Spice Box (8 page)

“Yes, I remember a little. I think I was going to my sister. There seemed no other place to go then, and the storm was terrible. I couldn’t go any farther. I was so very tired.”

“Poor little girl,” said Howard Sterling, gently laying his hand on her white one for an instant. “I know. And perhaps this telling about it is too hard for you, yet. Would you rather wait till you feel stronger?”

“No, it is better to get it over,” she said with a sigh, closing her eyelids quickly and shaking off a couple of tears that were rolling down her cheeks. “It’s all right. If I’ve got to live, I’ve got to snap out of this. I thought perhaps I could die and go away where Louise went, but since I can’t, I’ve got to get strong enough to get a job and earn my living. I want to repay you people for all you’ve done for me. I realize it’s been a lot.”

“There, now, you’re not to think about that,” he said soothingly. “We’ve all been glad to do everything we could to help, and we’re so happy that you are really on the mend now.”

“You’ve all been wonderful!” she said with another of those quivering sighs.

“But haven’t you any friends? Wouldn’t you like to have us send for some of them?”

A great fear came into her eyes.

“Yes, I have a lot of ‘pleasant’ friends, but no such very close ones. You see, my sister was sick for quite awhile before and after the baby died, and I stayed at home with her most of the time for a couple of years. We didn’t go out much. They are nice people, but I don’t want any of them now, please.”

“Well, of course you do not have to have them if you do not want them,” said the doctor. “I just thought there might be a few who are missing you and greatly pained that you have disappeared.”

“No,” she said. “They weren’t as intimate as that.”

“I’m sorry,” said the doctor. “I was hoping there was at least one or two who would come and cheer you up if they knew where to find you.”

She shook her head sadly, and Sterling felt that the interview for the present was at an end, till suddenly he thought of another question.

“Do you know, my friend, you haven’t told me your name?”

“Oh,” said the girl, and a look of fright came into her eyes. “Do I have to?”

“Well, of course we’ve got to call you something,” he said, smiling genially. “We have to have something to put in the hospital records. You don’t want to just go by a number as if you were a convict, do you? The nurses and officials would think it was very strange if you had no name. Would you want to use an assumed name?”

“Oh no, I wouldn’t like to do that,” she sighed. “But—I seem to have arrived here in such a dramatic style. I wouldn’t like to be talked about, nor have it get into the papers. My sister would have hated to have that happen to me. You see, we are very quiet people.”

The doctor bowed gravely.

“I can quite understand how you feel,” he said gently, “and I thought you would be pleased to know that I told only the officials of the hospital when I brought you here. I told them that you were found at the entrance of the cemetery as if you were going to the grave of a dear one. You have a right to your own privacy, of course, but haven’t you a middle name that you could use in some way? I think that would be pleasanter for you while you are here. Do you have any friends who live about here, who are in this immediate vicinity, who would be likely to come visit someone and perhaps see you or hear of you?”

Janice looked up with a sudden, faint smile.

“I don’t know where
here
is, you know,” she said quaintly.

“Of course, I forgot. Well, we’ll have to remedy that as soon as possible. How soon do you think you will feel well enough to take a ride with me? When you are, I’ll drive you around and give you a glimpse of the place. It is called Enderby, and it is about ninety miles from the place where I found you. Enderby is a very pretty spot, especially at this time of year. I really think a drive might do you a lot of good, put some color into those white cheeks and a little brightness in your eyes. Then we can talk more about all these things and perhaps settle on some name by which you can be known. Be thinking up a few questions you would like to ask me if you want to. How soon do you think you would enjoy getting out in the spring air?”

Janice smiled gently.

“You are very kind,” she said, “but you don’t need to go to all that trouble. I am all right, and I’ll be up and around soon now. But there is one question I would like to ask you. Would you be likely to know of any place around here where I can get a job so that I can pay the hospital here what I owe them, and pay you? That is the only question that interests me now.”

