The second victorian mys.., p.62
The Second Victorian Mystery Megapack, page 62
“No; I don’t know that,” said Sister Anne.
Sam recognized that it was quite absurd that it should be so, but this statement gave him a sense of great elation, a delightful thrill of relief. There was every reason why the girl should not confide in a complete stranger—even to deceive him was quite within her rights; but, though Sam appreciated this, he preferred to be deceived.
“I think you are working too hard,” he said, smiling happily. “I think you ought to have a change. You ought to take a day off! Do they ever give you a day off?”
“Next Saturday,” said Sister Anne. “Why?”
“Because,” explained Sam, “if you won’t think it too presumptuous, I was going to prescribe a day off for you—a day entirely away from iodoform and white enamelled cots. It is what you need, a day in the city and a lunch where they have music; and a matinee, where you can laugh—or cry, if you like that better—and then, maybe, some fresh air in the park in a taxi; and after that dinner and more theatre, and then I’ll see you safe on the train for Greenwich. Before you answer,” he added hurriedly, “I want to explain that I contemplate taking a day off myself and doing all these things with you, and that if you want to bring any of the other forty nurses along as a chaperon, I hope you will. Only, honestly, I hope you won’t!”
The proposal apparently gave Sister Anne much pleasure. She did not say so, but her eyes shone and when she looked at Sam she was almost laughing with happiness.
“I think that would be quite delightful,” said Sister Anne,”—quite delightful! Only it would be frightfully expensive; even if I don’t bring another girl, which I certainly would not, it would cost a great deal of money. I think we might cut out the taxicab—and walk in the park and feed the squirrels.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Sam in disappointment,—“then you know Central Park?”
Sister Anne’s eyes grew quite expressionless.
“I once lived near there,” she said.
“In Harlem?”
“Not exactly in Harlem, but near it. I was quite young,” said Sister Anne. “Since then I have always lived in the country or in—other places.”
Sam’s heart was singing with pleasure.
“It’s so kind of you to consent,” he cried. “Indeed, you are the kindest person in all the world. I thought so when I saw you bending over these sick people, and, now I know.”
“It is you who are kind,” protested Sister Anne, “to take pity on me.”
“Pity on you!” laughed Sam. “You can’t pity a person who can do more with a smile than old man Flagg can do with all his millions. Now,” he demanded in happy anticipation, “where are we to meet?”
“That’s it,” said Sister Anne. “Where are we to meet?”
“Let it be at the Grand Central Station. The day can’t begin too soon,” said Sam; “and before then telephone me what theatre and restaurants you want and I’ll reserve seats and tables. Oh,” exclaimed Sam joyfully, “it will be a wonderful day—a wonderful day!”
Sister Anne looked at him curiously and, so, it seemed, a little wistfully. She held out her hand.
“I must go back to my duties,” she said. “Good-by.”
“Not good-by,” said Sam heartily, “only until Saturday—and my name’s Sam Ward and my address is the city room of the Republic. What’s your name?”
“Sister Anne,” said the girl. “In the nursing order to which I belong we have no last names.”
“So,” asked Sam, “I’ll call you Sister Anne?”
“No; just Sister,” said the girl.
“Sister!” repeated Sam, “Sister!” He breathed the word rather than spoke it; and the way he said it and the way he looked when he said it made it carry almost the touch of a caress. It was as if he had said ‘Sweetheart!’ or ‘Beloved!’ “I’ll not forget,” said Sam.
Sister Anne gave an impatient, annoyed laugh.
“Nor I,” she said.
Sam returned to New York in the smoking-car, puffing feverishly at his cigar and glaring dreamily at the smoke. He was living the day over again and, in anticipation, the day off, still to come. He rehearsed their next meeting at the station; he considered whether or not he would meet her with a huge bunch of violets or would have it brought to her when they were at luncheon by the head waiter. He decided the latter way would be more of a pleasant surprise. He planned the luncheon. It was to be the most marvellous repast he could evolve; and, lest there should be the slightest error, he would have it prepared in advance—and it should cost half his week’s salary.
The place where they were to dine he would leave to her, because he had observed that women had strange ideas about clothes—some of them thinking that certain clothes must go with certain restaurants. Some of them seemed to believe that, instead of their conferring distinction upon the restaurant, the restaurant conferred distinction upon them. He was sure Sister Anne would not be so foolish, but it might be that she must always wear her nurse’s uniform and that she would prefer not to be conspicuous; so he decided that the choice of where they would dine he would leave to her. He calculated that the whole day ought to cost about eighty dollars, which, as star reporter, was what he was then earning each week. That was little enough to give for a day that would be the birthday of his life! No, he contradicted—the day he had first met her must always be the birthday of his life; for never had he met one like her and he was sure there never would be one like her. She was so entirely superior to all the others, so fine, so difficult—in her manner there was something that rendered her unapproachable. Even her simple nurse’s gown was worn with a difference. She might have been a princess in fancy dress. And yet, how humble she had been when he begged her to let him for one day personally conduct her over the great city! “You are so kind to take pity on me,” she had said. He thought of many clever, pretty speeches he might have made. He was so annoyed he had not thought of them at the time that he kicked violently at the seat in front of him.
