suite in Jarvyse's little hotel up the river," he says, very sharp and
gruff. "I've staved that off for a month now, but they can't see it
and they're bound to try it: Jarvyse himself half advises it. And I'll
risk my entire reputation on the result. If she can't fight it
out--she's gone."
He waited a moment and put out his jaw.
"_She's gone,_" he said again, and I felt creepy when he said it, and I
tell you I believed him.
"Well, I'll try my best," I said, and I went on the case the next
morning.
As soon as I saw her I got the idea of her I've always had since:
that's me, all over. I went to a palmist's once with a lot of the
other nurses and that's the first thing he said to me.
"It's first impressions with you, young woman," he said. "Take care to
trust 'em and act on 'em, and you'll never need to count on the old
ladies' home!"
Well, as soon as I saw Miss Elton she put me in mind of one of Mr.
C----r's heroines, looks and clothes and ways, and all, and I've never
changed my mind. Her things were all plain, but they had the loveliest
lines, and she always looked as if she'd been born in them, they suited
her so! Her hair was that heavy, smooth blond kind that makes a Marcel
wave look too vulgar to think about, and her eyes and complexion went
with it. And with all her education she was as simple as a child:
there were any number of things she didn't seem to know. She took to
me directly, her mother said, and I could see she liked me, though she
hardly spoke. She had big rings under her eyes and seemed very tired.
She got a nap after lunch--only two hours, by the doctor's orders--and
it did seem a shame to wake her, she was off so sound, but of course I
did, and then we walked for an hour in the park. I didn't talk much at
first, but I saw that she liked it, and so gradually we got on to
different subjects, and I think she was entertained. She seemed
interested to hear about the nurses at the hospital and some of the
funny things that happen there, and I could see that she was trying to
keep her end up--oh, she was all right, Anne Elton was, and no mistake!
There was nothing morbid about her: she was trying to help all she
could.
When I came down for dinner there was a young man with them, a
handsome, dark fellow, and he talked a great deal with me--I could see
he was trying to size me up, and it was easy to see that he was pretty
far gone as far as Miss Elton was concerned, and didn't care who knew
it. We must have seemed a strange party to any one who didn't know the
ins and outs of the thing--only the five of us in that big dining-room
with the conservatory opening into it; the mother, one of those
stringy, grey New York women, that always wear diamond dog-collars,
worried to death and nervous as a witch; Mr. Elton--he was Commodore of
the New York Yacht Club at that time--fat and healthy and
reddish-purple in the face; young Mr. Ferrau (he was from an old French
family and looked it, though a born New Yorker) and me in my white
uniform and cap next to Miss Elton, all in white with a big rope of
pearls and pearls on her fingers. She could wear a lower cut gown and
look more decent in it than any woman I ever saw. All her evening
dresses were like that, perfectly plain, just draped around her, with
long trains and no trimmings: her skin was like cream-coloured marble,
not a mark or line or vein on it, but just one brown mole on the right
shoulder blade, and that, as her mother said, was really an addition.
Nobody talked much but Mr. Ferrau and the old gentleman--there's no
doubt he had been a gay old boy in his day!--for I never do talk when I
dine with the family, and the mother was too nervous for anything but
complaining of the food. The Lord knows why, for it beat any French
restaurant I ever ate in, or Delmonico's either, and Mr. Ferrau and I
got quite jolly over how they put soft-boiled eggs into those round,
_soufflee_ sort of things with tomato sauce over them, without spilling
the yolks. Then they asked if I'd play bridge a bit, and though I
don't care for games much, I learned to play pretty well with my
morphine-fiend and his mother, so of course I did, and the old
gentleman and I played the young couple, and Madam Elton crocheted,
sitting up straight as a poker on a gold sofa.
It always makes me laugh when I read what some persons' ideas are of
how rich people amuse themselves. The nurses are always jollying me
about my rich friends and playing the races and champagne suppers and
high-flying generally, and I often wish they could have seen us those
evenings at the Eltons, playing bridge--no money, mind you, and
Apollinaris at ten! The Commodore had to have ginger-ale, the ladies
hardly ever drank, and I never take anything but water when I'm on a
case, so Mr. Ferrau had all the champagne there was at that dinner. At
ten the masseuse came and rubbed Miss Elton to sleep, and I got into my
bed next hers before she went off, not to risk disturbing her. There
was a night lamp in her bath and I could just make out her long braid
on the pillow--the pillow cases had real lace insertions and the
monograms on the sheets were the most beautiful I ever saw.
