The Street of the City (2 page)

“What is the matter?” asked the old lady tenderly. “Come into the house and let me close the door. It is very cold!”

“Oh no, I can’t come in,” said the child excitedly. “I must go to my mamma! Won’t you come with me quick?”

“Why, you poor child! You are trembling with cold. You poor little thing! Who are you, and what is the matter with your mother?”

“I’m Bonnie Fernley,” wailed the child frantically, “and I don’t know what is the matter. My mamma just dropped down on the floor with her eyes shut, and she didn’t answer me when I called her. She was clearing off the table and all the dishes she was carrying are broken on the floor! Oh, won’t you come quick and make my mamma wake up?”

“Oh, my dear! I’m lame and I can’t come myself, but I’ll send somebody! Where do you live?”

“Right across the river in that redbrick house. Come out here and I’ll show you.”

“Wait, child! Who is your doctor? I’ll telephone him.”

The child began to cry again.

“We haven’t got any doctor. We just moved here! Oh, I must go quick! My mamma is all alone!”

“Wait!” said Lady Winthrop sharply. “You can’t go that way! You have no coat on, and it is very cold!”

“No! No!” said the child, jerking away. “I can’t wait!”

The old lady reached to the couch and grabbed a soft, bright knitted afghan, wrapping it quickly around the little shaking shoulders. Then she swung the door wide and looked out on the white morning scene and her shining glass pathway. And then straight into the scene at the upper bend of the road wheeled the tall skater coming at full speed.

The old lady did not pause to consider. She lifted her soft, frail hands, hollowed them around her lips, and made a deep sound like a big boy calling to his mates, a sound that boomed out and became a far-reaching “Halloo! Halloo!” and then turned sharply into another syllable, “Help! Help!”

The skater looked up sharply as the word rang out with a carrying quality that an old lady would not have been supposed to be capable of sending out.

“H-ee-lp!” cried Lady Winthrop with all the power of her frail little body thrown in to the cry.

And now she was standing out in the center of her porch, her little lavender shawl fluttering wildly, with bright strands of her lovely silver hair caught by the sharp morning breeze. She was waving her hands frantically as she cried.

The skater threw up his head attentively and faced her, whirling almost in a circle and coming about in front of the old house on the hill and the pretty old lady.

“Are you calling me?” he shouted, coming to a halt on his shining blades and looking up.

“Yes!” answered the old lady, nodding her white head excitedly.

“What’s the matter?” called the young man.

“Woman in trouble!”

“Where? Up there?”

“No, over across the river. This child will show you.”

She put the little girl before her, pointing to her, and the child started to plunge into the snow and come to him.

“Wait!” shouted the young man, “I’ll come up and carry you. There’s a big drift there!” and he swung to the edge of the river deftly and began breaking a way for himself up the crust of the snowy hillside.

Lady Winthrop took her handkerchief out of her pocket and softly, swiftly, wiped the little tear-wet face of the child and tucked the afghan closer around her shoulders. Then she lifted her head and watched the strong, firm steps that broke into the white crust of the hill. The young man was looking up now, taking the hill in great strides, studying the two on the porch.

“I’ll carry that child,” he announced as he arrived. “Sure, I can manage that all right. Are you coming, madam?”

“No,” said the old lady sadly, “I have a sprained knee, and I’m very unsteady on my feet. I’m afraid I couldn’t make the grade. Both my servants are out on errands. I’m here alone.”

“Well, can you tell me where I am going, and what I am to do when I get there?”

“This child’s mother has been taken sick. She will tell you. They are strangers to me, have just moved into that redbrick house across the river. She says her mother is lying on the floor. That she fell.”

“She wouldn’t answer me,” said the child, catching her voice in a sob. “Her eyes were shut tight!”

A tender, pitying look came over the young man’s face.

“And what is their name?” he asked. “I imagine there ought to be a doctor at once.”

“Yes,” said Lady Winthrop. “I was just going in to telephone my doctor. His office hours will be over, but I think I can catch him. The name is Fernley, isn’t that right, dear?”

