After the first few weeks were over Jean recovered her strength more
quickly than had been expected, and by the end of the second month was
able to take her usual place in the household.
One of the first things which she had done after being pronounced
convalescent was to fold away with her own hands all the tiny garments
which had been prepared with such joy, and to cover the dainty new
furnishings of the nursery with careful wrappings. This done, the key
was turned in the lock, and henceforward there was a ghost-chamber in
the house--a chamber haunted by the ghost of a dead hope.
Jean spoke but little of her loss--the wound went too deep for words;
and as time went on some of the old interest in life began to revive,
aided by the joys of recovered health, and of Robert's devotion, if
possible more ardent than before. Nevertheless no one could look upon
her without realising the change wrought by the last few months. She
had been a merry, thoughtless girl, to whom grief and pain were but
abstract words conveying no definite impression: now the great
revelation had come, anguish of body, anguish of soul, and she emerged
from the shadows, sobered and thoughtful.
"What women have to suffer! The thought of it haunts me. I can't get
away from it," she said to Vanna one afternoon as they sat together in
the autumn gloaming, enjoying that quiet _tete-a-tete_ which was the
most intimate moment of the day. "I walk along the streets staring at
the women I meet, and marvel! There they are--thousands of them,
British matrons, plain, ordinary, commonplace creatures with dolmans,
and bonnets far back on their heads, each with a family of--what? four,
six, eight, sometimes _ten_ children! For years and years of their
lives they have been chronic invalids, goaded on by the precepts that it
is `only natural,' and that they have no right to shirk their work on
that account. The courage of them, and the patience, and the humility!
They never seem to consider that they deserve any praise. If they read
in the newspaper of a soldier who saved a life in the rush and
excitement of battle, and was wounded in the act, they rave of him by
the hour together; but if you offered _them_ the Victoria Cross, they
would think you were mad! Yet every life given to the world means
nearly a year of suffering for some poor mother!"
Vanna was silent. It was inevitable that in her position she should see
the other side of the question, and feel that a year would be a light
price to pay for the joy of holding Piers's son in her arms; but Jean
had lost that great recompense which wipes away the remembrance of the
anguish. Her heart was still hungry and sore. Having no words of
comfort to offer, Vanna deftly turned the conversation to a safer
channel.
"Apropos of suffering, Jean, I have been waiting to talk to you about my
own plans. I've been here over four months, dear, and it's time I moved
on. I told you I had a plan in my head which was slowly working itself
out. Well! at last, I think I can see daylight. I have my life to
live, and I can't be content just to fritter it away. I must find
something that is worth doing, and which will justify my existence.
I've thought of many things, but it always comes back to nursing as the
likeliest and most suitable. For the last four years that's been my
work, and I know I did it well. Every doctor I have met told me I was a
born nurse. One Sunday when you were ill I went to Dr Greatman, and
had a long talk. He had asked me to go. I told him what I wanted--
technical training to add to what I had learnt by experience, and then
when I was properly equipped to _give_ my services to poor gentlewomen
who could not afford to pay to be properly cared for."
"A nurse! A hospital nurse! _You_!" Jean's tone was eloquent with
dismay. The day of lady nurses was but in its dawn, and public opinion
had yet to be reconciled to the thought. "Vanna, you could not stand
the everlasting strain. And you spoke of a home, a house of your own!
If you were at the hospital--"
"Let me finish my story, dear. Don't interrupt half through. Dr
Greatman was most kind and understanding. I think in a kind of way he
feels that he owes me some compensation, as it was he who laid the bar
on my life. I took him letters from the doctors who know me, giving my
character as professional nurse. They were rather nice, Jean. I was
proud of them, and Dr Greatman said he wished he could speak as highly
of many of his certificated nurses. He advises me to take a two years'
course of training at a hospital. I should have to `live in,' and give
up all my time; but as soon as the two years are over I will look out
for a house and a sheep dog, and gather together my treasures to make a
real little home of my own. You shall help me to arrange it, Jean! It
shall be in town, as near to you as rents will allow, in a quiet street,
with at least two spare rooms facing south. Then I shall be ready for
work as it comes along. Sometimes I shall go to a patient's house, and
nurse her there; sometimes--if her own house is unsuitable, or if she is
a poor governess, or a worker who hasn't got a home--I'll take her in,
and look after her in my own rooms. At other times I'll have
convalescents who want kitchen food and kindness. Sometimes I'll have
guests--poor, dull drones who are suffering from all work and no play,
and dose them with kindness and amusement. Then I shall fed of some
use, and that my house is doing good to other people besides myself."
"They'll sponge upon you, and tire you out, and take everything they can
get, and then go away, and slander you behind your back."
"_Tant pis_! Let's hope they'll do it sufficiently far away to let me
continue in my blissful delusion that I've done some good."
"You'll get sick of it. It's no use pretending; you were as fond of
gaiety and amusement as I was myself. You'll get sick of everlasting
invalids."
"Then I'll take a spell off, and do nothing, and be as selfish as I
please. I'm not bound. If a roving fit seizes me I can shut up house
and go off on my travels. I don't intend to spend all my life in a rut.
I'm a poor gentlewoman myself, and need my own medicine. Don't imagine
that I'm tying myself down to continual drudgery, for I'm not; but I
must, I must have an object in life!"
"And for two whole years you propose to shut yourself up in a hospital?"
"I do; with the exception of an afternoon a week, a day a fortnight, and
three weeks' annual holiday."
"May I ask what Piers has to say?"
Vanna's smile was both whimsical and pathetic.
"You may; but I shan't answer. Several volumes of very strong language,
poor dear man; but he knows--at the bottom of his heart he knows that I
am right!"
Not even to Jean could Vanna confess that her plans for the future had a
nearer and more personal object than mere philanthropy. The
conservation of love! This was the great problem with which she
struggled in secret. Her clear, far-sighted brain realised the truth,
despised by most lovers, that love is a plant which needs careful and
assiduous tending if it is to live and retain its bloom. Kindred
interests, kindred hopes, kindred efforts and aims--these are the foods
by which it is nourished in happy home-life; but if these be wanting--if
instead of the hill tops there stretches ahead a long flat plain, what
then can nourish the plant and guard it from decay? Piers had sworn
that his troth should not bind him if his heart grew tired; but, having
received that promise, Vanna never again allowed herself to allude to
the subject. Her woman's instinct taught her that no good could come of
continually putting such a possibility into words. She must write, act,
speak, as if the eternity of the love between them was beyond doubt--
fixed as the hills. What precautions seemed advisable to keep it so she
must take upon herself, and with as slight an appearance of intention as
might be. Piers might rage and fume at the prospect of her years in
hospital, but she knew that the scarcity of their meetings would be a
gain rather than a loss. Once a week they would meet for a few hours;
once a fortnight there would come a long happy day, which would make an
epoch to be anticipated and remembered with tenderest thought. Better
so than to run the risk of satiety, and the hastening of that day when
the dread question might arise: "What next?"
This conviction, deeply rooted in Vanna's mind, made her strong to
resist all arguments and reproaches, and the end of the year found her
established as a nurse at one of the largest and most advanced of the
great London hospitals.