I went off myself about eleven, for I was determined to act perfectly
natural: I knew I'd wake if anything was wrong. And sure enough: all
of a sudden I began to dream, a thing I seldom if ever do, and I
dreamed that my suicidal case was clambering over me to jump out of the
window, and woke with a start.
Miss Elton was sitting up in bed staring at me, breathing short.
"Can I do anything for you?" I asked quietly and she gave a sort of
gasp and said,
"No--I think not, thank you. I'm sorry to bother you, but the doctor
told me to."
"Why, of course," said I, "that's what I'm here for. Do you see
anybody?"
I didn't say, "Do you think you see anybody?" for I never put things
that way.
"Yes," she said, "she's there--Janet." I glanced about, and of course
there was no one, and I tell you, I felt awfully sorry for her. It was
all the worse that she was so pretty and calm and decent about it: I
didn't like that a bit.
"Where is she?" said I.
"Right on the foot of the bed," she answered, in that grim, edgy kind
of way they always talk when they're holding on to themselves. Oh, how
that morphine boy of mine used to begin!
"Excuse me, Miss Jessop, but would you mind assuring me that there's
nobody crouching under the bed?" he used to say. "Of course I know
there's not, but there appears to be, and I'd be obliged if you'd look!"
If I went under that bed once, I went fifty times.
"Why, to tell you the truth, Miss Elton, I don't see a thing," I said.
"Shall I turn on the light?"
"No--not yet," she said. "The doctor said to hold out as long as I
could. Would you mind putting your hand there?"
"Not a bit," said I, and I pawed all over the foot of her bed. Finally
I got up and sat there.
"What happens now?" I asked her.
"She just moves up and sits farther out," said she.
I couldn't think of much to say to that, she was so quiet and hopeless,
so I waited awhile and finally I said,
"Would it help you any to talk about it?"
"Oh, if you didn't _mind_!" she cried out, and then the poor thing
began. It makes me tired, the way people treat a patient like that.
There was that girl just bottled up, you might as well say, because
they all thought it would make her worse to talk about it. Her father
pooh-poohed it, and her mother cried and asked her to send for their
rector, and even Dr. Stanchon slipped up there, it seemed to me, for he
advised her not to dwell on it. Not dwell on it! Why, how could she
help it, I'd like to know?
"What I can't understand," she'd say, over and over, "is her coming,
when it hurts me so. Why, Janet loved me, Miss Jessop, she loved the
ground I walked on, everybody said! And she knows--she must know--that
I wouldn't have hurt her for the world. Why should I? She took care
of me since I was six years old--sixteen years! She said to put in
those powders in the box and I put them in. How could I know?"
"Of course you couldn't know," I said, "she knows that."
"Then why does she do this?" she asked me, so pitifully, just like a
child. "Why does she, Miss Jessop?"
"Well, you know, Miss Elton," I said, "you wouldn't believe me if I
lied to you, now, would you? And so I must tell you that I don't think
she _does_ do it: none of us do. It's just your idea. If Janet's
there, why don't I see her? You're overstrained and excited and you
feel that she might not have died----"
"Ah, but I didn't feel that the night she came!" she broke out, "truly
I didn't. Dr. Stanchon and all of them said I was very brave and
sensible. He talked to me and made me see: if Janet had been sleeping
with one of the maids and waked her up and told her not to turn on the
light because it hurt her head, but just to give her the powders in the
box, that maid would have done it. I can see that."
"Of course," said I.
"I didn't blame myself--really," she went on, and suddenly she looked
straight to the foot of the bed.
"Janet," she said, "the doctor said never to speak to you, and I never
will again, but I must, this once. Janet, _do_ you blame me? Are you
really there? Why do you come this way? You're killing me, you know.
I can't sleep. You shouldn't have taken that strong medicine, and the
doctor told you not to, you know, yourself. Won't you go, Janet? Not
to please Nannie?"
Really, it would have melted a stone to hear her.
She was still a moment and then she began to cry and whimper, and I
knew that it had made no difference.
"She won't go--she won't go," she said, crying, "not even for Nannie!"
Well, I talked to her and read to her and stroked her head, and by two
o'clock or so she was off for an hour, and I got a nap myself. But
from three till nearly five she was awake again, and I had to light up
the room; she said she hardly saw her then--only felt her, and that
wasn't so bad.
I don't know that anything different took place for a week after that.
