"It is not," said the nurse. "It is just plain common sense. Just you try it!"
"I don't need to," said Rosanna. "I know Mrs. Maslin will get well, and Claire will know so, too, when she gets over being frightened."
Claire did get over being frightened, although for many days her mother's life hung by a thread. They stayed at the nearest hotel, and as Colonel Maslin had been given leave of absence they had the comfort of his presence.
As time went on and it became a certainty that Mrs. Maslin would live and be her own self again, Claire was allowed to see her mother. At first her visits were limited to a skimpy five minutes once a day, spent under the eyes of a stern nurse who watched the time and put her out without mercy. But as the days wore by and the invalid grew stronger, Claire was allowed to spend many happy hours with her mother.
Came a day when the Colonel was obliged to return to duty. And after a talk with her mother Claire went with him, Rosanna of course accompanying them. Rosanna had had a good time after the first period of worry, during which she never left Claire for a half hour. And Claire was grateful. Rosanna did not guess how grateful. She did not guess how often Claire talked to her mother and father about the Girl Scout's loyalty and devotion. And Claire was naturally so quiet that it was hard for her to tell Rosanna just what she thought about it all. But Rosanna did not mind. She knew without words what her companionship had meant to Claire during her time of trial.
Rosanna knew from that strange inner source that tells us so much and leads us so unerringly that she had done right to give up the chance to see the Ports of the World. And she was glad. Her sacrifice had proved to her, at least, that being a Girl Scout meant more than the happy companionship along the woodland ways in summer, or the friendly striving for merits in winter.
One little thing worried her: her task was to be finished sooner than she had thought. When Claire's mother came home, Rosanna did not want to be there. For one thing, she wisely felt that Mrs. Maslin would want Claire all to herself, and she knew that Claire would have no time or thought to give anyone else, even a friend as well loved as Rosanna knew herself to be.
Rosanna did not know where to go. The Hargraves had gone down to the old home in Lexington; Mrs. Culver and Helen were visiting in Akron, Ohio. Rosanna thought harder and harder as the days passed, and the bulletins from the hospital grew better and more encouraging. At last the doctor actually set a date. In three days Claire could have her mother. She was to come home slowly and carefully in the limousine. And there must be weeks and weeks of unbroken rest in her own home, with her devoted husband and loving child and the adoring Chang to anticipate every wish.
Then Rosanna had an inspiration. Her old nurse and maid, Minnie, was married and living with her nice, hard-working young husband in a rose-covered cottage in the Highlands. Rosanna knew that they would both be perfectly delighted to receive her.
She closed the book she was reading and went to the telephone. As she reached it, the bell jingled.