"Aunt Jane? I don't know where she is. I thought she came into her
office."
"Well--she isn't here. You can see she isn't here, can't you? Find
her--please."
Aunt Jane behind her crack, shivered a little as the girl turned. But
the nurse had eyes and ears only for the surgeon and his impatience. She
hurried away.
Aunt Jane drew a free breath.
The surgeon crossed to her desk and halted there. His eye rested
absently on the great bunch of roses. Presently his face lighted up; he
was seeing the roses! He looked at them with an air of appreciation. The
little smile was still on his lips, and the tumty-tumty tune.... Slowly
he leaned forward, on tiptoe, and--smelled of them and nodded approval.
Aunt Jane's hands made swift, darting touches at her cap and her apron
and her hair and she got up quickly.... Perhaps he would go away! But
Dr. Carmon's eye had fallen on the little card under the vase and he
took it up--and read the name with near-sighted curious gaze, and turned
it over----
Aunt Jane stepped out from her place. "How is Number 16?" she asked
placidly.
He wheeled--the card in his hand.
"Oh! You're here! I just sent for you." He waved the card.
"I know. I was busy."
"Funny, I didn't hear you come in!" He looked at her thoughtfully.
"You were thinking of something else, maybe," said Aunt Jane tranquilly.
She came up to the desk.
He looked curiously at her face.
"What is the matter?" he asked.
"Nothing," responded Aunt Jane. "Do I look as if anything was the
matter?" The face under its ink stains was serene.
Dr. Carmon regarded it critically. "Soap and water--" he suggested. He
pointed a helpful finger at the smudge of ink on her cheek.
She lifted a quick hand.
He nodded grimly. "And there's a little over there by your left ear," he
said wickedly.
She rubbed at the place blindly. "I must have got ink on me--when I was
making up my book--" Her glance flitted toward it.
Dr. Carmon's eye fell on the open page and on the smudge of Room 36. He
bent forward, tapping the place with the card in his hand, and laughed
out.
"I never saw your book look like that!" He gazed at it and then at Aunt
Jane's face--a little suspiciously.
She leaned forward to inspect it.
"Somebody must have spilled water--or something on it!" she said
casually. "Folks are so careless here!" She laid a blotter methodically
across the smudge and closed the book and put it away.
Dr. Carmon surveyed the roses. "Handsome bunch of flowers!" he said
carelessly. He waved the card at them.
"They look nice," admitted Aunt Jane. "They're some Mr. Medfield
sent--they came from his garden." Her tone was quiet and
businesslike--there was no nonsense about those roses. She looked at
them impersonally.
"I saw it was his card." Dr. Carmon's hand motioned with the card and
dropped it to the desk. He might almost have been said to fling it from
him--as if it were a challenge.
"Who did he send them to?" he asked.
"Why--to me!" said Aunt Jane.
She tried her best to look commonplace and unconcerned--as if she had
been receiving roses all her life--as if she had large bunches of them
every day, flaming away there on her desk.
Dr. Carmon's glance twinkled across the roses--to the placid face.
"Humph!" he said.
"How is Number 16?" asked Aunt Jane.
"Fine!" Dr. Carmon's face lighted with it. He forgot roses--"He's going
to pull through all right--I think."
"That's good! I kind of reckoned he'd come through." She had turned a
leisurely glance to the door.
The nurse stood there.
"I can't--" she began. "Oh--you're here! I looked everywhere for you!"
"Yes, I'm here. I've been here quite a spell," said Aunt Jane.
The nurse withdrew and Dr. Carmon and Aunt Jane and the roses were left
alone.
He looked suspiciously and grudgingly at the roses and shrugged his
shoulders and turned away. He took his hat. "I want you to look in on
Number 16--sometime later."
There was no "please" about the request--or "will you kindly." But Aunt
Jane understood.
"I was planning to go in by and by--along about four o'clock," she said
kindly. "That's the time he'll need somebody most, I guess!"
Dr. Carmon looked again at the roses. "I shall want Suite A, Friday--for
a new patient," he said abruptly.
Aunt Jane's mouth opened--and closed.
"Medfield's well enough to go," said Dr. Carmon. He nodded to the
roses--as if they knew of Herman Medfield's health. "He'll be better off
at home!" he said shortly--and shot out the door.
Aunt Jane gazed after him, a minute.
She took up the card from the desk and held it off and looked at it
severely and shook it a little--as if it might have known better--and
dropped it into a small drawer behind the roses and locked the
drawer--and put the key in her pocket.
Then she turned off the lights and left the room. And the great bunch of
roses that had flamed up so bravely, lost their color in the dark.
Perhaps they went to sleep.
All night the fragrance of the roses stole out into the room and filled
it--as if little flitting dreams of roses came and went there in the
dark.