Christie Redfern's Troubles

by Margaret M. Robertson

Yet he had borne great and sore troubles in his lifetime—sickness and sorrow and disappointment. He carried the marks of those troubles still, perhaps because he had never learned that the way to heal one’s own sorrows is to do what may be done for the healing of the sorrows of others. Certainly no such thought had ever come into his mind, and he was quite surprised to find that the pale face and wistful eyes of Christie still followed him. He did not try to banish the thought of her as he sometimes tried to banish painful thoughts. He felt deeply for her. There were few days after that in which Christie did not have some token of his remembrance. Sometimes it was a bunch of flowers or a little fruit, sometimes a book or a message from Gertrude. Sometimes he sent, sometimes he went himself, for the sake of seeing the little pale face brighten at his entrance.

After a little time he found her no longer in her solitary room, but in one of the wards. It was not very large or very full. Many of the white beds, that stood in rows against the walls, were unoccupied; and most of the patients seemed not very ill, or on a fair way to recover. But it seemed to Mr Sherwood a very sad thing indeed that the eyes which shone with such eager longing when he spoke of the fields and gardens, or of the hills and valleys that he had seen in his wanderings, should open day after day upon a scene so dreary.

What a strange, sad picture of life it seemed to him. There were old faces and young—faces on which years of sin and sorrow had set their seal, young faces that looked old, and faces old and worn and weary, yet growing slowly back into the look they must have had as little children, as the end drew near.

There were a few bright faces even there. A young servant-girl occupied the bed next to Christie on one side. She had been burned severely, but not dangerously, in saving a child committed to her care from a serious accident. She suffered much at first, but quite patiently, and in a day or two was cheerful, even merry, at the thought of getting away to the country, where her home was. She went away soon, and so did others—some joyfully, with recovered health and hope, others to be seen no more among the living.

“Do you like this better than to be quite alone?” asked Mr Sherwood one day, as he sat by Christie’s bed, watching the strange, painful scenes around him. She did not answer for a moment, and her face saddened as her eye went down the long ward, thinking of the peculiar sorrow of each of the suffering inmates.

“For some things I like it better. It is less trouble to the nurse, and the time does not seem so long. It is very sad, though,” she added. “Even when I am free from pain myself, there is sure to be some one suffering near me. But I am getting used to it. Folk get used to anything in time, you know.”

Almost always he left her cheerful, and though her recovery seemed day by day no nearer, she never seemed to doubt that she would soon be well, at least she never expressed any doubt to her kind friend till one day after he had been many times to see her.

September had come in more sultry and warm than August had been; even out in the open streets, towards the mountain, the motionless air was hot and stifling. It was a trying day in the narrow alleys and in the low parts of the city, where many an invalid lay moaning and wishing for the night to come.

In the ward where Christie lay the windows were darkened, and coming out of the glare of the sun, for a moment Mr Sherwood thought it cool and pleasant there. It was close and unwholesome, however, as it was everywhere, and Christie was more restless and feverish than he had ever seen her. She was now very often that way in the afternoon, she told him; but when his eyes were accustomed to the dim light, he saw that there were traces of tears on her flushed cheek, and he noticed that even now it was all that she could do to keep her voice steady as she spoke.

He did not ask her what troubled her; he had an instinctive feeling that the question would bring back her tears, but he said, cheerfully: