon?"
"Not yet." She went on toward the bed and the nurse passed out.
In the dimness of the room, nothing had happened. The curtains swayed a little in the breeze—the motionless figure on the bed lay rigid as before under its blanket—and the shadows crept toward it and back. But in the turning of a minute, forces had ranged themselves in the quiet room.
Aunt Jane turned off the light and pushed back the curtains from the window and brought a chair to the side of the bed, and sat down quietly with the forces. She had moved with the certainty of one who sees what is to be done. She knew that presently there would steal out from the shadows something that has neither name nor shape.
She slipped her hand along inside the blanket and found the lifeless one and rubbed it a little and touched the wrist with firm, quick fingers and clasped the hand close.
Then she sat with her head bent, as motionless as the figure beside her. The moments came and went. Outside, the clock-tower boomed the hour softly, and then the half-hour; and somewhere in the distance a rooster crowed—a shrill, clear call, like light.... Something ran through the figure on the bed—the man stirred a little. Half-way through the lifeless fingers something crept toward warmth, and lay chill—and went slowly back and came again—and Aunt Jane's hand closed on it, clean and soft.... The man stirred and opened his eyes and stared vaguely out.
The shadows in the room were clear gray—the east light had touched them. The eyes looked out on the light, unseeing, and fell shut. A half sigh fluttered to the parched lips and escaped and the man turned his head. Aunt Jane bent forward, waiting. The eyes opened and saw her and closed, and an even breath came through the lips. Then a deep groan broke from them and Aunt Jane smiled.... It was a quiet, brooding smile like the light of the morning that was flooding in through the room.... The man groaned again.
Aunt Jane nodded happily and got up. She opened the windows wide and let in the freshness and stood for a moment breathing it in. Then she went back to the bed.
The man's eyes regarded her dully.
"You feeling all right now?" she said cheerfully, bending over him.
He turned his head with a groan and Aunt Jane touched the bell.
It was the nurse with the reddish hair who responded, fresh from her nap.
"How is he?" she asked. She looked toward the drawn face on the pillow.
"He's all right," said Aunt Jane. "He's just begun to suffer. He'll get along all right now."
"You don't think we need to send for Dr. Carmon?" she asked doubtingly.
"No, we don't need Dr. Carmon," replied Aunt Jane. "He didhiswork yesterday. It's our turn now— It's Mr. Medfield's turn." She nodded toward the bed and smiled and went out.
Through the open door of Room 5, Aunt Jane heard voices and stopped to listen. Then she went in.
"This is my husband," said the little woman on the bed. "He says they're getting along real well."
The man by the bed rose awkwardly, turning his stiff hat in his hands. He wore a high collar with sharp points turning back in front and a bright-blue necktie. A large stick pin was thrust through the tie, and his hair was combed carefully in a wide, flat curl on his forehead. He stood with his feet close together, and bowed to Aunt Jane over the hat.
She held out her hand. "How do you do, Mr. Pelton?— Your wife is getting along first-rate!" She nodded toward the bed.
The little woman's face flushed with clear color. "The doctor says I can go in ten days!" she announced.
Aunt Jane considered it. "Well, you can go as soon as you can go—it may be ten days and it may be eleven. I wouldn't begin to say just how many days 'tis—if I was you. We mean to make you comfortable as long as you stay here." She looked at her benignly over her glasses. "You're comfortable, aren't you?"
"Oh, I'm comfortable!" said the woman. "Everybody's real good to me, John." She turned to him. "Tommie don't miss me, does he?" It was wistful.
John tugged at something in his pocket. "He kind of misses you, I guess. But we're getting alongfine!... I got these for you—so's you could see." He put a fat envelope in her fingers and she received it doubtingly. She held it up and looked at it.
"I don't know where they put my spectacles—I can't see very well."
"You don't need to see—not for them. Here—I'll show you." He took the envelope proudly and stiffly and drew out a card and held it toward her. "There you be!"
