It was on the day of Gloria's visit with the District Nurse that Mr.
McAndrew came home to luncheon, which was rather an unusual proceeding
for the busy attorney during hot weather. Mrs. McAndrew, seated with her
mending on the shady piazza, could see a worried expression upon her
husband's face even before he reached the steps.
“Something is the matter,” she said, rising hastily, while spools and
scissors fell upon the cat dozing near. “Something is the matter or he
would never have come home in this boiling sun.”
“What is it, dear?” she asked, as the middle-aged, slightly bent figure
toiled up the steps exhaustedly.
“Where is Gloria?” was Mr. McAndrew's reply, as he dropped with a sigh
of relief into one of the piazza chairs.
“Gone with Miss--I can't think of her name--the District Nurse. She
would go--you mustn't blame me. Ask Abou Ben if she wasn't the settest
little thing!”
“I was afraid so--felt it in my bones. Now, why,” groaned the lawyer,
“must she have selected today? And here I've come up home at the risk of
my life all to no end! I wanted to make sure she wasn't poking round in
that miserable street today, of all days--and you have to tell me she
_is!_”
“You mustn't blame me,” his wife repeated mildly. “You know yourself
when Glory's _set_--”
“Yes, but you ought to have been set, too! Why didn't you put your foot
down that she shouldn't go off to such a foolish place? No knowing what
mischief it has done!” worried a look as did her husband's. Then she
added, “If we had explained the whole thing to her at the start, it
would not have been so difficult. But how is anyone to tell her now? She
is so intense, and she's hardly more than a child to reason with. And in
the meantime she's gotten so many ideas into her head that she wouldn't
have had, maybe, if she had known the situation from the first, and
grown up with it.”
“I acted for the best,” her husband grumbled. “Such things are coming
up in life all the time. But when women are mixed up in 'em, there's
no making them see straight. It wasn't fitting that Gloria should have
everything explained to her at the start. It wasn't businesslike. When
she comes into full control of things herself, it will be different. I
am afraid Richards is not quite the man to have charge of things down
there. I have given him his own way too much. But one has to with
Richards. He's a good collector.”
“But the stair-rail, dear,” interposed his wife. “Stair-railings should
be secure, above all things.”
“Yes, Richards ought to have seen that everything was safe. I cannot
understand a glaring negligence like that. He's always given me the
impression that things were kept very fairly shipshape.” Having said
this, Mr. McAndrew rose and began pacing the veranda.
“Richards said it was a poor, half-witted creature,” he murmured, as
though thinking aloud.
“But, dear,” interposed his wife, “half-witted creatures can be killed!”
Aunt Em's thoughts seemed to be keeping pace with those of the man
marching up and down the piazza floor.
“Oh, she won't die. That sort o' folks don't,” her husband answered.
And at that moment Gloria was standing in Rose's room in No. 80,
listening to the dying away of the footsteps of the angry mother of
Sal, the woman vowing vengeance on the one who could leave a house to
tumble down over people's heads. And in with the angry tones were the
protesting ones of the District Nurse.
A few moments later Rose's door opened, and the District Nurse, flushed
and worried, entered.
“Sal's mother has been drinking, and she's wild over the accident,” she
said in tones as steady as she could make them. But Gloria saw that she
was strangely wrought up.
“Drink or no drink,” said Gloria, with a bridling of her head. “I should
think a mother had cause to be worked up over an accident like that.” A
look of hauteur was on the young girl's face. “That such things can be,
and no note taken of them, is a disgrace to the century.”
The nurse's face paled, as she looked into Gloria's eyes.
“Don't, Gloria, don't!” she said pleadingly. “It is pitiful enough.
Don't--” she stopped.
“And may not one even utter a protest against the existence of such a
thing?” said Gloria. “Well, I shall go to the hospital and see Sal. I
can at least do that.”
“It can hardly do any good,” said the nurse in a discouraged tone. “But
if you really wish to go, Gloria, I will go with you.”
“Very well,” said Gloria, “we will go just as soon as we get rested
after luncheon.”
At the corner near Gloria's home, the District Nurse bade Gloria
good-by, as she had an errand to do on her way home. Gloria watched her
to a car. Then she turned and made her own way back to Treeless Street.
It was on the corner near No. 80 that she came upon the very one she was
wishing for.
“Oh, Dinney, I am so glad to find you! I want your help. You are a good
business man, and I want you to do something for me.”
“I a good business man?” said Dinney, grinning from ear to ear. “I
should say! What's your business, Miss?” And having said this, he
doubled up with droll laughter.
“Don't!” said Gloria, laying her hand beseechingly upon him. “I am
really in earnest.”
Dinney straightened, and then in as decorous a manner as he could
command, said:
“I'm your man for business.”
“Very well. Now, Dinney, you're listening. I want you--to--find--out,”
said Gloria, impressively speaking each word distinctly, “who it is that
owns No. 80. I want you to find it out, and I want you to tell me and
_no one else_. If you will find out and _promise_ not to tell _anyone
else_, and will come to me with the name, then I will give you a
_five-dollar gold piece_.”
Dinney's breath was fairly taken away. He stood there on the sidewalk
stock still, looking into the face of the girl before him. At last he
said in an awed voice:
“Honest?”
“Honest,” answered Gloria.
The boy drew a long breath. Five dollars! Instantly there came before
him some little red shoes for Hunkie, and some stockings, and maybe a
little red cap. But there was not time to go further into the matter as
to what five dollars might stand for. Gloria's hand was grasping his
shoulders with a firm grip.
“Will you find it out, Dinney? Will you? Will you come to me straight
with the name and to nobody else?”
