A BEE STING
Elliott was wretchedly, miserably ill. She despised herself for it and
then she lost even the sensation of self contempt in utter misery. She
didn't care about anything--who helped her undress or where the
undressing was done or what happened to her. Mercifully nobody talked;
it would have killed her, she thought, to have to try to talk. They
didn't even ask her how she felt. They only moved about quietly and
did things. They put her to bed and gave her something to drink, after
which for a time she didn't care if she did die; in fact, she rather
hoped she would; and then the disgusting things happened and she felt
worse and worse and then--oh wonder!--she began to feel better.
Actually, it was sheer bliss just to lie quiet and feel how
comfortable she was.
"I am so sorry!" she murmured apologetically to a presence beside the
bed. "I have made you a horrid lot of trouble."
"Not a bit," said the presence, quietly. "So don't you begin worrying
about that."
And she didn't worry. It seemed impossible to worry about anything
just then.
"I feel lots better," she remarked, after a while.
"That's right. I thought you would. Now I'm going to telephone your
Aunt Jessica that you feel better, and you just lie quiet and go to
sleep. Then you will feel better still. I'll put the bell right here
beside the bed. If you want anything, tap it."
The presence waddled away--the girl could feel its going in the tremor
of the bed beneath her--and Elliott out of half-shut eyes looked into
the room. The shades were partially drawn and the light was dim. A
little breeze fluttered the white scrim curtain. The girl's lazy gaze
traveled slowly over what she could see without moving her head. To
move her head would have been too much trouble. What she saw was
spotless and clean and countrified, the kind of room she would have
scorned this morning; now she thought it the most peaceful place in
the world. But she didn't intend to go to sleep in it. She meant
merely to lie wrapped in that delicious mantle of well-being and
continue to feel how utterly content she was. It seemed a pity to go
to sleep and lose consciousness of a thing like that.
But the first thing she knew she was waking up and the room was quite
dark and she felt comfortable, but just the least bit queer. It
couldn't be that she was hungry!
She lay and debated the point drowsily until a streak of light fell
across the bed. The light came from a kerosene lamp in the hands of an
immense woman whose mild blue eyes beamed on Elliott.
"There, you've waked up, haven't you? I guess you'll like a glass of
milk now. You can bring it right up, Harriet. She's awake."
The woman set down her lamp on a little table and lumbered about the
room, adjusting the shades at the windows, while the lamp threw
grotesque exaggerations on the wall. Elliott watched the shadows, a
warm little smile at her heart. They were funny, but she found herself
tender toward them. When the woman padded back to the bed the girl
smiled, her cheek pillowed on her hand. She liked her there beside the
bed, her big shapeless form totally obscuring the straight-backed
chair. She didn't think of waist lines or clothes at all, only of how
comfortable and cushiony and pleasant the large face looked.
Mothery--might not that be the word for it? Somehow like Aunt Jessica,
yet without the slightest resemblance except in expression, a kind of
radiating lovingness that warmed one through and through, and made
everything right, no matter how wrong it might have seemed.
"I telephoned your Aunt Jessica," said the big woman. "She was just
going to call us, and they all sent their love to you. Here's Harriet
with the milk. Do you feel a mite hungry?"
"I think that must be what was the matter with me. I was trying to
decide when you came in."
The fat form shook all over with silent laughter. It was fascinating
to watch laughter that produced such a cataclysm but made no sound.
Elliott forgot to drink in her absorption.
"Mother," said Harriet Gordon, "Elliott thinks you're a three-ringed
circus. You mustn't be so exciting till she has finished her milk."
Elliott protested, startled. "I think you are the kindest people in
the world, both of you!"
"Mercy, child, anybody would have done the same! Don't you go to
setting us up on pedestals for a little thing like that."
The fat girl was smiling. "Make it singular, mother. I have no quarrel
with a pedestal for you, though it might be a little awkward to move
about on."
Mrs. Gordon shook again with that fascinating laughter. "Mercy me! I'd
tip off first thing and then where would we all be?"
Elliott's eyes sought Harriet Gordon's. If she had observed closely
she would have seen spots on the white dress, but to-night she was not
looking at clothes. She only thought what a kind face the big girl had
and how extraordinarily pleasant her voice was and what good friends
she and her mother were, just like Laura and Aunt Jessica, only
different.
"There!" said Mrs. Gordon. "You drank up every drop, didn't you? You
must have been hungry. Now you go right to sleep again and I'll miss
my guess if you don't feel real good in the morning."
"Good night," said Harriet from the door. "Did you give Blink her
good-night mouthful, Mother?"
"No, I didn't. How I do forget that cat!" said Mrs. Gordon. She turned
down the sheet under Elliott's chin, patted it a little, and asked,
"Don't you want your pillow turned over?" Then quite naturally she
stooped down and kissed the girl. "I guess you're all right now. Good
night." And Elliott put both arms around her neck and hugged her, big
as she was. "Good night," she said softly.