She took it in questioning fingers.
"Why, it's Mamie!"
She turned her face to Aunt Jane and held up the card to her: "That's my oldest girl—that's Mamie!" Her voice had a happy tone—with quick tears somewhere in it.
The man smiled broadly. "I've got another one!" He took it from the envelope and extended it. "And here's two more!" He held the group of pictures spread before him like a fan in his big hand and gazed at them.
"Why, John Pelton! You don't mean you had 'em all done!"
"The whole family," he said proudly.
"John—Pelton! Here—letmesee!"
She took the pictures from him, one by one, and her fingers trembled with them. "That's Tommie! He's got on the little sack Aunt Minnie made for him!
"He looks nice—don't he?" She held it toward Aunt Jane.
"And that's Wesley. His tie don't set quite straight." Regret and pride mingled over the tie and smiled at it fondly. "And that's Lulie! It's the whole family!"
"Well, Iam pleased!"
She lay back and looked at them, proudand content, and Aunt Jane praised the children.
"I've got another one here," said the man. He looked half shamefaced as he drew it out.
Aunt Jane took it and smiled, and glanced from the picture to his face.
"Yes, it's good— Looks like you," she said.
The woman raised a curious hand to it——
"Why—John!"
He stood smiling almost bashfully.
"I thought you'd better have the whole family while you were about it," he said.
She gathered her family into eager hands. "I'd rather have them than anything in the world!" she said softly.
"They didn't cost much," he volunteered. "Twenty cents apiece—the kind you send on post-cards, you know."
"I don't care what they cost!" said the little woman. "It's worth it!... The doctor says I'm going to be real well, John, when I get up."
She was looking at the baby, in his knitted sack. "But there won't be any more babies," she said half wistfully.
John blew his nose violently and looked out of the window.
"I'd better be going," he announced.
"Yes—time for you to go," said Aunt Jane. She moved with him toward the door.
In the corridor he turned to her. "Tickled most to death, wa'n't she?—I was kind o' 'fraid she'd think it was foolish."
"If more men were foolish, the world would get along a good deal better," said Aunt Jane cryptically.
She beamed on him. "You better not come again for four-five days now, Mr. Pelton. She'd ought to keep quiet and not think about what the children are doing and what's going on.
"She can think about her pictures for a while," she added kindly as his face fell. "There's times when picture children help more than real ones—more handy for sick folks sometimes."
"I guess that's so," said the man. "I don't know as I ever saw her look so pleased—not since before we were married," he added thoughtfully.
Aunt Jane watched him march happilydown the corridor. Then she turned back to the room.
The woman had spread the children in a little row along the ridge of the blanket, and was looking at them with happy eyes. She turned her gaze to Aunt Jane as she came in.
"Wa'n't that just like a man!" she said deprecatingly.
"Just like a man," assented Aunt Jane. "One of them senseless things that comes out all right!"
She sat down comfortably by the bed. "Sometimes I think men don't know any more'n big grampuses—they just go blundering along!" She looked benevolently at the row of faces on the blanket.
Half-way down the corridor Aunt Jane encountered Miss Canfield.
The nurse stopped her with a word. "Mr. Medfield keeps asking for you." She raised her chin a little as she spoke.
Aunt Jane regarded it mildly.
"Anything the matter with him?" she asked.
Miss Canfield hesitated. "He's irritable," she said safely.
Aunt Jane nodded. "That's good for him—— That won't hurt any! He's got his Suite and he's got the best 'special' in the house on his case."
Miss Canfield's face softened subtly.
"You tell him I'm busy," said Aunt Jane. "Tell him I'll come by and by, when I get around to it—— There's Miss Manners with a baby! I was just looking for a baby!" She hurried off.
Miss Canfield watched, with amused face, while Aunt Jane gathered the baby into herample arms and disappeared in Room 15. Then she turned back to report to Herman Medfield in Suite A that Aunt Jane would come when she was not so busy.
