But Corliss, coming close, whispered earnestly, “Oh Mother, Dale’s been wonderful to us. She’s just as sweet and kind as can be! She’s taking care of us.”
And Powelton came closer on the other side. “Dale has been awfully good to us,” he said firmly. “She has taken us home with her and made us just as comfortable as can be. She couldn’t be better. You must not talk that way about her. She is sweet and kind.”
“Oh, she is, is she? Well it’s the first time in her life, then,” snapped the woman on the pillow. “But she’ll turn you out when she gets ready. Don’t trust her.”
Then the nurse came near and said in a low tone, “She doesn’t rightly know what she is saying yet. She’s still under opiates, somewhat, and hasn’t got back into the world yet. But I think the next time you come she’ll be more like herself.”
Oh, thought Dale sadly, she’s quiet like herself. You just don’t know her, that is all. But aloud she said: “Of course. I know.”
The invalid’s sharp eyes had closed, and the visitors began to think it was time for them to leave, but suddenly she opened them, and looking straight at her son, she snapped, “I want to see my lawyer. You go down and explain to him what they are doing to me, keeping me here in this ward, and tell him to come right up and get me out of here. Do you understand?”
The young man looked at his mother disapprovingly. “I don’t think the doctor would approve having your lawyer come to see you now. You will have to wait till you are better. Just be patient, Mother. It will all come right.”
“Oh, you think you can manage me, do you? Why, that’s ridiculous! Nurse! Help me get up. I’ve got to get out of this bed right away.”
The nurse came quickly, administered some medicine, and said gently, “Just you lie still for a little bit, Mrs. Huntley. Everything’s going to be all right.”
Then the sick woman turned her eyes toward her daughter. “Where are you going now, Corliss?”
“Why, I think maybe I’ll play a little tennis,” said Corliss with a quick understanding. “You take a nice little sleep, Mother, and then we’ll come and see you again.”
Already the medicine was taking effect, and they were able to slip away without further talk, but the nurse followed them to the hall to reassure them. “You know she’ll be quite different from this in a few days. You needn’t feel worried. The doctor seemed to think she was doing as well as could possibly be expected yet.”
They got themselves silently out of that hospital and down into the sunlit street, their faces utterly sad and disheartened.
“Now,” said Dale suddenly when they were out from any chance of being overheard, “I think we’ve got to plan to do something pleasant, don’t you? It wasn’t a cheerful session today. In fact, I was afraid it would be just that way, because I’ve heard before that when people have had concussions and shocks they are very vague in their minds. But they come out of it. Don’t you worry. In fact, the head nurse told me that things were going very much as the doctor had hoped, and he thought if nothing further developed later that we might be very comfortable about the patient. So, the idea is to try to be as cheerful as possible. Have you any suggestions? How about it, Corliss? You said something about playing tennis. Is that what you’d like to do?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Corliss with a desolate look. “I don’t suppose Pow will be willing to. He said the last time we played that I wasn’t playing as well as I used to, and he was fed up with playing with me.”
Powelton turned, annoyed. “I didn’t say just that, Corrie. I said we ought to try and get some others to play with us. I said you were getting stale just playing with me and that if we had a foursome you’d get back to your game.”
“Well, isn’t that the same thing?” said Corliss sullenly.
“No,” said the brother quietly, “not quite. But anyhow, now, I’m glad to play.”
Dale wondered what had come over Powelton, but she smiled encouragingly. “That’s fine of you, Powelton,” she said, “but if you want a foursome I think I could find one for you. In fact, I might play awhile myself if we can’t find anybody else, and I’m sure Dick Netherby would help out. He’s young, but he’s rather a wizard at the game, I understand. Anyway, let’s try it. I’ll call him up and see if he’s free.”
Neither of the cousins was particularly overjoyed at the idea of strangers, but they were on their good behavior just now, it seemed, so they said nothing except, “Oh, all right.” And Dale went to the telephone. When she came back, she said it was all right, that Dick could come, and he was going to bring over another racket for her to use, so they would all be able to play.
“Who is this Dick?” asked Corliss rather grimly. “Is he just a kid? Because kids can’t really play our game.”
“Wait till you see,” said Dale, smiling. “They send for him everywhere to play because he’s really a sort of champion. But suppose we come on and eat our lunch now and be ready when Dick comes. He may not be able to stay long this time. He’s working somewhere in the late afternoons.”
So they went in to the nice lunch that Hattie had ready for them, and the atmosphere became a trifle less doleful.
But Dick as a tennis player turned out to be a great success. He arrived early, and they heard his sharp whistle while they sat waiting for him. They went off happily together, Corliss studying this bright-faced homely boy with the engaging grin and wondering why it was she couldn’t seem to make him look at her admiringly, the way the high school boys at home did. But there was a sort of dignity about Dick that, in spite of his youth, made him seem older than he really was.
Hattie watched them going off together, Dale swinging her racket as cheerfully as any of them, and she said to herself, Miss Dale, she is a real livin’ saint, that’s what she is! Just fancy her goin’ off to play with them brats after the way they treated her before this.