The next time Elliott woke up it was broad daylight. Her eyes opened
on a framed motto, "God is Love," and she had to lie still and think a
full minute before she could remember where she was and why she was
there at all. Then she smiled at the motto--it wasn't the kind of
thing she liked on walls, but to see it there did not make her feel in
the least superior this morning--and jumped out of bed. As Mrs. Gordon
had prophesied, she felt well, only the least bit wabbly. Probably
that was because it was before breakfast--her breakfast. She had a
disconcerting fear that it might be long long after other people's
breakfasts and for the first time in her life she was distressed at
making trouble. Hitherto it had seemed right and normal for people to
put themselves out for her.
She dressed as quickly as she could and went down-stairs. Harriet was
shelling peas on the big veranda that looked off across the valley to
the mountains. There must have been rain in the night, for the world
was bathed clean and shining.
"Mother said to let you sleep as long as you would." Harriet stopped
the current of apology on Elliott's lips. "Did you have a good
night?"
"Splendid! I didn't know a thing from the time your mother went out of
the room until half an hour ago."
"Didn't know anything about the thunder-shower?"
"Was there a thunder-shower?"
"A big one. It put our telephone out of commission."
"I didn't hear it," said Elliott.
"It almost pays to be sick, to find out how good it feels to be well,
doesn't it? Here's a glass of milk. Drink that while I get your
breakfast."
"Can't I do it? I hate to make you more trouble."
"Trouble? Forget that word! We like to have you here. It is good for
Mother. Gives her something to think about. Can't you spend the day?"
Now, Elliott wanted to get home at once; she had been longing ever
since she woke up to see Mother Jess and Laura and Father Bob and
Henry and Bruce and everybody else on the Cameron farm, not omitting
Prince and the chickens and the "black and whitey" calf; but she
thought rapidly: if it really made things any easier for the Gordons
to have her here--
"Why, yes, I can stay if you want me to." It cost her something to say
those words, but she said them with a smile.
"Good! I'll telephone Mrs. Cameron that we will bring you home this
afternoon. I'll go over to the Blisses' to do it, though maybe their
telephone's knocked out, too. The one at our hired man's house isn't
working. Here comes Mother with an egg the hen has just laid for your
breakfast." "Just a-purpose," said Mrs. Gordon. "It's warm yet and
marked 'Elliott Cameron' plain as daylight. Is my hair full of straw,
Harriet?"
"It is, straw and cobwebs. Where have you been, Mother? You know you
haven't any business in the haymow or crawling under the old carryall.
Why don't you let Alma bring in the eggs? She's little and spry."
"Pooh!" said Mrs. Gordon, with one of her silent laughs. "Pooh, pooh!
Alma isn't any match for old Whitefoot yet. You'd think that hen laid
awake nights thinking up outlandish places to lay her eggs in. Wait
till you get to be sixty, Harriet. Then you'll know you can't let
folks wait on you. Before that it's all right, but after sixty you've
got to do for yourself, if you don't want to grow old.--Two, dearie?
I'm going to make you a drop-egg on toast for your breakfast."
"Oh, no, one!" cried Elliott. "I never eat two. And can't I help? I
hate to have you get my breakfast."
"Why, yes, you can dish up your oatmeal," calmly cracking a second
egg. "'T won't do a mite of harm to have two. Maybe you're hungrier
than you think. Now Harriet, the water, and we're all ready. I'll help
you finish those peas while she eats."
The woman and the girl shelled peas, their fat fingers fairly flying
through the pods, while Elliott devoured both eggs and a bowl of
oatmeal and a pitcher of cream and a dish of blueberries and wondered
how they could make their fingers move so fast.
"Practice," said Mrs. Gordon in answer to the girl's query. "You do a
thing over and over enough times and you get so you can't help doing
it fast, if you've got any gumption at all. The quarts of peas I've
shelled in my life time would feed an army, I guess."
"Don't you ever get tired?"
"Tired of shelling peas? Land no, I like it! I can sit in here and
look at you, or out on the back piazza and watch the mountains, or on
the front step and see folks drive by, and I've always got my
thoughts." A shadow crossed the placid face. "My thoughts work better
when my fingers are busy. I'd hate to just sit and hold my hands. Ted
dared me once to try it for an hour. That was the longest hour I ever
spent."
Mrs. Gordon had risen to peer through the window after a rapidly
receding wagon.
"There!" she said. "There goes that woman from Bayfield I want to sell
some of my bees to. She's going down to Blisses' and I'd better walk
right over and talk to her, as the telephone won't work. I 'most think
one hive is going to swarm this morning, but I guess I'll have time to
get back before they come out. Hello, Johnny, how do you do to-day?"
