"Well! folks do say that first-rate cooks and nurses are allers as cross as bears! 'Tan't for me to say whether it's so 'bout cooks, but 'bout nurses there an't no sort o'doubt! I would not want to go there, Miss Gertrude; I'm sure she'd bit your head off."
"Wouldn't Miss Emily take the flowers?" asked Gertrude, looking quite grieved.
"Well, she hadn't no word in the matter. You know she couldn't see what they were; and Mrs. Ellis flung 'em outside the door, vowin' I might as well bring pison into the room with a fever as roses. I tried to speak to Miss Emily, but Mrs. Ellis set up such a hush-sh-sh I s'posed she was goin' to sleep, and jest made the best o' my way out. Ugh! don't she begin to scold when there's anybody taken sick!"
Gertrude sauntered out into the garden. She had nothing to do but think anxiously about Emily, who, she feared, was very ill. Her work and her books were all in Emily's room, where they were usually kept; the library might have furnished amusement, but it was locked up. So the garden was the only thing left for her, and there she spent the rest of the morning; and many others, for Emily grew worse, and a fortnight passed away without Gertrude's seeing her, or having any other intimation regarding her health than Mrs. Ellis's occasional report to Mr. Graham, who, as he saw the physician every day, and made frequent visits to his daughter, did not require that particular information which Gertrude was eager to obtain. Once or twice she had asked Mrs. Ellis, who replied, "Don't bother me with questions! what do you know about sickness?"
One afternoon Gertrude was sitting in a large summer-house at the end of the garden; her own piece of ground, fragrant with mignonette and verbena, was close by, and she was busily engaged in tying up some little papers of seeds, when she was startled by hearing a step beside her, and looking up, saw Dr. Jeremy, the family physician, entering the building.
"Ah! what are you doing?" said the doctor, in a quick manner peculiar to him. "Sorting seeds, eh?"
"Yes, sir," replied Gerty, blushing, as she saw the doctor's keen black eyes scrutinising her face!
"Where have I seen you before?" asked he, in the same blunt way.
"At Mr. Flint's."
"Ah! True Flint's! I remember all about it. You're his girl! Nice girl, too! And poor True, he's dead! Well, he's a loss to the community! So this is the little nurse I used to see there. Bless me! how children do grow!"