Aunt Jane gazed shrewdly over the little bundle of blankets in her arms at Edith Dalton, sitting propped against her pillows and scowling a little discontentedly.
Aunt Jane sat down and undid the blanket. "They're such cute little things," she said. "It don't seem as if there'd ever be enough ofhimto make a man of, does it!" She held up the coming man in his long white gown.
Edith Dalton glanced indifferently—and glanced away.
The baby, out of his blue eyes, gazed at something unseen.
"I always do wonder what they're looking at and what they're thinking about!" said Aunt Jane. She had gathered the baby comfortably up against the curve of her breast and was rocking gently back and forth.
"I don't suppose they think about anything," said Edith Dalton with a look of unconcern.
"I used to think maybe that was so," said Aunt Jane. "But since I've had so many of 'em——"
"How many have you had?" asked the other quickly.
"Of my own—you mean?" Aunt Jane paused. "I never had but one of my own," she said regretfully. "But here—I've had three hundred and sixty-nine."
Edith Dalton smiled a faint smile.
Aunt Jane watched it and rocked.
"It's different when you've a good many," she said placidly. "You begin to see what they mean—just plain baby! Not because it'syourbaby, you know—but what they're like and what they mean."
"They don't mean much of anything, do they—except to cry?" The indifferent look held itself, but something had stirred in it.
"Yes, they cry!" Aunt Jane was silent.... "They cry, good and hard sometimes.... And that means something, too. Folks don't let 'em cry half enough,Ithink! I don't know what it means—their crying so," she admitted. "But it sounds as if it meant something—something more than just tummy-ache....And their smiling's like that, too. It isn't just smiling at something you do to them, or something you say. It's more as if they were smiling at something inside—kind of as if the whole world was a joke to 'em, and being alive was a kind of beautiful joke—if we could see how 'tis." She was looking down at the bundle in her arms and smiling to it.
Edith Dalton eyed it curiously.
Aunt Jane shook her head reproachfully at the baby, still smiling a little. She looked significantly at Edith Dalton. "He's trying to get his thumb in," she said. "They won't let him do that in there." She nodded toward the other wing.
"He kind of knows, I reckon. He knows his Aunt Jane will let him do it—if he can." She watched him happily.
"There! he's done it!"
The woman glanced at the baby indifferently and then at Aunt Jane's face, and the softness crept out a little.
"You think a great deal of babies and children, don't you?" She said it almost jealously.
"Yes, I love 'em," said Aunt Jane. She rocked happily. "You didn't ever have any children, did you?"
"No."
Aunt Jane's face made no comment. She rocked a minute. "I reckon women always wants children.... Every woman wants 'em—even when she doesn't know.... She wants 'em—way in back somewhere; she kind o' misses 'em."
She rocked again—slowly.
"I only had that one baby myself—and he died. But I've always been thankful I had him—even if he died.... That was a good many years ago. But even now, every once in a while, I'll dream I'm holding him in my arms; and then I'll wake up—and I'm not holding anything.... When I wake up like that, when I've been dreaming, I generally throw on my wrapper and run down to the Mother's Ward and wander around a spell, tucking 'em in and seeing that everybody's comfortable. Then I can generally go back and go to sleep all right."
Her face was beautiful and gentle as she talked, and Edith Dalton watched it wistfully.She had relaxed a little, and rested back against the pillow.
"You don't want children unless you have a home for them," she said half rebelliously.
"That's so. Children do need a home! I guess that's what homes are for—little children playing round in 'em."
The two women were silent and the room grew darker. Aunt Jane watched the face on her arm.
"He's going to sleep," she said. "I'll have to take him back to his mammy."
She got up quietly and moved toward the door, jogging her arms as she went. At the door she paused and looked back, over the sleeping child, to the woman on the pillows and smiled to her—as if they knew something together.