"All right," lisped the small solemn-eyed urchin who had strayed in
from the kitchen and now stood in the door hitching at a diminutive
pair of trousers and eying Elliott absorbedly. "Gone!" he announced
suddenly; coming out of his scrutiny.
"What, your button?" Harriet pulled him up to her. "I'll sew it on in
a jiffy. Don't worry about the bees, Mother. I can manage them, if
they decide to swarm before you get back, and while you're at the
Blisses' just telephone central our phone's out of order--and oh,
please tell Mrs. Cameron we're keeping Elliott till afternoon."
Mrs. Gordon departed and Harriet sewed on the button. "There, Johnny,
now you're all right. You can run out and play."
But Johnny became suddenly galvanized into action. He dived into a
small pocket and produced a note, crumpled and soiled, but still
legible.
"If that isn't provoking!" said Harriet, when she had read it. "Why
didn't you give me this the first thing, Johnny? Then Mother could
have done this telephoning, too, at the Blisses'."
"What is it?" asked Elliott.
"A message Johnny's mother wants sent. She's our hired man's wife and
I must say at times she shows about as much brains as a chicken. You'd
think she'd know our 'phone wouldn't be likely to work, if hers
didn't. Now I shall have to go over to the Blisses' myself, I suppose.
The message seems fairly important. Where has your mother gone,
Johnny?"
But Johnny didn't know; beyond a vague "she wided away" he was
non-committal.
"She might have stopped somewhere and telephoned for herself, I should
think," grumbled Harriet. "I'll be back in a few minutes. Or will you
come, too? If I can't 'phone from the Blisses' I may have to go
farther."
"I'll stay here, I think, and wash up my dishes. And after that I'll
finish the peas."
"Mercy me, I shan't be gone that long! We're shelling these to put up,
you know. Don't bother about washing your dishes, either. They'll
keep."
"Who's saying bother, now?" Elliott's dimples twinkled mischievously.
Harriet laughed. "You and Johnny can mind the place. The men and Alma
are all off at the lower farm and here goes the last woman. Good-by."
Elliott went briskly about her program. She found soap and a pan and
rinsed her dishes under the hot-water faucet. Then she sat down to the
peas. Johnny, who had followed her about for a while, deserted her for
pressing affairs of his own out-of-doors. Elliott pinched the pods as
scientifically as she knew how and wondered whether, if she should
shell peas all her life, her slender fingers would ever acquire the
lightning nimbleness of the Gordons' fat ones. How long Harriet was
gone!
She was thinking about this when she heard something that made her
first stop her work to listen and then jump up hurriedly, spilling the
peas out of her lap. The wailing of a terrified child was coming
nearer and nearer. Elliott set down the peas that were left and ran
out on the veranda. There was Johnny stumbling up the path, crying at
the top of his lungs.
"Why, Johnny!" She ran toward him. "Why, Johnny, what is the matter?"
Johnny precipitated himself into her arms in a torrent of tears. Not a
word was distinguishable, but his wails pierced the girl's ear-drums.
"Johnny! Johnny, _stop it_! Tell me where you're hurt."
But Johnny only sobbed the harder. He couldn't be in danger of
death--could he?--when he screamed so. That showed his lungs were all
right, and his legs worked, too, and his arms. They were digging into
her now, with a force that almost upset her equilibrium. Could
something be wrong inside of him?
"What's the matter, Johnny? Stop crying and tell me."
Johnny's yells slackened for want of breath. He held up one brown
little hand. She inspected it. Dirty, of course, unspeakably, but
otherwise--Oh, there was a bunch on one knuckle, a bunch that was
swelling. "Is that where it hurts you, Johnny?"
Johnny nodded, gulping.
"Did something sting you?"
"Bee stung Johnny. _Naughty_ bee!"
The girl stared at the small grimy hand in consternation. A bee sting!
What did you do for a bee sting or any kind of a sting for that
matter? Mosquitoes--hamamelis. And where did the Gordons keep their
hamamelis bottle?
Johnny's screams, abated in expectation of relief, began to rise once
more. He was angry. Why didn't she _do_ something? This delay was
unendurable. His voice mounted in a long, piercing wail.
"Don't cry," the girl said nervously. "Don't cry. Let's go into the
house and find something."
Up-stairs and down she trailed the shrieking child. At the Cameron
farm there were two hamamelis bottles, one in the bath-room, the other
on a shelf in the kitchen. But nothing rewarded her search here. If
only some one were at home! If only the telephone weren't out of
order! Desperately she took down the receiver, to be greeted by a
faint, continuous buzzing. There was nothing for it; she must leave
Johnny and run to a neighbor's. But Johnny refused to be left. He
clung to her and kicked and screamed for pain and the terror of
finding his secure baby world falling to pieces about his ears.
