“I’m terrible sorry to make you all this trouble, Mr. Black,” she said. “My, it’s wonderful how you’ve done all this.” And she eyed the little tray with its cup of steaming coffee, now a deep black in hue, its two slices of curling but unburned toast, and its opened egg.
“I think it’s rather wonderful myself,” the minister conceded. Moisture stood upon his brow; his right wrist showed a red mark as of a burn; but his look was triumphant. “I hope you’ll enjoy it. And I’ve asked Doctor Burns to look in, on his rounds, and fix you up. If he says you should have a nurse we’ll have one.”
“I don’t want the doctor, and I won’t have a nurse—for the lumbago; I’d feel like a fool. All that worries me is how you’ll manage till I can get round. You ain’t used to doin’ for yourself.”
“I’ve done for myself in most ways ever since I came over from Scotland, a boy of sixteen. Come, eat your egg, Mrs. Hodder. I’ll be back for the tray soon. Let me put another pillow behind your back——”
He would wait on her, she couldn’t help it, and it must be admitted she rather enjoyed it, in spite of the pain that caught her afresh with every smallest move. It was like having a nice son to look after her, she thought. She submitted to his edict that she was to trust him to run the house in her absence from the kitchen, and if she had her doubts as to how he would accomplish this, they gave way before the decision in his tone.
It was three days after this that Red, coming in at five in the afternoon, to take a look at Mrs. Hodder, whom he had been obliged to neglect since his first visit in a pressure of work for sicker patients, discovered Black in the midst of his new activities. The minister was hurriedly sweeping and dusting his study, having rushed home from a round of calls at the recollection that a committee meeting, which included three women, was to be held there that evening. Mrs. Hodder was accustomed to keep the room in careful order; he himself had been throwing things about it for three days now,—and undusted black walnut desks and other dark furniture certainly do show neglect in a fashion peculiarly unreserved.
“Well, well!” Red paused in the study door. “I knew you were a man of action, but I didn’t know it extended this far. Can’t anybody be found to bridge the chasm?”
“I don’t want anybody, thanks. A little exercise won’t hurt me. Will you stop a minute? I’ll dust that leather chair for you.”
To his surprise Red moved over to the chair and sat down on the arm of it. “You look a trifle weary,” he observed.
“That’s the dirt on my face. I swept the room with violence—it needed it. Most of the dust settled on me.”