The child nodded.

“It’s number ten Rosemary Lane,” she added. “It’s the old brick house. We just moved there last week. Our things haven’t all come yet.”

“I see,” said the young man. “Well, let’s get going. Lady Winthrop, you had better go inside. The wind is pretty sharp this morning. Better get warm at once or there will be two sick ladies instead of one.”

“You know me?” she asked.

“Sure,” said the young man with a pleasant grin, “go in and get warm!” He plunged sharply down the crusty hill with the child held firmly in his arms. He landed in a smooth glide on the ice and flew away upstream.

The old lady watched for an instant to make sure the child would be all right with this engaging young stranger, and then turned swiftly in to her telephone, not even stopping to shiver, though it was a good many years since she had permitted herself to be as cold as she was now. There had always been that afghan to throw around her if anyone came to the door and she had to stand a moment talking to them. But she wasn’t thinking about being cold now. She was thinking of that little child and a poor mother lying unconscious on the floor. She must get the doctor before he started on his rounds!

She waited frantically as it rang, wondering what to do if the doctor was gone. Was there some other doctor she would feel like sending in his place if her doctor was not available? Then she was relieved to hear the doctor’s voice answering.

“Yes, Mrs. Winthrop? You’re not ill, I trust? Yes, of course I recognized your voice. There isn’t another voice like yours. You see, I sent Miss March out on an errand, and I was just leaving myself—that’s how I happened to be taking the call. Is anything the matter?”

“Not with me, Doctor, but I am afraid there is terrible trouble across the river from me, and I don’t know what to do about it. I sent the servants to the city shopping for me, and I’m here alone for the moment. They have a lot of errands and will be some time, I’m afraid, and this may be a matter of life and death. Doctor, could you possibly go right away and see? A little child came rushing across the ice to my door screaming for help. She said her mother had fallen down on the floor and wouldn’t answer her when she called. She was half frightened to death, nearly frozen, and crying bitterly. She had come across the river without hat or coat and was blue with cold and shivering. Perhaps the woman has only fainted, but you know I can’t walk over, and I thought someone ought to investigate at once, for maybe she is dying. The child said they had just moved here and didn’t have a doctor. Can you take the time to go?”

“Of course. I’ll go at once. Where is it?”

“Number ten Rosemary Lane, a little, old redbrick house across the river from our house. The name is Fernley.”

“All right, I’ll go at once. And I’ll be reporting back to you afterward. Don’t you worry, and don’t think of going out yourself. It would be suicidal for you. There is a glare of ice everywhere, and the wind is bitter. Good-bye! I’m leaving immediately.”

She turned from the telephone and hurried over to the window again, but the skater and the child had disappeared. She stood there a moment watching to see if the young man would be coming back, but the river was empty, no skater in sight either way.

With a sigh she turned away from the window, suddenly aware that she was very cold. She went to the hall closet and took out a warm, soft, old-fashioned shawl, wrapping it close around her, remembering the little shivering child who had come crying for help.

Back at the window there was still no sign of anyone. If only Joseph and Hannah would come she would have them drive her over at once to find out what this was all about anyway. It was hard to have to be helpless and wait. And that poor woman over there dying perhaps. Was the young man staying in the house all this time, or could he possibly have gone by while she was getting her shawl? She could see the river perfectly from the telephone, and she had been watching the window every minute. She hadn’t been a second getting that shawl. Probably he was doing something for the sick woman. Of course. Reviving her perhaps, if it was a faint. But would he know how? Not every young man was versed in first aid in such an emergency. This young man was at the age when he would have recently been away to college. They didn’t have much time to study first aid in college, did they? Although if they were in athletics they might have some experience.

Of course her own boys, if they had been here, would know what to do; at least enough to keep the woman alive if she was still living. And this young man looked like a wise fellow. He had intelligent eyes. Who was he, anyway, and how had he happened to know her name? Had she ever seen him before? The boys nowadays grew up so fast. And then, of course, she hadn’t been around the young people of the neighborhood as much as she used to be when her own boys were at home and had the house full of friends all the time.