Chapter 14
It was a golden day in the late fall, and as they started out for the tennis courts, the leaves of the trees seemed just beginning to flame into deeper color, especially the maples, some of which had brought out a lovely coral pink that seemed almost as if they were trying to aim at the new fall fashionable shades. Dale took it all in, to paint it over again in words for David when she had an opportunity to be by herself and write him again. Up in a tall tree a little bird was voicing its joy in the continued mildness of the weather and announcing its intention of going south soon for the winter.
Somehow the problems of the immediate future grew less staggering to her mind as she went out into the sunshine to try and help two other despairing souls to keep their footing in their new uncertain world.
But there was something else besides the sunshine and the singing of the birds that gave Dale a song in her heart as she went out for a real playtime; and that was her love, going somewhere—out into danger, far away from her—but loving her, with a love that she felt would last even into another life, if God willed that he might not come back in this one. But oh, how she prayed that he might come back! And so David in mind went out with her, and she thought much about him and perhaps played better because of her thought of him.
That afternoon set the pace for a steady life for the two, little more than children, who were suddenly cast upon the mercy of an up until then unloved cousin. They all had a good time, even the girl who was giving up her time and thought to help the two cousins.
They came home to another good dinner. Hattie was all for what her young mistress was doing, now. These wild young visitors were showing some sense and allowing themselves to be led in right ways. Well, she would help all she could. So the dinner was full of little pleasant surprises that only Hattie knew how to make, and yet it had not been costly, either in money or ration stamps.
That evening Dale got out a large jigsaw puzzle, and so well had she proved herself an equal in tennis playing that the other two were interested to inspect the puzzle. Before long they were all working away happily at it, spurred on by tryin
g to get their portions finished as soon as their cousin finished hers, which proved to be some contest, for Dale was skillful at jigsaw puzzles as well as tennis.
Dale hustled them off to bed at ten, realizing she had a letter to write yet before she slept and wondering if Corliss would repeat last night’s act again. She asked her if she would like to sleep in her room again, but Corliss sheepishly declined. Dale had caught a glance between the brother and sister, showing that the brother had been making fun of his sister for what she did the night before, probably scolding her. “I’ll be all right,” she said with a pale little smile, and then added, “but thank you just the same.”
“All right,” said Dale in a matter-of-fact tone, “but come in anytime, night or day, when you feel you need company.” And a smile passed between the two girls that was far different from any glance they had ever shared before.
The jigsaw puzzle, left on the table in a corner all night, proved an incentive to get up early the next day and go at it, and Dale began to feel that if she could just keep these two busy and a little interested, half her problems would be solved.
So the days fell into a pleasant routine—the visits to the hospital beginning each day, sometimes another in the late afternoon, all brief and bringing very little satisfaction.
As the mother recovered, more and more she fell into the habit of bewailing her fate and somehow trying to blame Dale for her accident. If Dale hadn’t been so trying, she said, she was sure she would never have gotten so confused as to let herself get run over.
Dale avoided such issues as much as possible and responded by bringing a few lovely late blossoms from the garden, until Aunt Blanche waved them away one day and called them weeds. “Take those weeds away!” she snarled disagreeably. “They give me the creeps. They make me sneeze, and they might have worms on them.” So then Dale brought a few roses from the florist’s and made Corliss give them to her mother. But it made little difference in the woman’s attitude. She was determined to complain. She took a dislike to all the nurses and demanded others. She kept up a continual outcry about being put in the ward and kept demanding a private room. But no private room was given her. There was the same excuse, “We have no private room to spare. The private rooms are now occupied by two or three patients at least, because of war conditions.”
But that kind of talk had never stopped Aunt Blanche, and she kept right at it, harping on it whenever her children came to see her. Blaming Dale for not doing something about it. But the most Dale could say was that she would speak to the doctor about it.
And then she began to clamor again to see her lawyer. But when the nurse tried to reach him, he as always out of town. The plain truth being that he did not want to see her, for having gotten all the money out of her that he reasonably could, he felt it was time to be away from the vicinity. And neither Dale nor the children made any response to Mrs. Huntley’s requests to see her lawyer. They were not in sympathy with her on this subject. The son, at least, had reached the stage where he began to see just what kind of a man this lawyer was. He could not argue with his mother now, while she was sick and unable to leave the hospital and look after her affairs, so he said nothing. That had been his habit in dealing with things he did not like in the past, always to ignore them, so now his mother was not surprised at his attitude. But she spoke to him bitterly about his unwillingness to help her, and sometimes Dale could see that it was very hard for him to hear her faultfindings. Just once he did say, “Mother, I don’t have much faith in that lawyer,” but his remark brought about such a torrent of abuse and scorn that he did not venture to oppose her again. Dale could see he shrank from hearing his mother shriek out, “Powelton! Stop! How dare you speak that way about my lawyer?”
It was on the day that that happened first that the boy was very silent on the way home, until they got quite near to the house, and then he said quietly, “I wish you folks would begin to call me by my right name. I just hate that name Powelton! I wasn’t rightly named that, anyway. Dad wanted me named after himself, George Harold, and I want to use George now. It sounds more like something real, and not that sissy name of Powelton.”