He wondered what her history might be; he was sure it was full of beautiful courage and self-sacrifice. It certainly was outrageous that one so glorious must work for her living, and for such a paltry living—forty dollars a month! It was worth that merely to have her sit in the flat where one could look at her; for already he had decided that, when they were married, they would live in a flat—probably in one overlooking Central Park, on Central Park West. He knew of several attractive suites there at thirty-five dollars a week—or, if she preferred the suburbs, he would forsake his beloved New York and return to the country. In his gratitude to her for being what she was, he conceded even that sacrifice.
When he reached New York, from the speculators he bought front-row seats at five dollars for the two most popular plays in town. He put them away carefully in his waistcoat pocket. Possession of them made him feel that already he had obtained an option on six hours of complete happiness.
After she left Sam, Sister Anne passed hurriedly through the hospital to the matron’s room and, wrapping herself in a raccoon coat, made her way to a waiting motor car and said, “Home!” to the chauffeur. He drove her to the Flagg family vault, as Flagg’s envious millionaire neighbors called the pile of white marble that topped the highest hill above Greenwich, and which for years had served as a landfall to mariners on the Sound.
There were a number of people at tea when she arrived and they greeted her noisily.
“I have had a most splendid adventure!” said Sister Anne. “There were six of us, you know, dressed up as Red Cross nurses, and we gave away programmes. Well, one of the New York reporters thought I was a real nurse and interviewed me about the Home. Of course I knew enough about it to keep it up, and I kept it up so well that he was terribly sorry for me; and.…”
One of the tea drinkers was little Hollis Holworthy, who prided himself on knowing who’s who in New York. He had met Sam Ward at first nights and prize fights. He laughed scornfully.
“Don’t you believe it!” he interrupted. “That man who was talking to you was Sam Ward. He’s the smartest newspaper man in New York; he was just leading you on. Do you suppose there’s a reporter in America who wouldn’t know you in the dark? Wait until you see the Sunday paper.”
Sister Anne exclaimed indignantly.
“He did not know me!” she protested. “It quite upset him that I should be wasting my life measuring out medicines and making beds.”
There was a shriek of disbelief and laughter.
“I told him,” continued Sister Anne, “that I got forty dollars a month, and he said I could make more as a typewriter; and I said I preferred to be a manicurist.”
“Oh, Anita!” protested the admiring chorus.
“And he was most indignant. He absolutely refused to allow me to be a manicurist. And he asked me to take a day off with him and let him show me New York. And he offered, as attractions, moving-picture shows and a drive on a Fifth Avenue bus, and feeding peanuts to the animals in the park. And if I insisted upon a chaperon I might bring one of the nurses. We’re to meet at the soda-water fountain in the Grand Central Station. He said, ‘The day cannot begin too soon.’”
“Oh, Anita!” shrieked the chorus.
Lord Deptford, who as the newspapers had repeatedly informed the American public, had come to the Flaggs’ country-place to try to marry Anita Flagg, was amused.
“What an awfully jolly rag!” he cried. “And what are you going to do about it?”
“Nothing,” said Anita Flagg. “The reporters have been making me ridiculous for the last three years; now I have got back at one of them! And,” she added, “that’s all there is to that!”
That night, however, when the house party was making toward bed, Sister Anne stopped by the stairs and said to Lord Deptford: “I want to hear you call me Sister.”
“Call you what?” exclaimed the young man. “I will tell you,” he whispered, “what I’d like to call you!”
“You will not!” interrupted Anita. “Do as I tell you and say Sister once. Say it as though you meant it.”
“But I don’t mean it,” protested his lordship. “I’ve said already what I.…”
“Never mind what you’ve said already,” commanded Miss Flagg. “I’ve heard that from a lot of people. Say Sister just once.”
His lordship frowned in embarrassment.
“Sister!” he exclaimed. It sounded like the pop of a cork.
Anita Flagg laughed unkindly and her beautiful shoulders shivered as though she were cold.
“Not a bit like it, Deptford,” she said. “Good-night.”
Later Helen Page, who came to her room to ask her about a horse she was to ride in the morning, found her ready for bed but standing by the open window looking out toward the great city to the south.
When she turned Miss Page saw something in her eyes that caused that young woman to shriek with amazement.
“Anita!” she exclaimed. “You crying! What in Heaven’s name can make you cry?”
It was not a kind speech, nor did Miss Flagg receive it kindly. She turned upon the tactless intruder.
“Suppose,” cried Anita fiercely, “a man thought you were worth forty dollars a month—honestly didn’t know!—honestly believed you were poor and worked for your living, and still said your smile was worth more than all of old man Flagg’s millions, not knowing they were your millions. Suppose he didn’t ask any money of you, but just to take care of you, to slave for you—only wanted to keep your pretty hands from working, and your pretty eyes from seeing sickness and pain. Suppose you met that man among this rotten lot, what would you do? What wouldn’t you do?”
“Why, Anita!” exclaimed Miss Page.