How the years raced by her in panorama as she anxiously watched the icy pathway of the river! Oh, if only she hadn’t sent Hannah and Joseph off this particular morning! They could have gone later just as well. What could that skater-boy do anyway for a desperately sick woman, even if he did know enough to bring her back to consciousness?

She wished she could see the little brick house more clearly. The big elm tree in her back yard almost hid its front door. Was that somebody coming out now? Probably if she went out on the kitchen porch the view would be clearer. But no, she mustn’t; the wind was very sharp. She shivered now at the thought of facing it again as when she had called the young man. She mustn’t risk getting bronchitis again. No, she couldn’t go outside without dressing very warmly, and that would take a lot of time. Likely she would fail to see the young man if he came back. But that surely was a car parked by the side of the little brick cottage. Probably the doctor had arrived. And, ah—there was the young man, coming cautiously down the snow toward the river, just as he had walked up her lawn. And now he was dashing out on the ice and skimming along. Probably she had made him late to something, asking him to help. He might be a worker in one of those munitions places and would be late arriving, maybe be docked in his pay or even lose his job. But what else could she have done? She had to call someone, and he was the only one in sight. And he was a gentleman, she was sure of that. He had it written all over him, even in a leather windbreaker. He would never let her know she had inconvenienced him.

If he was late he wouldn’t likely stop to speak to her now, though he had said he would be back. But perhaps the doctor had understood and promised to stop and let her know.

Then she saw him coming, and suddenly he whirled to face her house and came dashing up, stepping in his same footprints as if they were stairs.

She opened the door and stepped out anxiously, but he called, “Don’t come out, Lady Winthrop. The cold is something fierce. I’ll come in. The doctor sent you a message.”

She stepped back into the house, and he was beside her almost at once, taking care, she noted, to keep his skate-shod feet on a rough mat at the door.

“She’s a pretty sick woman,” he said as he closed the door behind him. “It took me some time to bring her to, but the little kid brought some water and told me where to find aromatic ammonia and a few drops of that revived her. I got her on the bed and covered her warmly, rubbed her hands and feet. They were like ice. We put a hot blanket around them. They had a good, warm radiator in the room. That helped to heat the blanket. But we couldn’t find a hot water bag. The doctor said, did you have one or two you could lend him and a couple more blankets? Their goods haven’t all come yet. And the doctor asked if you would please telephone his office boy and ask him to bring over his other medicine bag and get hold of Nurse Branner and bring her right over to the house?”

“Why surely. There’s the telephone; suppose you call the office and talk with the boy while I get the blankets and things. The number is by the phone.”

As she hurried away she heard the young man’s efficient voice giving directions to the doctor’s office boy and rejoiced that she had so able a helper. This young man was going to stand right by as long as he was needed. Then she heard him coming down the hall after her, walking very carefully, not to damage her floor.

“Can’t I help you?” he asked, and he stepped gingerly up and took the blankets from her, then reached for the two hot water bags that were set so neatly together on a high shelf in the bathroom.

“Thank you,” said the old lady. “And now suppose we fill these bags from the teakettle in the kitchen. I happen to know it is full of hot water and standing over the burner. You can wrap the blankets around the bags and that will keep them hot and save a lot of time.”

“That’s a good idea!” said the young man. “You’ve been through a lot of sickness in your lifetime and you know what to do.”

“Well, I couldn’t have done much if you hadn’t responded to my call. And it couldn’t have been easy walking up that hill with skates on, either.”

The young man grinned and, turning, was soon plunging down the hillside, the big blanket-wrapped bundle held firmly as he sprang out on the ice and went skimming away again. What a fellow he was! How wise and brisk and efficient!

Lady Winthrop found she was quite weak with excitement when he was gone, and she sat down suddenly to rest and get her breath.

“Well,” she said aloud to herself, “to think all this would happen the first time when I was alone. If Joe were only here with the car I’d have been over there myself long ago seeing what I could do to help that poor woman. And now here I am, just a go-between. But perhaps that’s needed just now more than anything else, to do the telephoning.”