THE EIGHTH ROSE
On the morning after the party Polly was early downstairs.
Breakfast not being quite ready, she filled up the time by giving
fresh water to her birthday roses.
"You are going to the hospital to-day," she told them, as she clipped
the ends of the stems and broke off two or three great thorns. "That
is, most of you," she amended. "Let me see, you, and you, and you,"
she decided, laying aside three big beauties. Their number was
doubled, and then she hesitated.
"Mother, you wouldn't keep more than three, would you?"
Mrs. Dudley looked up from the grapefruit she was cutting.
"That is a good number to look at," she smiled.
"So I think," Polly agreed; "but they can have only one apiece over
at the hospital. One alone is pretty, though," she mused. "I'd leave
only one for us, but if Leonora should come, she might be afraid I
didn't care for them. No, I think eight will have to do, and it will
be better to give to those that have to lie abed, won't it?"
Only waiting for her mother's approval, she went on:--
"There's Reva and Ottoine and Mary up in the children's ward, and old
Mrs. Zieminski, and that funny little Magdalene, and Gustav and Miss
Butler--that makes seven," counting them slowly on her fingers. "I
don't know who I will give the eighth to--there are plenty of folks,
only I'm not acquainted with them. Never mind, anybody'll be glad of
one of these lovelicious roses, and I'll see when I get there."
"How does it feel to be eleven?" broke in the Doctor's happy voice.
"Why, I was eleven day before yesterday," laughed Polly. "I've had
time to get used to it."
"But that was a birthday, and yesterday was a party day; it is when
you get back to the everydayness that you begin to feel things."
"It isn't a bit different from ten," she declared. "Yes, a little,
because I have all these roses to give away. Aren't they sweet?" She
held them up for her father to sniff.
"Come to breakfast!" was the gentle command from the dining-room, and
Polly skipped on ahead, cautioning the Doctor to be sure not to spill
the water from the vase with which she had entrusted him.
The hour before school found Polly and the pink roses on their way to
the big white house. Having the freedom of the hospital almost as much
as Dr. Dudley himself, she flitted in and out whenever she chose,
never in anybody's way, and greeted with smiles from nurses and
patients.
Her errand this morning carried her first to the children's
convalescent ward, where she was so eagerly seized upon that she
escaped only by pleading her additional flowers to distribute, and
school time not far away.
With the eighth rose still in her hand, and debating whether to carry
it up to the children, or to give it to a boy in the surgical ward
with whom she had once spoken, she passed a half-open door on one of
the private-room corridors.
Glancing inside, she saw a young man, with bandaged eyes, lying on a
couch. He was quite alone, and his mouth looked sad.
"I wonder if he would like it," she questioned, and a breath of
fragrance from the half-blown rose answered her. "He can smell it,
even if he can't see it," she thought, and stepped inside the room.
The man turned his head.
"Would you like one of my birthday roses?" she asked. "It is very
sweet." She put it in his hand.
"I thank you, indeed." The sad lips smiled. "This is quite outside of
my programme. In fact, I had almost forgotten there were such pleasant
times as birthdays."
"It was day before yesterday," she ventured.
"And I judge by your voice that the number of roses needed was not
large."
She laughed softly. "Only eleven."
"About as I guessed! I hope the rest of the birthday matched the
roses. This is very beautiful." His fingers gave it a caressing touch.
"Oh, I had a lovelicious birthday! I really had two of them!"
"Two? That sounds interesting. Can't you sit down here and tell me
about it?"
"If I wouldn't be late to school," she hesitated. "I don't know what
time it is."
He pulled a watch from his pocket, and held it up for her view.
"Oh, I've twenty-seven minutes! I can stay a little while."
She took the chair beside him, and recounted the story of the
intermediate entertainment, intuitively omitting the part which Ilga
played. That it was appreciated by her listener Polly could not doubt.
"You must come and see me again," he invited, as she rose to go. "I
think you may do me more good than the Doctor."
"Oh, no!" she objected softly; "I couldn't do anything better than
father! He cures everybody."
The young man smiled doubtfully.
"May I ask who 'father' is? Not Dr. Dudley?"
"Why, yes, sir. I s'posed you knew. I'm Polly Dudley, Dr. Dudley's
little girl."
"Are you! Well, Miss Polly, I am surely glad to have made your
acquaintance." He ran hurriedly through his pockets. "I had a card
somewhere. Probably it was seized with the rest of my belongings. That
seems to be a way they have at hospitals--hide a man's things so he
can't get at them! Never mind, I haven't forgotten my name. I am Floyd
Westwood of New York."
"That's a lovelicious name," Polly told him frankly.
The corners of his mouth curled up.
"I hope you will not fail to come often," he told her, as she put her
little hand in his for good-bye.
"Oh, I'll come!" she promised. "But it's father that will cure you."
"I hope so, but," he added soberly, "it doesn't look much like it at
present."
Polly's eyes went troubled.
Perhaps the other read her silence, for he said brightly:--
"Now that I know the Doctor's little girl, it may be I shall have more
confidence in the Doctor's assurances."
"Oh, if he says you'll get well," she laughed, "you needn't worry a
single mite! Father doesn't ever lie to people."
"That sounds pleasant and mighty reassuring. I am glad you came in. I
was getting blue."
"Perhaps you were 'scared,' like Magdalene," she chuckled. "I do wish
you could see her! She is the funniest little German girl! She had
appendicitis, and the doctors sent for father. He knew right off she
couldn't live without an operation, and he told her father and mother,
and then he went and talked to her. He didn't tell her she'd die, for
she's only six years old; but he said she couldn't ever go out to
play, or have any more good times, unless they took her to the
hospital to cure her. And she looked up at him, just as sober, and
said, 'I'm scared! I'm scared!'--not a thing else! They brought her up
here in the ambulance, and she never said a word all the way. But when
she got downstairs, where there were lots of doctors and nurses,
father happened to go near her, and she looked straight up into his
face, and said, 'I'm scared! I'm scared!' Poor little thing! I should
think she would have been; but she is so funny."