We went through the same business every night, and I took a nap every
afternoon when she did. She told me, what I wasn't much surprised to
hear, that she and Mr. Ferrau were engaged--or just about--when this
precious Janet died, and that now she wouldn't hear of it and had
refused to marry him till she was well again. And I must say I think
she was right. Of course the old gentleman didn't see it that way, and
we had many a discussion about it, he and I.
"God Almighty, Miss Jessop, my dear," he used to say to me, "you know
as well as I do--I'm speaking, of course, to a woman of practical sense
and experience, and therefore I speak plainly--you know as well as I do
that the day after the wedding all this will be done for! We'll never
hear of that damned Janet nonsense again. Now, would we?"
"Well, Commodore, maybe not, but you can't tell," I'd say. "It's a
good bet, but--it's a bet, after all. It would be awkward if it didn't
work out, you know."
"Oh, bosh, bosh!" he'd burst out, and roll off to the Yacht Club.
People that live in big houses like that, I've noticed, always have to
go out to get a little peace, they say, and privacy. It's funny.
The weather was bad, so we didn't go on the motor trip at all, and that
was just as well, for if we had, I should never have gone up to the
hospital that day and never seen old Margaret. She was an old darky
woman that used to come in to clean the wards when they were short of
help, and all the nurses knew her, because she used to tell fortunes
with cards and a glass ball she looked into--pretty fair fortunes, too.
I've known of some awfully queer things she told different nurses that
were only too true. She always liked me because I used to jolly her
up, and I stopped to speak to her, and she asked me where I was working.
"Oh, a grand place on the Avenue, Margaret," I told her, "marble stairs
and a fountain in the hall."
"What's the sickness, honey?" she asked, for those darkies are always
curious.
"The patient's got a ghost, Margaret," I said, just to see what she'd
say, "and I'm sorry to say we can't seem to cure her."
"Co'se you cayn't cure her," says she, "no stuff in bottles for that,
honey! What the ghos' want?"
"Nothing at all," said I. "It just sits on the bed and looks."
"Laws, honey, Miss Jessop, but that yer kine's the wors' of all," says
she, staring at me. "She'll jes' have ter leave it onto somebody else,
that's all."
"Why, can you do that?" I asked.
"Sure you can do it," she says. "Was it one that loved her?"
"They all say so," said I.
She struck her hands together.
"I knew it--I knew it!" she cried out. "It's always that-a-way. My
ole mudder she had that ha'nt fer ten years, and it was her half-sister
that brung her up from three years ole! She'll jes' have ter leave it
onto some one."
"Well, I'll tell her so," said I, just in joke, of course.
"You do," says she, solemn as the grave, "you do, Miss Jessop, honey,
an' she'll bless you all her life. You get some one ter say they'll
take that ha'nt off her _right w'ile it's there, so it hears 'em_, and
w'ile there's a witness there ter hear bofe sides, an' you hear to me,
now, she'll go free!"
"I'll certainly tell her, Margaret," I said, and I went on and never
gave it another thought, of course.
We went up to the Elton's camp in Maine all of a sudden, for Miss Elton
got the idea she'd feel better there, and though it was cold as
Greenland, it did seem for a little as if she got a bit more sleep.
But not for long. We slept out on pine-bough beds around a big fire,
for that made more light, and that precious Janet seemed to be fainter,
but she was there, just the same, and the poor girl had lost eighteen
pounds and I felt pretty blue about it. It didn't really look as if we
got ahead any, as I told the doctor, and she hardly spoke all day. I'm
not much for the country, as a rule, it always smells so damp at night,
but the Lord knows I'd have lived there a year if it would have helped
her any.
Then came the night when Mr. Ferrau ran up to see how she was getting
along. It was too cold for Madam and the Commodore, so we were there
alone except for a gang of guides and servants and chauffeurs and
masseuses. She had a bad night that night, for she got the idea that
this lovely Janet was sitting up nearer and nearer to her, and she had
it in her head that when she got to a certain point it would be all up
with her. And when I told the doctor that, over the telephone, all he
said was:
"Too bad, too bad!" So I knew how _he_ felt.
Well, she got talking rather hysterically for her, and I began to wish
somebody else was around, when Mr. Ferrau jumps out of his door in the
bachelor quarters and dashes over to us in a heavy bathrobe, white as a
sheet.
"For God's sake, Miss Jessop, _do_ something!" he said, but I just
shrugged my shoulders. There was nothing to _do_, you see. She was
all bundled up in a seal-skin sleeping-bag with a wool helmet over her
head; her eyes certainly looked bad. I just about gave up hope, then.