Then she went out. And Edith Dalton lay staring at the wall. Slowly her eyes filled with tears that sobbed and ran down her face. She covered them with her hands and sobbed again and nestled to the pillows and cried happily—as if her heart were breaking in her.
"Mr. Medfield is asking for you again," said Miss Canfield.
Aunt Jane, coming out of the Children's Ward, stopped and looked at the nurse and smiled. "I suppose he's fussing and tewing a good deal?" she asked.
"He is," admitted Miss Canfield.
"Well, I'll be in by and by. You can tell him I'm coming."
She went leisurely on. When she had made the rounds of the top floor and had descended to the office and entered a few items in her day-book and given directions for linen and had a conference with the cook, she turned toward Suite A.
She knocked on the outer door, and bent her head a little to listen—and as she listened she had a sudden sense of the room on the other side of the door—she saw it lying in the darkness, and she heard the rooster's clear, shrill call through the window, and saw the straightform on the bed. It all came before her and vanished as she put her hand on the door and knocked.
"Come in!" The voice was sharp and a little imperious.
Aunt Jane opened the door.
A burst of light and color greeted her. The shades were rolled to the tops of the windows. And there were flowers everywhere.... Roses on the table, a great bunch of carnations on the desk, violets on the stand at the head of Herman Medfield's bed, foxgloves and snapdragons filling the window-sill and spilling over into the room. It was a riot of color; and in the midst of it, propped on his pillows on the high white bed, the millionaire looked out with a scowl.
He wore an embroidered Chinese shoulder coat of blue and gold; and his hair, carefully combed, stood up a little on his forehead. The Vandyke beard was clipped to a point.
"You look pretty as a picture," said Aunt Jane cheerfully.
The scowl deepened a little—then it broke. "Will you sit down?" said Medfield politely.
Aunt Jane drew up a chair.
He watched her descend into it and his brow cleared. "I have been wanting to see you."
Aunt Jane nodded. "I've been meaning to come. There's a good many things to do in a hospital." The chair adjusted itself—"Was it anything in particular you wanted to ask me about?"
The millionaire's eyes had been resting on the quiet face. They turned away, a little startled. "Why—um—yes! I was thinking—I was thinking—" His eyes fell on the roses and he swept a hand toward them. "These flowers—all of them!" he said.
Aunt Jane turned a little in her chair and beamed. "They look nice, don't they?"
"They're well enough," said Medfield grudgingly. Then—with petulance: "I'm tired of them. I want them taken away—all of them!"
"Sick folks get notions," said Aunt Jane placidly. "Where shall I take 'em to?"
"Why, take them—" He looked about impatiently. "Take them where you usually take flowers!"
"We generally take them to the folks they're sent to." She leaned forward to the violetsand touched them with cool, gentle fingers, looking at them kindly.
"There's something about violets makes me think of home places," she said.
"Would you like them?" said Herman Medfield. He was watching the cool, firm fingers with a quiet look—almost a pleasant look.
"Me?—Mercy, no!" The fingers withdrew to her lap. "You couldn'tsend'em to me. I'm here."
"Yes, you are here—that's so!" He almost smiled at her. His eyes returned to the fingers resting in her lap. "I have not had a chance to thank you—for your great kindness the other night."
"You are welcome," said Aunt Jane.
"It wasn't any great kindness," she added after a minute, "I always do for folks that need me."
"I suppose you know—" He stopped a moment, as if he could not quite speak of the thing that was in his mind. "I think youmademe—come back," he said slowly.
"It makes a difference whether somebody cares," admitted Aunt Jane.
"Did you care?" The sharp, pointed face was turned to her. "Did you care—!"
"Yes, I cared," said Aunt Jane.
"But—" He looked at her, bewildered, and was silent—looking before him.
Aunt Jane regarded him and smiled. "There didn't seem to be anybodybutme—to care," she said cheerfully.
"No—there wasn't."
"But I see now that there's a good many of them—" She motioned to the flowers. "I don't know as I ever see anybody have more flowers the first week."