“All right,” said Dale. “I’ll call you George. I like that name. But—will your mother mind?”
“I expect she will,” he said bitterly. “Powelton was her maiden name. But I’d rather have my father’s whole name.”
“I think you have a right to be called what you want to,” said Corliss unexpectedly. “I know Mother used to want to call me Clarissa, and I wouldn’t stand for it. But now she seems to like Corliss. Anyhow, I think you can do what you like. Mother won’t be around for a while till we get used to it. I like George best, too.”
The lad looked pleased and nothing more was said, but they were careful after that to call him George.
After dinner that night, Dale brought out a new jigsaw puzzle and they grew almost happy at times as they worked over it. They were beginning to really enjoy each other’s company, and since the mother was away there was no one to find fault.
So the days settled into a quiet routine, and it was good for Dale that she had something pleasant to occupy her mind, for David’s last letter had intimated that he was being sent off on some mission from which he would not be able to write to her, perhaps for a long time.
Nightly she read over that last precious letter and prayed for him, wondering where he was, trusting him to the care of the heavenly Father, and then reading a few verses in the Bible, verses they had agreed together to read at night while he was gone.
So they got through the days, wondering always what was coming when the invalid recovered and was able to walk. Would she come to the house that Dale owned, where they were staying? And what would it be like if she did?
It is safe to say that all three of these young people thought a great deal about this subject. Dale knew that of course she must invite her aunt if she seemed to want to come but that it would bring dissension on every side. Corliss and George both knew that this quiet time while they were waiting for the recovery of the mother was heaven compared to what it would be if she returned. Then there was the subject of a nurse. Corliss knew she would never be able to take care of her mother, for there would be no satisfying her ever with anything. Oh, it was all a sore subject, and none of them liked to think about it. And only Dale could throw it off by laying it all in the keeping of her heavenly Father. “All through the night,” and all through the days, also.
Of course Dale was the one who dreaded it most, perhaps, for she would be the butt of all the faultfinding, and she would be the one who would have to sweat and bear it as if it were nothing. Could she do it? Yes, but not in her own strength. In the strength of her Lord she could lie back and take it sweetly, remembering that it was not herself who was bearing the responsibility but her Lord who had promised to undertake for her. She had put her all in His hands, and she must only be careful that she did not interfere in the matter but let her Lord manage it all for her.
It was very still in the room for a few minutes, with only the soft sound of the flickering flames in the fireplace, where a quiet wood fire brightened the dusk in the corners of the room, mingling with the silvery beam of the new moon shining across the floor as if to meet and caress the firelight.
Troubled thoughts were going through the minds of the young people as they sat working over the new jigsaw puzzle. At last Corliss broke the silence. “What are we going to do, Dale, when Mother begins to get well? I tried to ask her today while you went to speak to the nurse, but she looked at me so strangely and just said, ‘Stop! Don’t torment me with questions like that when I’m sick.’ And then you came back with the nurse and I couldn’t say anything more, but what are we going to do?”
“I think the way will open somehow when the time comes,” said Dale with a sweet smile. “There’s really nothing to worry about, you know. There will be a way.”
“Yes, but we can’t stay here,” said the boy. “You want to start a
school or something, and we are taking up all your time and your house. And goodness knows it will be work when Mom comes here with a nurse in the bargain. We ought not to put you out this way.”
It was a manly speech, and it thrilled Dale’s heart to think her cousin had had kind thoughts for her comfort.
“But I’m not worried, George,” she said pleasantly. “Maybe that school wasn’t in God’s plan for me just now, and certainly having you here was, for the present, anyway. And somehow I think it was nice that you stayed here and we got better acquainted with each other, don’t you?”
“Swell!” said George heartily. “I never knew you were so nice, and I’ll always be glad I got to know you. You’ve been wonderful to Corrie and me. You couldn’t have been better. But all the same, that’s another reason why we ought to get out and let you have your house to yourself.”
“No,” said Dale earnestly. “You mustn’t think that way. I’m just glad you are here, and I know we’re going to have a nice time together, in spite of worry and anxieties and maybe some discomforts in the days ahead. But I’m sure there’s something good coming out of it all.”
“What makes you so sure?” asked the boy curiously.
Dale hesitated for an instant. Should she tell him? Would he understand? Yet she felt she must. “Because my heavenly Father is managing it all, and I have trusted my life with Him. I know He will work it out right for our best good. You see, what He wants for us all is to make us like His Son, Jesus Christ, and if He sees that hard things will accomplish that for us in a better, quicker way than anything else would, then that is what He will do for us. I know, for I have told Him I want to rest my life with Him entirely.”
“But you couldn’t have any fun or good times that way, could you?” asked Corliss in wonder.
“Oh yes, definitely so,” said Dale. “You know He loves us, wants us to be happy in Him. So He would want to give us happiness as well as hard things. And I believe He truly loves me. He has given me a great deal of joy in many ways. Sometimes my heart is just thrilled to running over with the things He has handed out to me.”