“It’s the busy people who find not only the most time but the most happiness,” was Silence Blossom’s cheery answer.
And realizing, as she well did, how much more of real happiness there was in the modest Blossom home than in the big Fifield house, where no one ever thought of going to ask a service, and every life was wholly self-centered, Rose could not but admit that this was true.
“I don’t see what happiness you could find in sitting up all night with Aunt Polly Brown,” she protested. “I’m sure I never want to go where there’s sick people. I hope I’ll never be asked to.”
Already in that home where thoughtfulness for others was part of the daily life, and interest in any who were suffering a matter of course, it had come about naturally that Rose should be sent with a handful of flowers, or some dainty for a sick neighbor, or was asked to call at the door with a message of inquiry. So the next day she took it as a matter of course when Miss Silence asked her to take a bowl of chicken broth to Aunt Polly Brown.
“Take it right in to Aunt Polly,” said the young woman who opened the door. “She’s in the bedroom right off the sitting-room.”
Rose hesitated. She would have refused if she had known exactly how to do so. As it was, the bowl trembled a little as she walked through into the bedroom, where on a high four-post bedstead, under a “blazing star” quilt, Aunt Polly lay, a ruffled night cap surrounding her shrunken face.
“Well, now,” as Rose told her errand, “it was reel kind of Silence Blossom to send the broth. I was just thinkin’ that a taste o’ chicken broth would relish. Sit down, won’t ye,” with a wistful accent, “and tell me what’s goin’ on? Mary Jane never knows nothin’. Mebby I ain’t goin’ to get well, but ’tany rate I like to know what folks is doin’.”
“I was standing on one foot wondering how quick I could get out,” Rose said, relating it all to Miss Silence, on her return. “But when she spoke that way I just thought that if I were old and sick I’d be glad to have somebody come in; and I sat down and racked my brain to tell everything I could think of. She seemed real cheered up when I came away, and I promised her I’d come again.”
“I thought you never wanted to go where there were sick people,” and Silence Blossom’s eyes twinkled.
“Well, it wasn’t so bad as I thought it was going to be, though her hands are kind of skinny. And I don’t think I feel quite as I did about sick folks now. Besides, it must be dreadful to lie in bed day after day, and if I can make a little of the time pass, why I’m glad to.”