“What would you do?” demanded Anita Flagg. “This is what you’d do: You’d go down on your knees to that man and say: ‘Take me away! Take me away from them, and pity me, and be sorry for me, and love me—and love me—and love me!”
“And why don’t you?” cried Helen Page.
“Because I’m as rotten as the rest of them!” cried Anita Flagg. “Because I’m a coward. And that’s why I’m crying. Haven’t I the right to cry?”
At the exact moment Miss Flagg was proclaiming herself a moral coward, in the local room of the Republic Collins, the copy editor, was editing Sam’s story’ of the laying of the corner-stone. The copy editor’s cigar was tilted near his left eyebrow; his blue pencil, like a guillotine ready to fall upon the guilty word or paragraph, was suspended in mid-air; and continually, like a hawk preparing to strike, the blue pencil swooped and circled. But page after page fell softly to the desk and the blue pencil remained inactive. As he read, the voice of Collins rose in muttered ejaculations; and, as he continued to read, these explosions grew louder and more amazed. At last he could endure no more and, swinging swiftly in his revolving chair, his glance swept the office. “In the name of Mike!” he shouted. “What is this?”
The reporters nearest him, busy with pencil and typewriters, frowned in impatient protest. Sam Ward, swinging his legs from the top of a table, was gazing at the ceiling, wrapped in dreams and tobacco smoke. Upon his clever, clean-cut features the expression was far-away and beatific. He came back to earth.
“What’s what?” Sam demanded.
At that moment Elliott, the managing editor, was passing through the room his hands filled with freshly pulled proofs. He swung toward Collins quickly and snatched up Sam’s copy. The story already was late—and it was important.
“What’s wrong?” he demanded. Over the room there fell a sudden hush.
“Read the opening paragraph,” protested Collins. “It’s like that for a column! It’s all about a girl—about a Red Cross nurse. Not a word about Flagg or Lord Deptford. No speeches! No news! It’s not a news story at all. It’s an editorial, and an essay, and a spring poem. I don’t know what it is. And, what’s worse,” wailed the copy editor defiantly and to the amazement of all, “it’s so darned good that you can’t touch it. You’ve got to let it go or kill it.”
The eyes of the managing editor, masked by his green paper shade, were racing over Sam’s written words. He thrust the first page back at Collins.
“Is it all like that?”
“There’s a column like that!”
“Run it just as it is,” commanded the managing editor. “Use it for your introduction and get your story from the flimsy. And, in your head, cut out Flagg entirely. Call it ‘The Red Cross Girl.’ And play it up strong with pictures.” He turned on Sam and eyed him curiously.
“What’s the idea, Ward?” he said. “This is a newspaper—not a magazine!”
The click of the typewriters was silent, the hectic rush of the pencils had ceased, and the staff, expectant, smiled cynically upon the star reporter. Sam shoved his hands into his trousers pockets and also smiled, but unhappily.
“I know it’s not news, Sir,” he said; “but that’s the way I saw the story—outside on the lawn, the band playing, and the governor and the governor’s staff and the clergy burning incense to Flagg; and inside, this girl right on the job—taking care of the sick and wounded. It seemed to me that a million from a man that won’t miss a million didn’t stack up against what this girl was doing for these sick folks! What I wanted to say,” continued Sam stoutly “was that the moving spirit of the hospital was not in the man who signed the checks, but in these women who do the work—the nurses, like the one I wrote about; the one you called ‘The Red Cross Girl.’”
Collins, strong through many years of faithful service, backed by the traditions of the profession, snorted scornfully.
“But it’s not news!”
“It’s not news,” said Elliott doubtfully; “but it’s the kind of story that made Frank O’Malley famous. It’s the kind of story that drives men out of this business into the arms of what Kipling calls ‘the illegitimate sister.’”
It seldom is granted to a man on the same day to give his whole heart to a girl and to be patted on the back by his managing editor; and it was this combination, and not the drinks he dispensed to the staff in return for its congratulations, that sent Sam home walking on air. He loved his business, he was proud of his business; but never before had it served him so well. It had enabled him to tell the woman he loved, and incidentally a million other people, how deeply he honored her; how clearly he appreciated her power for good. No one would know he meant Sister Anne, save two people—Sister Anne and himself; but for her and for him that was as many as should know. In his story he had used real incidents of the day; he had described her as she passed through the wards of the hospital, cheering and sympathetic; he had told of the little acts of consideration that endeared her to the sick people.
The next morning she would know that it was she of whom he had written; and between the lines she would read that the man who wrote them loved her. So he fell asleep, impatient for the morning. In the hotel at which he lived the Republic was always placed promptly outside his door; and, after many excursions into the hall, he at last found it. On the front page was his story, “The Red Cross Girl.” It had the place of honor—right-hand column; but more conspicuous than the headlines of his own story was one of Redding’s, photographs. It was the one he had taken of Sister Anne when first she had approached them, in her uniform of mercy, advancing across the lawn, walking straight into the focus of the camera. There was no mistaking her for any other living woman; but beneath the picture, in bold, staring, uncompromising type, was a strange and grotesque legend.
“Daughter of Millionaire Flagg,” it read, “in a New Role, Miss Anita Flagg as The Red Cross Girl.”