“Well, perhaps I might,” said the doctor thoughtfully, “but I wouldn’t want you to try any hard work at present. I want to keep a close watch on you for a while to make sure there are no complications lingering around to make trouble for you later in your life. But I’ll be thinking about it. I wonder—how would you like to be doing something around the hospital for a while? There are light office jobs, work at the desk, meeting parents of the child patients, something like that. Would that interest you? And later you might even start to take nurse’s training if you are interested in that.”

A light came to Janice’s eyes and a quick flush of color to her cheeks.

“Oh, that would be wonderful! Could I really? Yes, I should like to do anything like that, in fact, anything you feel I can. At least until my bills are paid.”

“Well, don’t fret about bills. That will all come in good time. Get well first. And in the meantime, take a little nap right away, and then begin to think about the name you want to be called.”

“I don’t want to think anymore about that,” she said. “You may tell them I am Mary Whitmore.”

He looked at her keenly for an instant, wondering if that was real or an assumed name, but he took it in his best style, with an easy smile.

“Fine!” he said. “That sounds good. I think it fits you nicely. Now, close your eyes and go to sleep. Set your thoughts on getting ready for that drive in the country as soon as possible.”

Then with a cordial smile he left her, and she lay there thinking how very kind he had been and how easy he had made the matter of her name. After all, she had not had to tell him whether that was her real name or not, and she didn’t feel worried now about it, for Mary was her middle name, although she never used it. The people she knew would not remember it. They had never known her as Mary, and she doubted if Herbert had ever known about it either. At least he wouldn’t be looking for her under that name.

Drifting off to a restful sleep, she thought again how kind and helpful that doctor had been. She owed her life to him, and she supposed she ought to be grateful, although it would have been such a happy release if she could have gone on to heaven with her sister. But then that was not a thing she had any right to think about. God had put her here, as the doctor had said, with some purpose, and she must stay until He took her away. That was practically what the doctor had said. He must be a Christian. It was what her Christian mother and father had taught her before they left her. It was what her sister believed, and what she had been trained to believe. Of course it was right. And of course she must be glad that her life was saved. Maybe sometime she would reach the place where she could be thankful about it. But certainly the doctor was kind, for apparently he could very easily have left her lying in that snowbank to die and not taken all that trouble to bring her here. God had been good to her, and probably there was going to be a way made for the next things that had come to her.

So thinking, she dropped off to sleep and dreamed there were angels somewhere near, and her sister with the baby who had gone to heaven such a little while before.

When she awoke later, she felt a pleasant hope at the memory of the job the doctor was going to help her get as soon as she was strong enough.

These bright thoughts made a brighter outlook on life, and she began to feel decidedly better. It wasn’t long before she felt quite equal to the ride the doctor had suggested.

It was a beautiful morning when the nurse came up to say that the doctor wanted her to take a ride, and, donning a borrowed uniform, she was soon ready. To think she was to go into the great out-of-doors again! It seemed so very long that she had been here in this little hospital bed. And spring was now come. There would be nothing to remind her of that awful storm in which she had arrived.

The doctor drove into quiet lanes and away from houses. Indeed, there seemed to be very few houses, even in the distance. It was just sweet countryside. Farmers plowing and harrowing ground, planting seed. The low, even furrows in the wide fields seemed restful. And then they drove through wooded land with perfume of wild growing things in the air, the pine trees’ resinous tang, slippery elm, and the mingling of fresh earth, newly washed with rain.

The doctor watched her furtively, saw the sad look fade out of her eyes and a sparkle of interest in the beauty about her grow in its place.

“Oh, there are blue violets all over that bank!” she exclaimed. “How many there are! Oh, I would like to get out and pick them.”

“Well, you may try it,” said Sterling, parking on the side of the road. “Just a minute. Not too long, and if picking the first one tires you, stop immediately!”

