Chapter 20

_From Miss Helen Jelliffe to Miss Jane Van Zandt_

_Dearest Auntie:_

It is again the little girl to whom you have been a mother for so many years who comes to you now, to lay her weary head upon your dear shoulder and seek from you the kindness and sympathy you have always so freely given me.

Last night I slept. Yes, slept like some dead thing that never cared whether it ever returned to life, but which would awaken, at times, stupidly, and toss until oblivion returned. I don't exactly know what it is that affects me so. It may be the long watching, I suppose, and the uneasiness of a heart that has lost its owner, and seeks and seeks again, turning for comfort like a poor lost dog to every face which may prove friendly. Just now things seem to be in such a dreadful tangle that I can not even find a thread of it that I can unravel.

Late in the evening, the day before yesterday, I was sitting by the bed where Dr. Grant was lying, and the conviction kept on growing upon me that he was becoming worse all the time. I could not help whispering my fears to Mr. Barnett, who gulped when he answered, as if he also knew what it is to have that dreadful lump in one's throat.

The long, weary hours dragged themselves along, and presently the doctor began to speak, and we bent forward to listen, because it was not very loud and he spoke fast. At first it was all a jumble of delirious words, but suddenly he looked at me and shook his head.

"My own poor darling," he said. "I am afraid that the sea has 'ketched' me, and that I shall never make that cove again."

Then he was still again, so very still that I was afraid, and the tears came and my head went down in my lap, between my hands, and the world became so full of bitterness that I did not feel as if I could stand it for another minute. The dear little parson put his hand on my shoulder, in that curiously gentle way of his.

"We must be strong," he told me, "and we must pray for power to endure."

He then rose, quietly, and moistened the doctor's lips and his brow while I looked on, feeling that I was the most desolate and helpless thing in the world, and as if I could weep for ever. And then all of a sudden, through the recurring booming voices of the waves breaking on the cliffs outside, burst out the shrill voice of the _Snowbird's_ siren and I rushed to the door. Frenchy followed me, and I was so weak that I hung upon his big arm. In the sodden blur of everything I saw our boat coming in, like a great white ghost, and there were more blasts of her whistle. She knew what a welcome awaited her and how we had despaired of her arrival.

In the darkness I could see that people were rushing out of their houses, cheering, and I heard piercing cries of women.

"Th' white ship she've come back," some of them were screaming.

They were scrambling down towards the landing, just hoping that they might in some way be of service. The yacht had lost her headway but the propeller was still churning, and I could see that she was turning around to her mooring. Then I heard them putting the yawl overboard. Lights were breaking out of some of the fish-house windows, and lanterns swung on the little dock, and at last I dimly saw the rowboat coming. I ran down also, with Frenchy, and met Stefansson.

"I got all of that stuff there was in St. John's," he said, "and this gentleman is the doctor. We hunted high and low for a nurse but couldn't get one right off."

But what cared I for nurses just then? Was I not ready to do all that a woman possibly could? Was there a nurse in the world as ready as I to lay down her very life for her patient?

I seized the doctor's hand. I had never been so glad in all my life to see any one. He looked just like a big boy, but he represented renewed hope, the possibility of the achievement of a longing so shrewd that it was a bitter pain to endure it.

"You are going to help us save him!" I cried.

"I will most gladly do all I possibly can," he answered, very simply and quietly.

These doctors are really very nice people, Aunt Jennie dear. They speak to you so hopefully, and there seems to be something in them that makes you feel that you want to lean upon them and trust them.

When I had a better look at this one he appeared to be really very young, and perhaps just a little gawky, and he wore the most appreciably store-clothes, and the funniest little black string of a neck-tie. Isn't it queer that silly things should enter one's head at such times? But he looked like a fine, strong, honest boy, and I liked him for coming, and when he smiled at me I really thought he had a very nice face, and one that gave one the impression that he knew things, too.

"Please hurry," I said. "Come with me quick. Dr. Grant is dying, you know. I am sure he is dying, but perhaps those things you have brought will make him well again."

"I hope so," answered that doctor boy, and together we ran up the path to that poor little hut that holds all the world for me, perhaps a dying world, like those I have been told are fading away in the heavens.

He wasn't a bit out of breath, though I was panting when we reached the shack. He cast a quick look about him, and just nodded briskly to Mr. Barnett, like a man who has no leisure for small talk. He first went up to the little boy's bed, and looked at the parson, enquiringly.

"He's getting better," said the latter.