The moon made everything a sort of bluish-white and we all must have
looked pretty ghastly.
"I think I'll give her a little codeine," I said. "Just stay here a
moment, will you?"
He knelt down by her bunk while I began to unwind myself from all the
stuff you have to get into up there.
"Oh, Anne, my dearest, dearest girl," he said, "if only I could take
this instead of you! If only I could see her, and you not!"
"Would you--would you, really, Louis?" I heard her say. "You _do_ love
me, don't you? But that would be too dreadful. I couldn't allow that
to happen."
"Heavens, my dear girl, I'd take it in a minute, if I could!" he cried.
"Oh, Anne, do try to look at it in that way--try to give it to me!
Perhaps if you used your will-power enough for that----"
"That can't be, Louis," she said, "this is just my fate. I must bear
it--till it kills me. But if it could be, I'll tell you this: I
_would_ give it to you, dearest, for you are stronger, and maybe a man
could fight it better."
I was off to the main camp then, but when I got back with the codeine
she was asleep with her head on his shoulder, and he kneeled there till
four without moving--he was game, that Mr. Ferrau, and no mistake!
She slept right through till eight, and I left them together all day,
as much as I could, and I let her off her nap, she begged so. I could
see from the solemn way she talked that she was saying good-bye to him,
as much as he'd let her. She told me that as soon as it began to get
on her brain, really, and she got worse (we always called it "getting
worse"), she was going up to Dr. Jarvyse's place, and he wasn't to see
her at all.
"I want him to remember me--as I was," she said. It certainly was
tough. I used to cry about it, when I was alone, sometimes. You get
awfully fond of some patients.
He stayed the next night, too, and I took my regular nap from ten to
one. I could nearly always count on that, and I'd got so I woke the
moment she did. I was fast asleep when I felt her touch me, and I
woke, feeling scared, for she almost never did that.
"What is it?" I said, half awake. "Is she coming nearer?"
"Miss Jessop, dear Miss Jessop, she isn't here at all!" she said,
shaking and crying. "I've been awake an hour, and she hasn't come
to-night! Oh, _do_ you think, _do_ you----"
"Yes, I do," I said, though I was pretty excited myself, I can tell
you. "I believe you're getting better, Miss Elton, and now I think
I'll have Miss Avidson rub you, and see if we can get through the night
all right."
The Swedish woman put her right to sleep, working over her head, and we
never opened our eyes till nine. One of the guides told me that Mr.
Ferrau had been called to the city early, and had left quietly, not to
disturb us, but we were both so delighted and yet so anxious not to be
delighted too soon, that we didn't notice his going much. She ate
three good meals that day, besides her tea, and we walked five or six
miles--I wanted to wear her out. And that night she slept right
through!
We waited one night more, to be certain, and then I 'phoned the doctor.
"Hurray!" he yelled, so I nearly dropped the receiver. "Bully for you!
Keep out for a week and then move in--with a light. Drop the light in
another week. Then I'll send 'em all off to Beachmount." This was
their Long Island place.
Well, it all worked out perfectly. She gained nine pounds in three
weeks, and I don't know when I've been so pleased. The old people came
up to see her, and I spent most of my time convincing them that it was
no case for tiaras and sunbursts, as I never wore them. Mrs. Elton
really looked almost human. She cried so that I finally had to take a
little string of pearls. They were small, but all matched, and she
said I could wear them under my blouse and I could always sell them.
You'd have thought that I'd cured the girl, when, as I told them, the
thing had just run its natural course, and her youth and good sense and
the outdoor life had done the rest.
Of course, there was no more use for me, and I went right off on a big
operation case--a very interesting one, indeed. I promised to come to
the wedding, if I possibly could; she told me she would be married just
as soon as Mr. Ferrau wished, she felt she'd made him go through so
much in the last four months. And it seemed that he _had_ felt the
strain more than they thought, for her mother told me that just as Anne
recovered, he seemed to give way and got very nervous and had gone off
on a yacht with some of his college friends to the south somewhere. I
was rather surprised not to see him at the house, and so was Miss Anne,
I thought; but he sent the loveliest flowers every day and telegrams,
and of course they were working on the trousseau and pretty busy,
anyway.
I couldn't get to the wedding, after all, for my patient was taken to
Lakewood and simply refused to let me off, which was rather mean of
her, for I could have run up for the afternoon as well as not. But
that's what you have to expect, if you go into nursing, and you get
used to it.
