CHAPTER XXIIDARK DAYS
Earlyin the morning Janice went to Mrs. Beasely’s cottage. She was diffident about offering her services to the widow; but she was sure Aunt ’Mira would see nothing wrong in her doing so. She just couldn’t enter into any discussion of Nelson’s illness at home, that was all.
Not many people were astir on the side street; the front blinds of the widow’s home were closed, and that fact startled the girl. Mrs. Beasely was in her kitchen, clearing the breakfast table.
“It’s the first chance I’ve had to do ’em,” she said, referring to the dishes. “That poor boy’s an awful one ter care for. Out of his head most of the time; and when he ain’t, he’s fussin’. Dr. Poole says there’s something on his mind—his school work, like enough. Mr. Haley works awful hard. Some folks says he gads about with that Bowman gal too much; but I must say he spen’s enough time over his books. He’s the one that burns the midnight ile, if anybody does.”
“Is he better this morning?” asked Janice.
“I dunno. The doctor ain’t been. He never left him till midnight and I jest caught cat-naps on the sofa in his room until daybreak. Thank goodness! Mr. Haley’s asleep now. But his room looks like the wrath o’ doom had struck it.”
“Can’t I help you?” queried Janice. “I can clear up his room and dust. I won’t make any more noise than a mouse.”
“Well—if youwould,” said Mrs. Beasely, with a sigh. “And if you’d watch till he wakes up, I could git another little nap and feel fresh for the day. He ain’t to be waked for his medicine; but when he does wake you can run and tell me and I’ll give it to him.”
“I’ll do that, dear Mrs. Beasely, gladly,” said Janice. “He needn’t know that you haven’t been with him all the time. Maybe he wouldn’t like anybody else to be in his room.”
“Humph! I don’t know as it would hurt him. But it might fret him, as you say. So we’ll say nothing about it.”
The girl went rather tremblingly to the big chamber in which Nelson slept. It was easily “ridded up,” as Polktown housewives expressed it. Nelson lay quietly on his bed and at first Janice did not even look at him. She feared if she approached the bedside she might disturb the young man.
But when he groaned and turned uneasily, she came nearer. His face was so pale and wan thatit troubled her. The veins in his closed eyelids were startlingly blue. He had not shaved for two days and the sparce down upon his cheeks and lip made him look even more boyish than usual.
He did not awaken; but Janice saw that his pillow was rumpled and must be uncomfortable. She slipped her strong arm under his neck and lifted him a little, while with the other hand she plumped up the pillow.
Nelson groaned and muttered something. His wandering hand caught at hers as she drew it away, and clung to it for a moment.
“Janice! Janice!” he murmured.
The girl was really frightened. She stood with palpitating heart, fearful that he had recognized her. What would he think if he knew that she had come to his sick room after they had been so long estranged?
But Nelson was not conscious. He might have been dreaming of her—the thought afterward thrilled Janice; but he actually knew nothing of her presence. She finished tidying the room and then sat down by the window where a little light came through the blind, and waited.
What would Daddy say if he knew she was doing this? She tried to remember all her father had written regarding her feeling for Nelson Haley and his feeling for her. During those months whencircumstances had separated them, Janice had missed his companionship sorely.
Had he missed her? Was he as unhappy as she was regarding the breaking off of their friendship?
Daddy had said that one of the finest inspirations for a young man just starting out in life was the friendship of a young girl. Janice was sure that she had never done anything to harm Nelson; quite the contrary.
But Annette Bowman! Janice distrusted the civil engineer’s sister. Her influence over Nelson could not be good.
Since the barn dance at Judge Slater’s Annette had not been so popular in Polktown. The tongue of gossip wagged industriously about her. It was told that she had been requested to leave the barn dance because of her disgraceful actions. Her name was coupled with “that foreigner,” Bogarti. The very ladies who went to the dancing master for instruction sneered at Annette for having been so familiar with him.
Had Janice been a revengeful girl she could have gloated over Annette’s fall in public estimation. Not that the city girl’s pedestal had been one to envy from the beginning. She had gained no faithful friends, nor any real place in the public estimation. She had catered merely to the thoughtless and frivolous and had influenced only such people as desired to be showy and up-to-date.
Annette was another kind of “do something” person. She had stirred Polktown, it was true; but Janice doubted if the girl had stirred it to any good purpose. Dress, and dancing, and social life played a very small part, after all, in the real progress of the town.
Unfortunately, Nelson Haley had been swept into the current of Annette’s influence. The fact had been publicly commented upon. Janice knew that it was very fortunate for him that he had not chanced to attend her at the barn dance and that her own brother had brought her back to town. Otherwise the tongue of scandal would surely have been busy with his name, too. Why, right now, Janice knew, there were mothers who had forbidden their girls to speak to Annette on the street, or go to houses where she was made welcome.