At once the new doctor turned away and stood by John's bed. I must say John now, Auntie dear, just when you and I are talking together. Perhaps it will only be for a few hours, or a day or two, that he can be John to me, in my heart and soul, for after that he may be only a memory, a killing one, as I feel now.

For a moment he stood there, immobile, looking at John, noting that awful grey color, and the rapid, hard breathing that sometimes comes in little sobs. And then he felt the pulse, coolly, and counted the respirations, in so calm a way that I began to feel like shrieking to him to do something. But all this really took but a very short time. He went to the little table, on which a lamp was burning, rather dimly, and opened the package which contained all those vials they had brought from St. John's. Captain Sammy had just come in, and stood near the door, and he sought my eyes for some message of comfort, but I could only shake my head sadly.

"This lamp gives a very poor light," said Dr. Johnson.

At once the old man leaped out and sprinted towards the nearest neighbor's. There he dashed in, seized the lamp around which the family sat at their evening meal, and rushed out again, leaving them in total darkness. Of course it went out in the wind and had to be lighted again, and I noticed that the young doctor gave a calm, curious glance at me, and Frenchy, and that his eyes swiftly took in all of the poor, sordid, little place.

I stood in a corner, out of the way, for now it seemed to me that I was of very little moment. This man was going to do everything that really mattered, and I would only sit by the bed, afterwards, and watch, and try and do things to help.

Dr. Johnson filled a syringe with the antitoxine and injected the stuff in Dr. Grant's arm, which looked awfully white, and then he turned to me.

"You need not stay any longer, Miss Jelliffe," he said, civilly. "I shall watch him all night."

"You are not going to drive me away?" I cried.

Then he looked at me again, curiously, and there was a tiny little nod of his head, as if he had just understood something, after which he took the poor little chair and pushed it near the bed.

"Won't you sit down?" he said, so gently that my eyes filled with tears, and again everything was blurred as I blundered to the seat.

He did some other things, and mixed medicines that he took out of a black bag, and made John take some. After this he sat down on a wooden box, near me, and watched in silence, and I felt that he was a friend. Mr. Barnett left, promising to return soon, and we remained there, listening to the quick breathing, and dully hearing the long, low booming of the great waves outside, till I fancied they were saying things to me, which I could not understand.

After a time Susie came in.

"Yer father says won't you please come in an' have yer supper," she said. "I knows ye'd rather stay here, but there ain't no jobs folks kin do better starvin' than when they's had their grub. An' th' poor dear man wants yer that bad it makes me feel sorry fer him."

"You ought to go and have something to eat, and rest a little, Miss Jelliffe," said the doctor. "This young person appears to have some rather sensible ideas, and you can return whenever you want to."

So I rose, because it wasn't fair to poor old Dad to leave him alone all the time. Of course it was hurting me to leave, but it would also have hurt to think that he would be having his supper all alone, so sadly.

"You will let me know if...."

"Of course I will," interrupted the doctor boy. "You may depend on me. I'll send the big chap here over, if there is any change."

"You are very good," I said. "I think--I think you are a very nice doctor."

To my surprise he blushed just a little.

"Thank you," he said. "Thank you very much."

There was a smile on his face, and I think I managed to smile a little too, and then I went off with Susie.

"They is some o' th' old women as tells about love medicines as can make folks jist crazy fer one another," she said, as we walked away, rapidly. "Seems ter me 'twould be good enough if some o' them doctors found out some drug as worked t'other way. This bein' in love is harder'n the teethache, an' is enough ter make one feel like hopin' ter be an old maid."

"Perhaps it does, Susie," I assented.

"Come in," cried Dad, as I pushed the door open. "Glad to see you, Helen. I hope the poor chap's better. I just had Stefansson up here, and he says that old Sammy tried his best to drown them all and smash the yacht to kindling. But he admitted that the way the old fellow slapped her through was a marvel. But next year he's going back to racing boats; says he's had enough of cruising."

He looked at me, as I sank wearily in a chair, too tired to answer.

"What's the matter, daughter?" he asked. "You are not ill, are you?"

He rose and came towards me, his dear loving face full of concern, and I jumped up too and kissed him.

"That's my own dear little girl," he said, much comforted. "And--and Helen dear, I don't suppose you will want to sail to-morrow, will you, or in a day or two?"

There was something very pleading in his voice, it seemed to me.

"Perhaps in a day or two it won't--it won't matter much what I shall do, Daddy dear," I answered.