He helped her out and stooped down beside her, picking with her, watching her white fingers moving among the broad leaves. And when he put her back in the car, he laid his own handful of purple blossoms in her lap and smiled to see how eagerly she arranged them and drew them up to her face to touch them and smell their freshness.

They did not talk much that first ride, just spoke now and again of the blue of the sky, the loveliness of the hills in the distance. Quite casually he pointed out the notable spots in the landscape, but he did not make much of them. He wanted to ease her back into the world again with as little ado about it as possible. To make her feel that she was back into living, and had been a long time, and that the sorrow and sickness were far behind her. When he brought her back to the hospital, her face seemed really bright, almost happy.

They hadn’t talked personally at all, until just as they turned into the drive of the hospital grounds, he said quite casually, “Well, if you are still of mind to go to work, I think I can promise you that there will be a place for you, perhaps by next week, if you still feel strong enough for it.”

“Oh!” she said, catching her breath with a pleased exclamation. “I am so glad. I’m sure the knowledge of that will help me to get strong quickly.”

He smiled down at her.

“You’ve a better color already,” he said. “We must try this again. How about day after tomorrow? I have to take Dr. Severance over to see a patient near Crystal Springs, and there is no reason why you shouldn’t go along if you are so minded.”

“Oh, thank you!” she said with a quick, appreciative look. “I’ll be glad to go. I wouldn’t want you to take any extra trouble for me, but if you have to go anyway, I’m sure I shall enjoy it.”

And so it was that Sterling managed to get Janice out in the open frequently, sometimes when he was taking others, sometimes alone. And when they went alone, he would always manage somehow to get a bit of information about her family and her life with her sister, or her early upbringing. Yet he never appeared to be seeking such information. It seemed just to happen into their talk, and he stored all such knowledge in his mind in case there should come a time when he might need further information about her for her own good.

So little by little and without consciousness of what was happening, they grew into good fellowship, which both enjoyed.

By this time Janice was beginning to have little duties assigned to her every day, and she enjoyed feeling that she was doing something really useful. The doctor watched her carefully, making sure that she was not overdoing, and rejoiced to see a light growing in her eyes as if she was really interested in living again. There was a spring in her step now as she went about each duty, and more and more they were beginning to assign real duties to her, till finally she began her training in earnest and was very proud of her success.

Of course, now that she was on duty a good deal, she had less time to take rides, and less opportunities to talk with Dr. Sterling. And of course she couldn’t expect to have as much attention from him now that she was well as when she was a patient. She told herself that perhaps it was a good thing, for he certainly was an attractive young man, and of course she mustn’t get to admiring him too much. He was a busy man, and going to rise in the world, and she was a penniless girl with her living to earn. He had been a kind benefactor, and she must not consider him in any other light ever.

Still, she was very happy. Here in this safe, sweet place, with real work to do and a chance to rise, perhaps, with nothing to fear. She was very grateful to God for what He had done for her. And more and more she remembered to take time for prayer morning and evening. She must not get away from God. The world just wasn’t a safe place without God.

They talked about that one day on a drive.

They had been watching the sky with soft, floating clouds that formed into lovely groups, and pointing out that some of them looked like distant cities and mountains, and then they were both still for a few minutes. Suddenly Janice said, “God has been so very good to me. I feel such days as this as if I cannot thank Him enough for giving me such wonderful friends and helping me to a place where I can go on living.”

Sterling looked down at her with a tender light in his eyes and thought how sweet she looked under her white starched nurse’s cap. Then he asked, half amusedly, “You really believe that God takes notice of His creatures and follows their lives, arranging things for them, don’t you?”

Janice looked up, startled.

“Why, yes of course, don’t you?”

“A great many do not,” he said, with a speculative look and a kind of sigh, as if the matter had sometimes troubled him.

“Oh!” she said almost sorrowfully. “I suppose they don’t. I know some that I am sure do not think anything about God. But I’m sure that if I didn’t believe God was there arranging things for me, I wouldn’t have the nerve to go on.”