Nancy McVeigh of the Monk Road

by R. Henry Mainer

"I'll go now, but will see you there in the morning," Doctor Dodona called, as he hastened away.

"So that's how the wind blows," Nancy muttered, thoughtfully, as she watched him depart; then she laughed softly in spite of the bad news.

Mrs. Conors, growing very feeble, was garrulously comfortable before the fire in Nancy McVeigh's kitchen. She was in a happy frame of mind, as her worldly anxieties were now very much a dream of the past. Nancy herself, with her strong, resolute face, her kindly eyes and tall gaunt frame, enrobed in a plain, home-made black dress, was setting things to rights in the home of James Piper. Her coming brought order, and a fearless performance of the doctor's commands. She was a herald of fresh hope, and carried into the gloomy house her sense of restful security. Her sixty-five years of life, a portion of which was spent as proprietress of a tavern, wherein the worst element of a rough countryside disported itself, had given her nerves of steel, and yet the chords to her heart were tuned to the finest feelings of sympathy. Sophia Piper felt the glow of her presence as she lay tossing and moaning in the first grips of the malady. The children cried less frequently, and Willie's temperature lowered two points by the doctor's thermometer after the first day's service of the new nurse. And yet Nancy only went about doing the doctor's wishes and whispering to each in her motherly way. Her confidence in herself seemed to exert a pleasing influence with the sick ones, and then she was so strong. The hours of night found her wakeful to the slightest noise, yet patient with their fretful humors, and in the morning she came to them as fresh as a new flower in spring.

Doctor Dodona noticed the change, and marvelled. He came morning and evening, and each time sat a long while by Miss Sophia's bedside. He was wondering why he had never guessed something long before, and he did not suspect that Nancy read him like an open book. He had known Sophia for years, had gone to the same school with her, had worked by her side on committees of the charitable and religious organizations of the county, and here he was on the verge of confirmed bachelorhood and only learning the rudiments of love.

"His heart's fair breakin' fer her," was Nancy's muttered comment.

Then came the long night's fight for the life of Annie, the little daughter of James Piper. A struggle where only two could join, the doctor and the Widow McVeigh, as the infectious nature of the disease forbade any assistance from without. Annie's illness had taken a very serious turn just as the doctor arrived on his evening call. He studied her case for a long ten minutes, and then he remarked to Nancy, "It is the crisis." Nancy smiled, not that his words amused her, but rather as an expression of her confidence in her powers to hold the spark of life in the little body. From then until early dawn they watched her, the life flickering like a spent torch in the wind. The doctor had taken extreme measures to combat the disease, and his greatest fear was that his efforts to cure might have a contrary effect by reason of the frailty of the child. Once he despaired, but, looking up, caught a momentary glint of steel in Nancy's eyes. His very fear that she might detect his weakness compelled him to continue. For ten hours she sat with the child on a pillow in her lap, apparently impassive, yet conscious of the slightest change in the hot, gasping breathing. Occasionally the doctor arose and passed into the room where the others lay, to see that they were not suffering through lack of attention. Returning from one of these silent visits, just as the sun shot its first shafts of light under the window blind, he noted a change in the little maid.

"She'll live," he declared.

"I've not been doubtin' the fact at all, at all," Nancy responded, bravely trying to cover her weariness.

From that night both children began to mend rapidly, and more time was left for the care of the elder patient. The case of Miss Sophia was somewhat different. Her age made it a much more difficult problem to unseat the poison from her system. It had committed sad ravages with her constitution before she had given in, and though Dr. Dodona felt reasonably certain that he could check the trouble, yet it seemed doubtful if her strength would sustain the fight.

As the days passed he could see plainly that she was unimproved. His professional training told him that, and he threw into the work all the skill that he possessed. He suddenly became conscious that he had lost some of the assurance in himself which had been the backbone of his former successes, but it took him a short while to comprehend fully his own incapacity. As he drove over the miles of snowy road into town, after an evening at her bedside, the truth became a conviction in his mind. His heart was too deeply concerned, and it had shattered his nerves.