He took me and pressed me to his breast and I felt as if many years were passing away, and I was again the desolate little girl who used to come to him with her woes, when a kitten died or a doll was broken. He sat again in his armchair, and I rested on the arm.

"Let us talk as in the old days, girlie," he said. "Let us be the loving friends we've been all these years. I want to see you happy. Your happiness is the only thing in the world that really concerns me now. To obtain it for you I would spend my last cent and give the last drop of my blood. You believe me, don't you?"

"Indeed I do, Daddy dear," I answered. "I don't deserve such kindness. I'm afraid I am a very selfish girl."

"You haven't an atom of selfishness in you, Helen. You are a woman, a true, strong, loving woman. We shall remain here as long as you want to. Now that there is another doctor here I am not so much afraid for you. If Grant should--should not recover, your old Dad's love may comfort you. And if, as I earnestly hope, he does get well, then come to me and tell me what you want. It shall be yours, girlie, with all my love. That's what I wanted to say."

I slipped off the arm of the chair, and sat down at his feet, looking up at him, through the blur that was in my eyes.

"I--I hardly dare hope he will get well, Daddy," I said, "and--and I don't know yet whether he loves me or not. This evening, in his delirium, he called me his darling, but never before this has he ever said a word of love to me. He's just been a friend to me, Daddy, such a friend!"

"How can he help loving you?" said the dear old man.

But I did not answer, and for a time we remained in silence, watching the wood fire in the tiny chimney, until Susie came in.

"Th' kittle's biled," she announced. "Me cousin Hyatt he've brung some meat off'n the mash, an' I briled some."

"I'm not very hungry, Susie," I told her.

"Nor me neither, ma'am, with all them goin'-ons," she confided. "But what's th' use o' despisin' any of th' Lord's blessin's, specially when they gits kinder scarce?"

So Daddy and I had our supper together, very comfortably, and really I did manage to eat a little, because the thought struck me that a girl couldn't possibly be beyond all hope of comfort as long as she had such a Dad, and I did my best to be brave. But soon after we had finished I became very restless and nervous, and Dad looked at me and patted my hand.

"I expect you'd better run along, my dear," he told me. "But you must really try to have some rest to-night. If that doctor promised to sit up you might just as well have a little sleep. You mustn't be ill, you know, for we all need you too much for that."

So I kissed him and hurried back to the shack, overtaking Mr. Barnett, who was also going there. Frenchy met us at the door.

"Mebbe heem Docteur no die now, _hein_! Mebbe heem leeve now. I think heem no die. What you think?"

"We hope and pray he may get well, my good man," answered the parson.

We went in, and Dr. Johnson rose.

"I can see no change as yet," he said, "but then it is hardly possible that any should occur so soon. At any rate he is no worse."

So Mr. Barnett and I sat down by the bed, and Dr. Johnson went away for some supper; I am sure he must have been nearly starving.

"He's been muttering a good deal," said the doctor before leaving, "but that is of no very great moment. The important thing is to watch him to prevent his getting out of bed, if he should become excitable. We must have no undue strain on his weakened heart."

So the little parson and I sat quietly by the patient, who appeared to be sleeping, and for a long time there was no sound at all, and I think we dreaded to move lest the slightest noise might rouse him.

But after a time, so suddenly that it startled me, came the hoarse, low voice that was so painful to hear, and I bent further forward to listen. At first the words were disconnected, with queer interruptions, so that they possessed no meaning, but presently I was listening, breathlessly. He appeared to be giving orders.

"You, Sammy, cast away the lines! Look lively there! Time, time, time!" he muttered. Then he seemed to be waiting for something and began again.

"I told you to be ready! The years, do you hear me? You are wasting the years. She's good for sixty miles an hour and it will take forty million years to reach the nearest star, where Helen waits. Can't make it, you say? Don't I see her beckoning!"

Then he turned his head, slightly, as if he were addressing some one very near.

"One has to have patience," he said. "They don't understand, and their fingers are all thumbs, and the hawser is fouling my propeller, and Helen calls, and--and I can do nothing."

His head, that had been slightly uplifted, fell back again, and two great drops gathered in the dark, sunken eyes and slowly ran down the hollowed cheeks.

Mr. Barnett turned to me. In his eyes there was a strange look of apprehension, as when one awaits yet fears an answer. But there was nothing that I could say to him. My heart was beating as though ready to burst. I cared nothing then for the little man who stared at me, and sank on my knees beside my poor unconscious John, lifting his limp hand to my lips.