THE EIGHTH ROSE
On the morning after the party Polly was early downstairs.
Breakfast not being quite ready, she filled up the time by giving fresh water to her birthday roses.
“You are going to the hospital to-day,” she told them, as she clipped the ends of the stems and broke off two or three great thorns. “That is, most of you,” she amended. “Let me see, you, and you, and you,” she decided, laying aside three big beauties. Their number was doubled, and then she hesitated.
“Mother, you wouldn’t keep more than three, would you?”
Mrs. Dudley looked up from the grapefruit she was cutting.
“That is a good number to look at,” she smiled.
“So I think,” Polly agreed; “but they can have only one apiece over at the hospital. One alone is pretty, though,” she mused. “I’d leave only one for us, but if Leonora should come, she might be afraid I didn’t care for them. No, I think eight will have to do, and it will be better to give to those that have to lie abed, won’t it?”
Only waiting for her mother’s approval, she went on:—
“There’s Reva and Ottoine and Mary up in the children’s ward, and old Mrs. Zieminski, and that funny little Magdalene, and Gustav and Miss Butler—that makes seven,” counting them slowly on her fingers. “I don’t know who I will give the eighth to—there are plenty of folks, only I’m not acquainted with them. Never mind, anybody’ll be glad of one of these lovelicious roses, and I’ll see when I get there.”
“How does it feel to be eleven?” broke in the Doctor’s happy voice.
“Why, I was eleven day before yesterday,” laughed Polly. “I’ve had time to get used to it.”
“But that was a birthday, and yesterday was a party day; it is when you get back to the everydayness that you begin to feel things.”
“It isn’t a bit different from ten,” she declared. “Yes, a little, because I have all these roses to give away. Aren’t they sweet?” She held them up for her father to sniff.
“Come to breakfast!” was the gentle command from the dining-room, and Polly skipped on ahead, cautioning the Doctor to be sure not to spill the water from the vase with which she had entrusted him.
The hour before school found Polly and the pink roses on their way to the big white house. Having the freedom of the hospital almost as much as Dr. Dudley himself, she flitted in and out whenever she chose, never in anybody’s way, and greeted with smiles from nurses and patients.
Her errand this morning carried her first to the children’s convalescent ward, where she was so eagerly seized upon that she escaped only by pleading her additional flowers to distribute, and school time not far away.
With the eighth rose still in her hand, and debating whether to carry it up to the children, or to give it to a boy in the surgical ward with whom she had once spoken, she passed a half-open door on one of the private-room corridors.
Glancing inside, she saw a young man, with bandaged eyes, lying on a couch. He was quite alone, and his mouth looked sad.
“I wonder if he would like it,” she questioned, and a breath of fragrance from the half-blown rose answered her. “He can smell it, even if he can’t see it,” she thought, and stepped inside the room.
The man turned his head.
“Would you like one of my birthday roses?” she asked. “It is very sweet.” She put it in his hand.
“I thank you, indeed.” The sad lips smiled. “This is quite outside of my programme. In fact, I had almost forgotten there were such pleasant times as birthdays.”
“It was day before yesterday,” she ventured.
“And I judge by your voice that the number of roses needed was not large.”
She laughed softly. “Only eleven.”
“About as I guessed! I hope the rest of the birthday matched the roses. This is very beautiful.” His fingers gave it a caressing touch.
“Oh, I had a lovelicious birthday! I really had two of them!”
“Two? That sounds interesting. Can’t you sit down here and tell me about it?”
“If I wouldn’t be late to school,” she hesitated. “I don’t know what time it is.”
He pulled a watch from his pocket, and held it up for her view.
“Oh, I’ve twenty-seven minutes! I can stay a little while.”
She took the chair beside him, and recounted the story of the intermediate entertainment, intuitively omitting the part which Ilga played. That it was appreciated by her listener Polly could not doubt.
“You must come and see me again,” he invited, as she rose to go. “I think you may do me more good than the Doctor.”
“Oh, no!” she objected softly; “I couldn’t do anything better than father! He cures everybody.”
The young man smiled doubtfully.
“May I ask who ‘father’ is? Not Dr. Dudley?”
“Why, yes, sir. I s’posed you knew. I’m Polly Dudley, Dr. Dudley’s little girl.”
“Are you! Well, Miss Polly, I am surely glad to have made your acquaintance.” He ran hurriedly through his pockets. “I had a card somewhere. Probably it was seized with the rest of my belongings. That seems to be a way they have at hospitals—hide a man’s things so he can’t get at them! Never mind, I haven’t forgotten my name. I am Floyd Westwood of New York.”
“That’s a lovelicious name,” Polly told him frankly.
The corners of his mouth curled up.
“I hope you will not fail to come often,” he told her, as she put her little hand in his for good-bye.
“Oh, I’ll come!” she promised. “But it’s father that will cure you.”
“I hope so, but,” he added soberly, “it doesn’t look much like it at present.”
Polly’s eyes went troubled.
Perhaps the other read her silence, for he said brightly:—
“Now that I know the Doctor’s little girl, it may be I shall have more confidence in the Doctor’s assurances.”
“Oh, if he says you’ll get well,” she laughed, “you needn’t worry a single mite! Father doesn’t ever lie to people.”
“That sounds pleasant and mighty reassuring. I am glad you came in. I was getting blue.”
“Perhaps you were ‘scared,’ like Magdalene,” she chuckled. “I do wish you could see her! She is the funniest little German girl! She had appendicitis, and the doctors sent for father. He knew right off she couldn’t live without an operation, and he told her father and mother, and then he went and talked to her. He didn’t tell her she’d die, for she’s only six years old; but he said she couldn’t ever go out to play, or have any more good times, unless they took her to the hospital to cure her. And she looked up at him, just as sober, and said, ‘I’m scared! I’m scared!’—not a thing else! They brought her up here in the ambulance, and she never said a word all the way. But when she got downstairs, where there were lots of doctors and nurses, father happened to go near her, and she looked straight up into his face, and said, ‘I’m scared! I’m scared!’ Poor little thing! I should think she would have been; but she is so funny.”