There was a feeling, too, throughout the town, that the person in charge of the children, delegated to instruct and lead them, should not be too frivolous. Nelson’s association with Miss Bowman might be used as a lever to oust him from the principalship of the school. Elder Concannon did not like the young man and would be glad to put him out if he could.
“And it would be a dreadful thing,” thought Janice as she sat quietly in the sick chamber, “if this third year in the Polktown school should injure Nelson’s career instead of helping him. Those peopleat the college are watching him sharply, I am sure. He can fail just as surely this year as he could last.
“Oh, dear me! I wonder if he does really care for Annette? I don’t see how he can admire her; yet her brother loves her and overlooks her most glaring faults. I suppose there is nobody so mean that they haven’t some good traits. And Annette Bowman is pretty, accomplished, bright, and can be pleasant company. I expect she has all the airs and graces that attract young men—and she knows how to use them.
“Am I doing right—have I been doing right since last summer—to let Annette have him without a struggle? He was my friend before he was hers. For his own sake, should I have put forth more effort to win Nelson away from that girl?”
The thought made Janice blush; yet now she seriously contemplated the question, which she had refused to do before. Her natural delicacy had kept this phase of the situation at a distance. But why shouldn’t she think of it? Now that Nelson was ill, she wanted to do everything that she could for him. If he was entangled in the skein of Annette Bowman’s machinations, then he was mentally and spiritually ill and needed her assistance quite as much.
Nelson was without a single relative save his old aunt; and she was at a distance. As far as Janiceknew, he had few close friends, even among his college associates. She had been as close to him as anybody. Why shouldn’t she undertake to save him from Annette just as she might help save his life now that he was ill? Was her duty not the same in either case?
There was a movement from the young fellow on the bed. Janice sprang up and tiptoed to his side. Nelson suddenly started into a sitting posture and his eyes were wide open.
“You get her to come here—you get her,” he murmured, clutching at Janice’s hand.
“Yes, yes! Lie down, Nelson, do,” she said, firmly, trying to put him back upon the pillow.
“Is she coming?” he whispered, hoarsely. His poor voice did not sound at all as it used to sound.
“Yes, yes!” Janice declared. “Do lie down.”
“You tell her I’ve just got to speak to her. I’ve got to!” went on the hoarse voice, wildly.
Janice feared he would awaken Mrs. Beasely. He would not lie down.
“Yes,” she promised him. “I’ll get her to come and see you. You—you mean Annette, don’t you?”
The name did not seem to catch his ear, and he kept muttering that he “must see her.”
“She shall come, Nelson,” Janice promised again, her own voice broken. “You mean you want to see Annette?”
“Annette? Yes—Annette,” he muttered. “Poor Annette—and—and——”
He allowed her to replace his head upon the pillow. His words faded into incomprehensible murmurings. His eyes closed. He seemed to breathe more easily and regularly.
Janice tiptoed away from the bed. Nelson seemed appeased and relieved when she had promised to bring Annette to his bedside. The girl experienced a pang that hurt her physically. She could feel her heart throbbing under the hand with which she attempted to still it.
There must be a serious attachment between Nelson and Annette. Otherwise, it seemed to her, he would not be worrying about the city girl when he was delirious. Janice’s experience with seriously ill people had been very limited indeed.
She sat down by the window again and waited. The doorbell rang and Mrs. Beasely was awakened. Janice heard her go heavily to the door.
“Good morning, Doctor!” the widow said, and Dr. Poole’s heavy voice replied:
“Just as bad as ever, Mrs. Beasely. How’s the patient?”
Janice whisked out of the room and went into the kitchen. There she waited until Mrs. Beasely came back for hot water with which to sterilize the doctor’s instruments.
“What does he say?” asked the girl, breathlessly.
“Seems encouraged. But I ain’t,” groaned the widow. “Nobody can live long and refuse vittles like Mr. Haley does. It was the trouble with my Charles,” she continued, referring to her husband, who frequently was the subject of Mrs. Beasely’s conversation. “If he could have kep’ on eatin’ he’d ha’ been alive to-day,” with which unanswerable argument she stalked back into the sick chamber.
Janice waylaid Dr. Poole as he was going out. “Hello, Janice Day!” he exclaimed, cheerfully. “Are you on the job? Then I’m sure my patient is going to get better right away.”
“I am only helping Mrs. Beasely a little,” she said. “But I wished to ask you, Doctor, if it would hurt Mr. Haley to—to see people?”
“Not a bit! Go right in and see him—only keep quiet. Your cheerful, pretty face is better than any drug——”
“Oh! I don’t mean myself,” gasped Janice. “But he has expressed a desire to see somebody else.”
“Hah! I knew there was something on his mind. Who does he want to see?” demanded the doctor.
“A—a young lady.”