What she saw of honesty and truth in Dinney's face so satisfied the girl
that her hands fell from the thin shoulders, and she in turn drew a
long breath as though she had found at last something she had long
been seeking. Then she looked down at Dinney. “I am going to tell you,
Dinney, just why I am wanting to find out. You would like to know a nice
secret; something we can keep to ourselves--a wonderful secret!” Dinney
was all expectation. At last he said, “Ma used to tell me things. She
told me lots the rest of the folks didn't know. All about pa and how
it was when they first married and lots more. I never told anyone else
around, as she said not to.”
“And you won't tell this? We will have it all to ourselves, and it will
make you want to help me. Sometimes boys can find out things big folks
can't. It came to me when I was walking along with the District Nurse
that you were just the one to help me. You're so--well, so sharp yet
safe. If they suspected, they would not let us know, maybe.”
The two were now walking along in a companionable way back in the
direction Gloria had come.
“Dinney, if you find out who owns that house I will buy it. I've got
money; Uncle Em says I have. I will buy it and we'll fix it up good.”
Dinney's face was aglow, his eyes shone, his breath was drawn sharp and
quick.
“Would you put in new stairs and new ceilings and new window panes if
you bought that house?”
“Yes, I would,” said Gloria. “At first I thought I'd tear it down. But I
don't believe now I would, it's been home for so many. I'd just like to
see it fixed up the way it should have been years and years and years
ago.”
“And you'd fix the hole in the ceiling?” asked the boy. Evidently that
break in the ceiling over the bed that had been his mother's had left a
deep impression on him.
“Wouldn't I, Dinney!” And now the girl's eyes shone. “It is a secret
worth keeping,” she said.
“I should say!” answered Dinney. “And I'll find out if--if--it takes my
life, I will.”
Dinney was young in years, but old in experience. His small figure now
straightened with determination, and over his face swept a look of
honest manliness far beyond his years. Gloria, looking down upon him,
felt glad she had taken him for a helper. “I wish mother had waited,”
Dinney said quietly, and then the two parted.
After her late luncheon, eaten alone, her uncle having returned to the
office, Gloria was ready for the District Nurse, who had promised to go
with her to the hospital. Aunt Em was taking a nap, so Gloria did not
disturb her. As the two walked along, Gloria's impatience broke forth
afresh.
“A coat of tar and feathers would serve the one right that allows such
things to exist!” she said.
“Don't, Gloria!” cried the nurse, in the same tone of terror she had
used in the hallway when trying to quiet Sal's mother.
“But I mean it!” said Gloria. “I don't see how the owner of that
building with all those trippy places can sleep nights. Think of anyone
taking rent for a house like that! I never knew such places were allowed
in the market.”
“I don't believe I would be so hard, Gloria, if I were you. Let it
rest.” There was a strange note of wistful pleading in the nurse's
voice. But Gloria did not heed it.
“Let it rest? Never!” she answered.
The hospital reached, the neatly-uniformed interne who came down to
answer the District Nurse's inquiry, assured them that their patient was
resting quietly. He even went so far as to say that possibly the fall
might work good in the end.
“I only say might in a general way. If the poor creature's mental apathy
has been due to an injury of the head, it may possibly be. Do you know
the cause of her mental condition?” he inquired of the nurse.
The nurse gave the information desired.
“If that is so, then the second blow may neutralize the first. It is
certainly an interesting case.” But at the end he assured his visitors
that time only could prove what the outcome might be. “Poor Sal!” said
the nurse, as they left the large building, and went quietly down the
stone steps. “I wonder if it would be comforting to her to know she is
an 'interesting case.' Sal was never interesting before.”
[Illustration: “I WILL GET THE MONEY FOR YOU, DINNEY,”]
“But just think if he should be right!” said Gloria, quivering with
excitement. “Wouldn't it be beautiful, just beautiful, if it should come
true! It would almost make me forgive that awful man who did not mend
the railing.”
“But then,” said the nurse, “unless life changes all through for Sal, it
might be worse to be beaten and starved and feel conscious of it, than
to be beaten and starved in a half-demented condition.”
“Oh, don't put it that way!” said Gloria.
“I could not help thinking how little you can see of what her life all
these years has been--you with your young sheltered life.”
Gloria's face softened. “No; one cannot discern--that is, I mean I
could not before to-day. But anything seems possible after all that has
happened to-day.”
It was while Gloria was standing on her own steps, having watched the
District Nurse close her door, that she caught sight of a little figure
flying up the street. It was Dinney. She waited impatiently for his
approach.
“I've got it, Miss Gloria!” he said, coming panting up the steps. “I've
got it! I struck the very man and he told me. He wrote it down for me.
It belongs to an estate. Here it is.”
Gloria looked down at the card that bore a few lines indifferently
traced. But what her eyes met caused the color to drift from her face.
“Are you _sure_, Dinney?” she said sharply to the boy. “Are you _sure_?
Quick!” A faintness was seizing her.
“Sure,” answered the boy.
The girl laid a trembling hand upon the door. “I will get the money for
you, Dinney, when I know you are dead right.”
The voice was not the voice Dinney knew. Looking at the girl, he saw
that tears had sprung to her eyes. She was fumbling blindly with the
latch-key.
“Miss Gloria,” he said, in an awed voice, as he took the key and fitted
it for her, “don't you go to feeling like that.” Suddenly he was a man
in his protective earnestness. “It ain't nothin' to you.”
But Gloria had passed him and was already ascending the broad flight of
stairs leading from the reception hall. She had forgotten her key, she
had forgotten to close the door. Dinney thoughtfully took the key out
and placed it on a stand near. Then closing the door after him, he went
slowly down the steps.
Somehow the brightness had gone from the day--he knew not why. But
it was gone. He turned toward Pleasant Street--Gloria's “Treeless
Street”--but there was no whistle now upon his lips.