She stood a moment anxiously watching him. She did not know just what she ought to do. Perhaps he was going to have pneumonia! Perhaps she ought to send for the doctor, and yet there were complications about that. She would be obliged to explain a lot—or else lie to the neighborhood! And he might not like it for her to call a doctor while he was asleep. If she only had some one with whom to advise! On ordinary questions she always consulted Mary Amber, but by the very nature of the case Mary Amber was out of this. Besides, in half an hour Mary Amber very discreetly put herself beyond a question outside of any touch with Miss Marilla’s visitor by taking herself off in her little runabout for a short visit to a college friend over in the next county. It was plain that Mary Amber did not care to subject herself to further contact with the young soldier. He might be Dick or he might not be Dick. It was none of her business while she was visiting Jeannette Clark; so she went away quite hurriedly. Miss Marilla heard the purr of the engine as the little brown car started down the hedged driveway, and watched the flight with a sense of satisfaction. She had an intuition that Mary Amber was not in favor of her soldier, and she had a guilty sense of hiding the truth from her dear young friend that made her breathe more freely as she watched Mary Amber’s flight. Moreover, it was with a certain self-reproachful relief that she noted the little brown suitcase that lay at Mary Amber’s feet as she slid past Miss Marilla’s house without looking up. Mary Amber was going away for the day at least, probably overnight; and by that time the question of the soldier would be settled one way or the other without Mary Amber’s having to worry about it.
Miss Marilla ordered a piece of beef, and brewed a cup of the most delicious beef-tea, which she took up-stairs. She managed to get her soldier awake enough to swallow it; but it was plain that he did not in the least realize where he was, and seemed well content to close his eyes and drowse away once more. Miss Marilla was deeply troubled. Some pricks from the old, time-worn adage beginning, “O what a tangled web we weave,” began to stab her conscience. If only she had not allowed those paragraphs to go into the county paper! No, that was not the real trouble at all. If only she had not dragged in another soldier, and made Mary Amber believe he was her nephew! Such an old fool! Just because she couldn’t bear the mortification of having people know her nephew hadn’t cared enough for her to come and see her when he was close at hand! But she was well punished. Here she had a strange sick man on her hands, and no end of responsibility! Oh, if only she hadn’t asked him in!
Yet, as she stood watching the quick little throb in his neck above the old flannel nightgown, and the long, curly sweep of the dark lashes on his hot cheek as he slept, her heart cried out against that wish. No, a thousand times no. If she had not asked him in, he might have been in some hospital by this time, cared for by strangers; and she would have been alone, with empty hands, getting her own solitary dinner, or sewing on the aprons for the orphanage, with nothing in the world to do that really mattered for anybody. Somehow her heart went out to this stranger boy with a great yearning, and he had come to mean her own—or what her own ought to have been to her. She wouldn’t have him otherwhere for anything. She wanted him right where he was for her to care for, something at last that needed her, something she could love and tend, even if it were only for a few days.
And she was sure she could care for him. She knew a lot about sickness. People sent for her to help them out, and her wonderful nursing had often saved a life where the doctor’s remedies had failed. She felt sure this was only a severe case of grippe that had taken fierce hold on the system. Thorough rest, careful nursing, nourishing broth, and some of her homeopathic remedies would work the charm. She would try it a little longer and see. If his temperature wasn’t higher than the last time, it would be perfectly safe to get along without a doctor.
She put the thermometer between his relaxed lips, and held them firmly round it until she was sure it had been there long enough. Then she carried it softly over to the front window, and studied it. No, it had not risen; in fact, it might be a fifth of a degree lower.
Well, she would venture it a little while longer.
For two days Miss Marilla cared for her strange soldier as only a born nurse like herself could care, and on the third morning he rewarded her by opening his eyes and looking about; then, meeting her own anxious gaze, he gave her a weak smile.
“I’ve been sick!” he said as if stating an astonishing fact to himself. “I must have given you a lot of trouble.”
“Not a bit of it, you dear child,” said Miss Marilla, and then stooped and brushed his forehead with her lips in a motherly kiss. “I’m so glad you’re better!”
She passed her hand like soft old fallen rose-leaves over his forehead, and it was moist. She felt of his hands, and they were moist too. She took his temperature, and it had gone down almost to normal. Her eyes were shining with more than professional joy and relief. He had become to her in these hours of nursing and anxiety as her own child.