“Did she come out all right?”
“Oh, yes, of course!—father performed the operation. The next day when he saw her she was looking as happy as could be, and he asked her if she was scared, and she didn’t speak, only just shook her head this way, and grinned.” Polly’s curls waved vigorously. “After a few days she grew worse, and they had a consultation, and three or four doctors were there. Father thought she looked frightened, and he asked her if she was scared, and she bowed her head hard—oh, she is so funny! I just carried her one of my roses, and I’m sure she liked it, but she didn’t say a single word.”
“I have a fellow-feeling for that little girl,” smiled Mr. Westwood. “I know all right what it is to be ‘scared,’ and it isn’t pleasant.”
As Polly’s lips parted for a response, her eyes fell upon the watch which the young man was still fingering.
“Oh, my!” she exclaimed, “I forgot all about school! Good-bye!” And she flashed away.
At dinner she told where she had left her eighth rose.
“I am glad you happened in there,” returned the Doctor. “He seems to be a fine young fellow, a chemist, just out of college. He came up from New York to see a friend, and while he was assisting with some chemical work he was temporarily blinded by an explosion. He is coming on all right; but for a few days I have noticed that he has seemed rather gloomy. Go again! You will do him good.”
Several times during the next week Polly obeyed her father’s injunction, and accepted Mr. Westwood’s repeated invitations. With every visit the two became better friends, and Polly waited almost as eagerly as the patient himself for the day when his bandaged eyes should be released. Only in Polly’s heart there was not a little regret mingled with her anticipated joy, for that would herald Mr. Westwood’s going away. Still she would not let the disturbing thought detract from her present pleasure, and she ran in and out of the young man’s room in a happy, quite-at-home fashion.
She was starting for one of these little visits, when her mother called to her.
“I wish you would go down to Besse and Drayton’s, and get me a yard more of this ribbon,” she requested; “I find I haven’t enough.” She held out a bit of blue satin.
“I’ll be back with it in a jiffy—a ten-minute jiffy,” laughed Polly.
Off she flew, tripping down the street and around the corner so briskly that she nearly ran into a little man who was proceeding at a quick, heedless pace.
“Why, Mr. Bean!” she cried.
“I declare, if ’tain’t Polly! little Polly! How do you do, my dear? How do you do?”
As soon as Mr. Bean learned that Polly was on her way down to the department store, he turned about, and walked along by her side, listening delightedly to her happy chatter.
“I’m proper sorry I hain’t found that letter yit,” he mourned. “Jane she’s been kind o’ upset ’n’ cranky lately, or I should ’a’ asked her about it before. I guess I shall speak about it to-night, yis, I guess I shall,” he assured Polly and himself.
“Oh, don’t hurry to do it right away!” Polly responded understandingly. “I can wait to know about my relatives. If Aunt Jane isn’t feeling—quite well, it wouldn’t be a good time.”
“No, ’twouldn’t,” he agreed in a relieved tone. “But I’ll have it for yer soon’s I see my way to it. Sometime when Jane’s feelin’ real good, I’ll broach the subjec’, I certain will.”
Home with her ribbon and then over to the hospital sped Polly. She found her friend impatiently striding up and down the limited space of his room.
“I’d about given you up,” he told her in an aggrieved tone. “I concluded you were tired of coming to be eyes for a poor old blind fellow like me, and so had stayed after school to play.”
Polly looked at him keenly. Sometimes she did not quite know whether to take him in fun or in earnest. Now his face was serious; but she felt almost sure there was a twinkle behind that tantalizing bandage.
“You know I couldn’t be tired of coming to see you,” she said simply, “and I never stay to play after school. I went on an errand for mother, and then I met Mr. Bean, and he stopped to apologize for not finding a letter that is—lost, a letter about my May relatives.”
“What!” His tone startled Polly. “Are you related to the Mays? how? Tell me!” He was waiting with eager, parted lips.
“Why,” she hesitated, vaguely abashed all at once, “I’m Polly May, you know—or was. I guess I haven’t told you.” Polly never talked of her adoption, instinctively guarding as a precious secret what was naturally well known throughout the city.
“No, you haven’t; but won’t you tell me now, please?”
“Father and mother adopted me the day they were married,” she explained simply. “Papa and mamma were dead, and I didn’t belong to Aunt Jane or anybody.”
“Polly, who was your father—your own father?” The words tumbled close on the heels of her sentence.
“Chester May,” she answered dazedly. Something was imminent. She knew not what.
“Chester May! And your mother’s name? Was it Illingworth? Phebe Illingworth?” The words shot like bullets.
“Why, yes!” gasped Polly. “How did you know?”
“Polly! Polly!” He thrust out his hands—they touched Polly’s, which he caught in a strong grip. “My mother was your father’s sister, his eldest sister! We are cousins, Polly, own cousins!”
Dr. Dudley came, with the nurse, before the story was ended, and then it had to be begun and told all over again,—the old, old story of a quarrel between the father and the “baby” of his family, of the hasty leaving home of the boy, of the meagre news of his early marriage, and lastly of the years that were empty of tidings. These Polly was able to fill up in part, when the story-teller turned listener, with interest almost as great as Polly’s own.
Floyd Westwood begged the physician to allow him one little glimpse of his new-found cousin; but Dr. Dudley was firm, and the eager eyes were not uncovered. Polly soon slipped away to share her joy with her mother, leaving the Doctor and his patient to talk over present plans and future possibilities.