"Flowers don't care—the people those came from don't care!"
The tone was scornful, almost bitter.
"Don't they!" She beamed on the flowers. "Somehow I can't ever believe flowers don't mean what they look," she said thoughtfully.
"These don't!" His little cynical smile rested on them. "Those roses there—They must have cost ten dollars at least——"
"I never saw bigger ones," assented Aunt Jane.
"My partner's widow sent them.... She sent them for business."
"Didshe!" Aunt Jane looked at the roses with interest.
"Mere business!" said Medfield. "And the carnations on the desk there—are from the men in the office——"
"There's always something fresh about carnations." She got up leisurely and went over to them and lifted the vase and brought it to him.
"Just smell of those!" She held them out. "Aren't they just about the freshest things you ever smelled!"
He sniffed at them reluctantly and motioned them aside.
"And those foxgloves there——"
He was talking out all the bitterness that had been in him as he had lain and watched the great boxes opened and the flowers ranged about him—"exactly as if I were a funeral!" he finished up at last.
Aunt Jane smiled to him. "What would you like me to do with them for you?" she asked tranquilly.
"Do whatever you like.Idon't care!" His indifference had returned and he looked tired.
She leaned forward a little. "I'm going to take out that head-rest," she said, "so's you can lie down."
She removed the frame from behind the pillows and shook them a little and let them gently back. "There—now you can lie down and have a good rest; and pretty quick now you're going to have some broth and then you'll go to sleep.... It don't do any good to get stirred up over folks' flowers," she said quietly.
"No." There was a little smile on his lips. He looked up at her, almost like a boy, from his pillow. "But it did me good to tell you!"
"I reckoned it would," said Aunt Jane. "Now I'll go get your broth for you."
She disappeared from the room and Herman Medfield's eyes closed—and opened again to find her standing beside him, the cup of broth in her hand.
She gave it to him through the crooked tube and watched the liquid lower in the cup with benignant eye.
"Just a little mite more," she said as he turned away his head—"Just a mite. There! You've done first-rate!"
She set the cup on the stand.
"Now I'm going to take all these flowers—" she gathered the carnations in her hands as she spoke: "I was thinking about it whilst I was heating your broth for you—I'm going to take them up to the Children's Ward. They'll be happy enough—when they see 'em!" She held the flowers at arm's length and looked at them with pleased eyes. He watched her with a faint smile and a look almost of interest.
"And I'm going to tell them that Mr. Medfield sent them——"
He raised a quick hand. "No——!"
She turned in surprise. "Don't you want me to tell them?"
"No."
He waited a minute.
"You can say a man sent them."
"Yes, I can say that—" Aunt Jane's face cleared. "I see how 'tis— You don't want them to know about you—who you are."
"No." He was looking almost embarrassed.
She considered it a minute. "What is your first name?" she asked.
He cleared his throat like a boy. "Herman,"he said meekly. "Herman G. Medfield."
Aunt Jane smiled. "I remember about it now—'Herman,'" she said it softly, as if it pleased her. "Herman— That'll do! We don't need the G.—just Herman.... I'll tell them Mr. Herman sent them." She smiled at him cheerfully.
"Very well."
Aunt Jane went over to the window and gathered up the foxgloves—as many as her hands could hold—and turned to the door.
"I'll come back for the rest."
But the door had opened and the white-coated boy was standing, holding out three large boxes and grinning pleasantly.
Herman Medfield, from his pillow, groaned.
Aunt Jane glanced toward him with reassurance in her look—"I shall take them all— You don't need to worry. You won't be bothered. You go get the wheel-tray, Preston, and we'll take 'em all at once."
They filled the cart—the three great boxes underneath and the loose flowers on top covering them and trailing over the sides and ends: and Preston wheeled it out the door.
Aunt Jane, still with her hands full of blossoms, looked back with a smile. "Now you'll rest comfortable," she said.