"It's a shame, Johnny. I ought to know what to do, but I don't. You
come too, then."
But Johnny refused to budge. He threw himself on his back on the veranda
and beat the floor with his heels and wailed long heart-piercing wails
that trembled into sobbing silence, only to begin all over with fresh
vigor. Elliott was at her wits' end. She didn't dare go away and leave
him; she was afraid he might kill himself crying. But mightn't he do
so if she stayed? He pushed her away when she tried to comfort him.
There was only one thing that he wanted; he would have none of her, if
she didn't give it to him.
Never in her life had Elliott Cameron felt so insignificant, so
helpless and futile, as she did at that minute. "Oh, you poor baby!"
she cried, and hated herself for her ignorance. Laura would have known
what to do; Harriet Gordon would have known. Would nobody ever come?
"What's the matter with him?" The question barked out, brusque and
sharp, but never had a voice sounded more welcome in Elliott Cameron's
ears. She turned around in joyful relief to encounter a pair of
gimlet-like black eyes in the face of an old woman. She was an ugly
little old woman in a battered straw hat and a shabby old jacket,
though the day was warm, and a faded print skirt that was draggled
with mud at the hem. Her hair strayed untidily about her face and
unfathomable scorn looked out of her snapping black eyes.
"It's a--a bee sting," stammered the girl, shrinking under the scorn.
"Hee-hee-hee!" The old woman's laughter was cracked and high. "What
kind of a lummux are you? Don't know what to do for a bee sting!
Hee-hee! Mud, you gawk you, mud!"
She bent down and slapped up a handful of wet soil from the edge of
the fern bed below the veranda. "Put that on him," she said and went
away giggling a girl's shrill giggle and muttering between her
giggles: "Don't know what to do for a bee sting. Hee-hee!"
For a whole minute after the queer old woman had gone Elliott stood
there, staring down at the spatter of mud on the steps, dismay and
wrath in her heart. Then, because she didn't know anything else to do
and because Johnny's screams had redoubled, she stooped, and with
gingerly care picked up the lump of black mud and went over to the
boy. Mud couldn't hurt him, she thought, put on outside; it certainly
couldn't hurt him, but could it help?
She sat down on the floor and lifted the little swollen fist and held
the cool mud on it, neither noticing nor caring that some trickled
down on her own skirt. She sat there a long time, or so it seemed,
while Johnny's yells sank to long-drawn sobs and then ceased
altogether as he snuggled forgivingly against her arm. And in her
heart was a great shame and an aching feeling of inadequacy and
failure. Elliott Cameron had never known so bitter a five minutes. All
her pride and self-sufficiency were gone. What was she good for in a
practical emergency? Just nothing at all. She didn't know even the
commonest things, not the commonest.
"It must have been Witless Sue," said Aunt Jessica, late that
afternoon, when Elliott told her the story. "She is a half-witted old
soul who wanders about digging herbs in summer and lives on the town
farm in winter. There's no harm in her."
"Half-witted!" said Elliott. "She knew more than I did."
"You have not had the opportunity to learn."
"That didn't make it any better for Johnny. Laura knows all those
things, doesn't she? And Trudy, too?"
"I think they know what to do in the simpler emergencies of life."
"I wish I did. I took a first-aid course, but it didn't have stings in
it, not as far as we'd gone when I came away. We were taught bandaging
and using splints and things like that."
"Very useful knowledge."
"But Johnny got stung," said Elliott, as though nothing mattered
beyond that fact. "Do you think you could teach me things, now and
then, Aunt Jessica? the things Laura and Trudy know?"
"Surely," said Aunt Jessica, "and very gladly. There are things that
you could teach Laura and Trudy, too. Don't forget that entirely."
"Could I? Useful things?" She asked the question with humility.
"Very useful things in certain kinds of emergency. What did Mrs.
Gordon do for Johnny when she got home?"
"Oh, she washed his hand and soaked it in strong soda and water,
baking-soda, and then she bound some soda right on, for good measure,
she said."
"There!" said Aunt Jessica. "Now you know two things to do for a bee
sting."
Elliott opened her eyes wide. "Why, so I do, don't I? I truly do."
"That's the way people learn," said Mother Jess, "by emergencies. It
is the only way they are sure to remember. Laura is helping Henry
milk. Suppose you make us some biscuit for supper, Elliott."
Elliott started to say, "I've never made biscuit," but shut her lips
tight before the words slipped out.
"I will tell you the rule. You'd better double it for our family.
Everything is plainly marked in the pantry. Perhaps the fire needs
another stick before you begin."
Carefully the girl selected a stick from the wood-box. "Just let me
get my apron, Aunt Jessica," she said.