She would have preferred not to see or know the objects of her charity, and because she preferred this she forced herself to face their distasteful misery. Mrs. Bolton had orders to send no one from the door who asked for food or work, but to call Annie and let her judge the case. She knew that it was folly, and she was afraid it was worse, but she could not send the homeless creatures away as hungry or poor as they came. They filled her gentlewoman's soul with loathing; but if she kept beyond the range of the powerful corporeal odour that enveloped them, she could experience the luxury of pity for them. The filthy rags that caricatured them, their sick or sodden faces, always frowsed with a week's beard, represented typical poverty to her, and accused her comfortable state with a poignant contrast; and she consoled herself as far as she could with the superstition that in meeting them she was fulfilling a duty sacred in proportion to the disgust she felt in the encounter.
The work at the hat-shops fell off after the spring orders, and did not revive till the beginning of August. If there was less money among the hands and their families who remained than there was in time of full work, the weather made less demand upon their resources. The children lived mostly out-of-doors, and seemed to have always what they wanted of the season's fruit and vegetables. They got these too late from the decaying lots at the provision stores, and too early from the nearest orchards; and Dr. Morrell admitted that there was a good deal of sickness, especially among the little ones, from this diet. Annie wondered whether she ought not to offer herself as a nurse among them; she asked him whether she could not be of use in that way, and had to confess that she knew nothing about the prevailing disease.
“Then, I don't think you'd better undertake it,” he said. “There are too many nurses there already, such as they are. It's the dull time in most of the shops, you know, and the women have plenty of leisure. There are about five volunteer nurses for every patient, not counting the grandmothers on both sides. I think they would resent any outside aid.”
“Ah, I'm always on the outside! But can't I send—I mean carry—them anything nourishing, any little dishes—”
“Arrowroot is about all the convalescents can manage.” She made a note of it. “But jelly and chicken broth are always relished by their friends.”
“Dr. Morrell, I must ask you not to turn me into ridicule, if you please. I cannot permit it.”
“I beg your pardon—I do indeed, Miss Kilburn. I didn't mean to ridicule you. I began seriously, but I was led astray by remembering what becomes of most of the good things sent to sick people.”
“I know,” she said, breaking into a laugh. “I have eaten lots of them for my father. And is arrowroot the only thing?”
The doctor reflected gravely. “Why, no. There's a poor little life now and then that might be saved by the sea-air. Yes, if you care to send some of my patients, with a mother and a grandmother apiece, to the seaside—”
“Don't say another word, doctor,” cried Annie. “You make me so happy! I will—I will send their whole families. And you won't, you won't let a case escape, will you, doctor?” It was a break in the iron wall of uselessness which had closed her in; she behaved like a young girl with an invitation to a ball.