"Did she come out all right?"
"Oh, yes, of course!--father performed the operation. The next day
when he saw her she was looking as happy as could be, and he asked her
if she was scared, and she didn't speak, only just shook her head this
way, and grinned." Polly's curls waved vigorously. "After a few days
she grew worse, and they had a consultation, and three or four doctors
were there. Father thought she looked frightened, and he asked her if
she was scared, and she bowed her head hard--oh, she is so funny! I
just carried her one of my roses, and I'm sure she liked it, but she
didn't say a single word."
"I have a fellow-feeling for that little girl," smiled Mr. Westwood.
"I know all right what it is to be 'scared,' and it isn't pleasant."
As Polly's lips parted for a response, her eyes fell upon the watch
which the young man was still fingering.
"Oh, my!" she exclaimed, "I forgot all about school! Good-bye!" And
she flashed away.
At dinner she told where she had left her eighth rose.
"I am glad you happened in there," returned the Doctor. "He seems to
be a fine young fellow, a chemist, just out of college. He came up
from New York to see a friend, and while he was assisting with some
chemical work he was temporarily blinded by an explosion. He is coming
on all right; but for a few days I have noticed that he has seemed
rather gloomy. Go again! You will do him good."
Several times during the next week Polly obeyed her father's
injunction, and accepted Mr. Westwood's repeated invitations. With
every visit the two became better friends, and Polly waited almost as
eagerly as the patient himself for the day when his bandaged eyes
should be released. Only in Polly's heart there was not a little
regret mingled with her anticipated joy, for that would herald Mr.
Westwood's going away. Still she would not let the disturbing thought
detract from her present pleasure, and she ran in and out of the
young man's room in a happy, quite-at-home fashion.
She was starting for one of these little visits, when her mother
called to her.
"I wish you would go down to Besse and Drayton's, and get me a yard
more of this ribbon," she requested; "I find I haven't enough." She
held out a bit of blue satin.
"I'll be back with it in a jiffy--a ten-minute jiffy," laughed Polly.
Off she flew, tripping down the street and around the corner so
briskly that she nearly ran into a little man who was proceeding at a
quick, heedless pace.
"Why, Mr. Bean!" she cried.
"I declare, if 'tain't Polly! little Polly! How do you do, my dear?
How do you do?"
As soon as Mr. Bean learned that Polly was on her way down to the
department store, he turned about, and walked along by her side,
listening delightedly to her happy chatter.
"I'm proper sorry I hain't found that letter yit," he mourned. "Jane
she's been kind o' upset 'n' cranky lately, or I should 'a' asked her
about it before. I guess I shall speak about it to-night, yis, I
guess I shall," he assured Polly and himself.
"Oh, don't hurry to do it right away!" Polly responded
understandingly. "I can wait to know about my relatives. If Aunt Jane
isn't feeling--quite well, it wouldn't be a good time."
"No, 'twouldn't," he agreed in a relieved tone. "But I'll have it for
yer soon's I see my way to it. Sometime when Jane's feelin' real good,
I'll broach the subjec', I certain will."
Home with her ribbon and then over to the hospital sped Polly. She
found her friend impatiently striding up and down the limited space of
his room.
"I'd about given you up," he told her in an aggrieved tone. "I
concluded you were tired of coming to be eyes for a poor old blind
fellow like me, and so had stayed after school to play."
Polly looked at him keenly. Sometimes she did not quite know whether
to take him in fun or in earnest. Now his face was serious; but she
felt almost sure there was a twinkle behind that tantalizing bandage.
"You know I couldn't be tired of coming to see you," she said simply,
"and I never stay to play after school. I went on an errand for
mother, and then I met Mr. Bean, and he stopped to apologize for not
finding a letter that is--lost, a letter about my May relatives."
"What!" His tone startled Polly. "Are you related to the Mays? how?
Tell me!" He was waiting with eager, parted lips.
"Why," she hesitated, vaguely abashed all at once, "I'm Polly May, you
know--or was. I guess I haven't told you." Polly never talked of her
adoption, instinctively guarding as a precious secret what was
naturally well known throughout the city.
"No, you haven't; but won't you tell me now, please?"
"Father and mother adopted me the day they were married," she
explained simply. "Papa and mamma were dead, and I didn't belong to
Aunt Jane or anybody."
"Polly, who was your father--your own father?" The words tumbled close
on the heels of her sentence.
"Chester May," she answered dazedly. Something was imminent. She knew
not what.
"Chester May! And your mother's name? Was it Illingworth? Phebe
Illingworth?" The words shot like bullets.
"Why, yes!" gasped Polly. "How did you know?"
"Polly! Polly!" He thrust out his hands--they touched Polly's, which
he caught in a strong grip. "My mother was your father's sister, his
eldest sister! We are cousins, Polly, own cousins!"
Dr. Dudley came, with the nurse, before the story was ended, and then
it had to be begun and told all over again,--the old, old story of a
quarrel between the father and the "baby" of his family, of the hasty
leaving home of the boy, of the meagre news of his early marriage, and
lastly of the years that were empty of tidings. These Polly was able
to fill up in part, when the story-teller turned listener, with
interest almost as great as Polly's own.
Floyd Westwood begged the physician to allow him one little glimpse of
his new-found cousin; but Dr. Dudley was firm, and the eager eyes
were not uncovered. Polly soon slipped away to share her joy with her
mother, leaving the Doctor and his patient to talk over present plans
and future possibilities.