“Hah!” snorted the physician again. “I thought he had more sense! Well, who is she?”
“Miss Bowman, who lives down at the Inn with her brother.”
“Hah!” and the doctor’s third snort was greater than those that had gone before. “I did think Nelse Haley had more sense. But if he wants her he might as well have her. But only for a few moments, and tell her to humor him. She can cross him as much as she wants to when he is well; but his mind must be at rest now, or I shall not answer for the consequences,” and the gruff old doctor strode away, shaking his head as he went.
And he went before Janice could finish her observations. She had wished to ask the doctor to stop in and speak to Annette himself. But, it seemed, the duty devolved upon her.
When she left Mrs. Beasely’s, having done all she could to help the troubled lady, she went straight to the Inn. She knew that Frank was away and that made her visit all the harder. At this time of year Ma’am Parraday, as the traveling salesmen called her, kept but one maid to help her—a Swedish girl so blankly ignorant that she scarcely knew enough “to lift one foot out of the way of t’other,” as the innkeeper’s wife expressed it. There was no use giving her name to this girl, for she wouldn’t have remembered it till she got to Annette’s sitting-room door; so Janice followed on behind the hulking figure and waited while the girl thundered a summons on the portal.
“For the love of the land, come in!” cried Annette’s querulous voice from within. “You’ll be the death of me, Amalia. My nerves are all frazzled by your pounding on the door. What is it—towels? or a pitcher of water? Or—— My goodness! Janice Day! What do you want?”
The welcome she received did not help Janice in her errand; but perhaps it brought her more bluntly to it.
“Mr. Haley is very ill,” she said. “He is threatened with pneumonia. Dr. Poole says he seems troubled about something, and he has expressed a desire to see you.”
“To seeme?” gasped Annette. “Oh! I don’t like to see sick people. I—I’m not a bit of good in a sick room.”
“But you can help make him well by calling on him for a few minutes, can’t you?” demanded Janice, sharply.
Annette caught the tone, and seemed to see something in Janice’s face that displeased her.
“I suppose you are in close attendance upon him, Miss Day?” she drawled. “Dear me! I shouldn’t think he would want anybody else.”
“I am not in attendance on him,” Janice said, sternly. “And he has not asked to see me. It is you he wants. I should think that you would have no hesitancy in going at such a time.”
“Oh, dear me!” said Annette, with one of hersilliest smiles. “I have my reputation to think of. To go to a young man’s boarding place—of course, he’s ill——”
“Mrs. Beasely will be there, and Mrs. Beasely is above reproach,” said Janice, wearily, and turning toward the door. “You will come?”
“Now, really, I’d like to, of course. Poor Nelson! And he wants to see me? Just fancy!”
“And she never expressed any feeling for him at all,” Janice said over and over to herself as she trudged home. “What a wicked, heartless girl!”
Nelson was not so well that evening. Janice learned that Annette had called, but had remained only a few moments and had refused to enter the sick chamber save with Mrs. Beasely. That good lady said, with a sniff:
“Poor gal! if she’s in love with him she must ha’ felt turrible bad, for of course she couldn’t tell him so with me there. She said folks had talked so mean about her that she didn’t dare give way as she’d like to an’ come right up here and help nuss him. I’m awful gladyouair sech a practical, sensible gal, Janice. An’ ye air a mortal help to a body.”
Janice was curious enough to ask if Mr. Haley seemed to recognize Annette and be aware of her presence.
“Oh, yes! he cheered up right away,” declared Mrs. Beasely. “But he’s as flighty as an unbrokencolt again now. I guess we’ll have a time with him to-night.”
For Janice, having gained her aunt’s permission, had brought a wrapper and felt-soled slippers, determined to help watch with the patient that night. Mrs. Beasely was grateful for her help, too, before morning. Nelson was very uneasy and excitable. He seemed to have forgotten that Annette had come, and was talking all the time about her—wishing she would come, and declaring that he must speak to her.
In the morning the doctor shook his head more gravely than before. Nelson was very weak. The drugs he took seemed not to take hold upon him as they should.
“Trouble here,” said Dr. Poole, tapping his forehead. “But what it is I don’t know. That girl came to see him? Well! it didn’t seem to relieve his mind any.”
That was Thanksgiving Day; but there was little thanksgiving in two of the homes of Polktown. It was a worrisome day at the Widow Beasely’s and at the old Day house Marty declared there “warn’t no taste to nothin’, not even to the turkey, without Janice.”
That, and several days that followed, were indeed dark days for Nelson Haley. His name was mentioned in the Friday night prayer meeting at the church, and Mr. Middler spoke feelingly of theyoung man who had given so much of himself for the benefit of the children of Polktown.
If there had been those who criticized Nelson’s association with Annette Bowman, they were shamed to silence now. The shadow of death hovered over the young schoolmaster, and the tongue of slander was stilled.