Mrs. Elton called me up once at the hotel, to see if I couldn't get
away (they were going to send the car for me if I could), and I asked
if Mr. Ferrau was all right again.
"Really, Miss Jessop," said she--and I could just see how she must have
looked, from her voice--"really, my dear, I am terribly, _terribly_
worried about Louis. He looks frightfully, so pale and nervous and run
down. And he simply _won't_ see a doctor, and when I earnestly begged
him to consult Dr. Stanchon, he flew out at me--he really flew out!"
"What can it be?" said I. "What does Miss Elton think?"
"Why, how can she know, my dear?" says the old lady. "Only he assures
her that it will be all right once they're married, and begs her so not
to put it off, that she won't, though I don't entirely approve, myself.
Really, you'd scarcely know Louis, Miss Jessop."
It did seem too bad, but then, those things will happen, and I just
thought to myself that probably there was more to that southern trip
than the old lady knew, and let it go at that. The doctor says that
all the nurses have dime-novel imaginations--but where do we get them,
I'd like to know, if not from what we see and hear? The Lord knows we
don't have to invent things.
Miss Elton was dreadfully disappointed that I couldn't be there for the
wedding, and promised me they'd stop a minute at the hotel on their
wedding journey and see me. They were going on a motor trip, nobody
knew just where, and Lakewood would only be a few miles out of their
way. Wasn't that nice of them? But it was just like both of them. So
I was quite excited, of course, and when it poured rain all day, and
got worse and worse, I did feel so sorry for them and never expected
they'd leave town. But, lo and behold, about five o'clock didn't the
boy bring up their cards, and for a wonder my patient was decent and
said she wouldn't want me till next morning--she had her own maid with
her and really didn't need me but once a day.
I ran down to one of the little reception rooms--I must say I like
those big hotels--and when I saw them I nearly collapsed, for though
she was looking perfectly beautiful and well as could be, poor Mr.
Ferrau certainly did give me a shock. He was all tanned, well enough,
but as thin as a rail, and dreadful around the eyes. And yet he looked
very happy and seemed quite glad to see me.
"Isn't she looking magnificent?" he asked me, and I said--I just have
to say right out what I think--"Yes, she is, but I can't say the same
for you."
"Oh, I shall be all right--after a bit," he said, turning red and not
meeting my eyes. "Just let me get away with Anne for a while, and
you'll see."
They insisted on my having tea with them, and I couldn't help but think
that she didn't realise how bad he looked and acted: his hand shook so
that his tea-spoon jingled. And yet he was as straight as a string, I
was sure.
It kept on pouring so dreadfully that they gave up the idea of going on
anywhere, and he engaged a suite at the hotel for that night, and I
said good-bye to them, then, for they were to have their dinner served
by themselves and I knew they'd want to get off quietly in the morning.
My patient kept her word and didn't bother me, and I listened to the
music for a while and then went up to my room and wrote some letters.
About ten I put my boots outside the door and happened to notice the
boots opposite and saw that they were Mr. Ferrau's--they were patent
leather, with rather queer cloth tops. So I knew that they had the
suite opposite ours; there were only those two for the one little hall.
I couldn't seem to sleep that night at all. I kept dreaming about that
suicide of mine, even when I did sleep, and finally I put on my wrapper
and decided to take a few turns up and down the corridor. I opened the
door softly and stepped out--and ran right into Mr. Ferrau! He was
stalking along in a bathrobe, his arms spread out, and tears rolling
down his cheeks, and he was chattering to himself like a monkey. His
eyes rolled, and I could see he was just on the verge of a regular
smash-up.
"Why, Mr. Ferrau, what's the matter?" I asked.
He stared at me like a crazy man. "You here!" he said. "For God's
sake! Go up to her--go to Anne--I'm all in," he said. "Oh, Miss
Jessop, it didn't work! It didn't work!"
He pointed to his door, and I went through the private dining-room and
the sitting-room and a dressing-room and a big marble bath, and there
she was, crying like a baby in one of the beds.
"Why, Miss Elton--I beg your pardon, Mrs. Ferrau--what _is_ the
matter?" I said, running up to her and taking hold of her hand. "Are
you ill?"
She only sobbed and held on to me and suddenly something struck me and
I said, "You haven't seen Janet again, have you?"
"No, no--but I wish I had! I wish I'd never stopped!" she gulped at
me. "Oh, Miss Jessop, _Louis sees her_! He sees her all the time;
that's what makes him look so ill! Ever since she stopped coming to
me, he's seen her, and he never told."
"For heaven's sake!" said I.