"That tub is very heavy, now," she said drowsily. "Is there a man to lift it?"
For the first time the woman smiled. Till then she had been hands and feet merely, tireless and tactful, but impersonal: now she smiled, and her face was very sweet.
"I shall empty it," she said. "I am quite strong. Go to sleep, now."
Very soon again the doctor came, and at her quiet request gave her news of husband, children and home; all well, it seemed, and smoothly ordered. Days of absolute stillness had broken the habit of insistent speech, and many things that once would have said themselves before she thought, now halted behind her lips and seemed not worth the muscular effort. But one thing she did mention.
"Ought not the nurses here to have more help?" she asked. "Mine lifts out my bath-water every day. Are there not servants enough? I could pay for it..."
"There are no servants here at all," he said, "and there is nobody you could pay more than you are already paying."
"Then they are all nurses?"
"There are no trained nurses here, if you mean that," he said.
"Then who—what is the woman who takes care of me?" she asked, vaguely displeased.
"She is one of the daughters of the house," he said. "She is no more a nurse than her mother is a cook or her sister a laundress. They do what is to be done, that is all. Each has done and can do the others' tasks."