The Storyteller

New Zealand Tablet, 21 April 1910, Page 603

The Storyteller

THE case of KITTY Upon my word I’ Dr. Garvin repeated for the third time, 1 have seen surprising things in this institution Miss Brisbane. But this ’ •j <t U m ay explain, Miss Donaldson,’ the head nurse said; I confess I am surprised.’ . T ‘ I l ad left particular directions!’ Dr. Garvin stormed. I had foreseen everything—everything but this! If lam to be set aside by two girls from your training school, I want to understand the situation at once,-Miss Brisbane.’ It struck him, even as he spoke, that Flora Donaldson was not afraid of him. Miss Brisbane was. Nurses and internes, orderlies and scrub.women in every hospital of the city were accustomed to tremble before the great Dr. Garvin. If Miss Donaldson was trembling, the white flutings of her cap did not show it. - * I will take all the responsibility for this,’ she said, it any blame attaches, let it fall on me—not on Miss Porter, We were in charge of the ward from two to seven. Miss Porter noticed a change in number eight about 5 o clock. I sent downstairs for Dr. Huntley. I did not consider that there were any directions covering the indications that we had to face. We did as he told us, and the patient was relieved within an hour.’ ‘Then you simply acted as if I didn’t exist!’ Dr. Garvin exclaimed. - I beg pardon, doctor. If you had been here—if you could have been here — I should have consulted you; but under the circumstances I acted as it seemed best. Once more I beg your pardon for the irregularity.’ ‘ That is all for the present. You may go,’ the head nurse said. . ‘The patient is all right, anyway!’ Dr., Garvin chuckled grimly when Miss Donaldson was out of hearing. 1 Huntley used a treatment that 1 never use—never liked—but it did tne work this time. Nevertheless, I can’t have mutiny among my nurses, Miss Brisbane. To think of her taking the law into her own hands, as if I hadn’t foreseen everything.’ J ‘ It must be that she didn’t recognise the symptoms you meant to indicate,’ Miss Brisbane suggested. ‘ I don’t want to send her away, doctor! She’s worth any three ofthe others, in an emergency,’ ; ‘Guilty, with a recommendation to the mercy of the court, eh?’ the surgeon chuckled again. ‘Well, I won’t insist on her execution this time. But don’t put her on any more of my cases!’ & Miss Donaldson had gone to the nurses’ dormitory on an upper floor. From one of the cots came a faint sound of sobbing. She knelt down beside the cot, and shook its occupant softly. ‘Hush! you’re safe for this time!’ she whispered. ‘But if ever I have to do that for you again, Kitty Porter!’ ‘ You didn’t tell?’ the girl on the cot whispered back. . ‘Not a word. And I didn’t lie. I let him suppose I ignored his orders, instead of telling him that you let them blow into the grate and burn! You’re safe. I can tell that Miss Brisbane, isn’t going to hurt you.’ ■ ‘But you? Will they punish you? I shall die if they do !’ ‘Nonsense! It will be a reprimand, that’s all. Maybe a setting back. That’s better than to have you failand Miss Brisbane said she wasn’t going to make any more allowances.’ The girl on the cot sat up suddenly, with a tragic face. ‘ Miss Donaldson! If they make you suffer for my fault, I will go downstairs and find Miss Brisbane and tell her the whole story ! ’ Flora put a hand on the girl’s shoulder and pushed her back, laughing. ‘ That’s exactly what you are not going to do, Kitty,’ she said. ‘lf you really want to oblige me, you’re going to redouble your own efforts, you know. That’s in the contract. I hold you to your bond! lam going to make a nurse out of you yet. For instance, you are never going to leave important papers again where they can blow into grates.’ _ . ■ ‘ Never !’ Kitty groaned. ‘Nor let Number Eleven try to hold her glass of malted milk, even when she does beg to have it without the tube — oh, but I saved you in the nick of time then, Kitty!’ ‘I know it!’ Kitty admitted. : - Nor stand by the window reading Somebody’s letter when Miss Brisbane is coming down the corridor to tell you that the screens ought to have had fresh muslins put in two days before.’ ‘I will be good I’ Kitty sighed. ‘ Don’t give me up. It is the only work I can — and I must graduate And I love it— l do love it; but I’ve got twenty years of careless ways to undo ! - • '.^MiKitty went to sleep that night, resolving to be a model of punctuality and good discipline. She suffered some further qualms of conscience when she learned, after a day or two, that Flora Donaldson had been called to the superintendent office for a formal reprimand. But all the hos-

prfcal authorities were inclined to admire Miss Donaldson and tne reprimand was not such a: serious air as to prevent Flora’s leaving the office with a smiling face. She went up to the ward where Kitty was at work, and began to give an oil rub with her usual cheerful vigor. ‘ Yes,’ said Flora briefly, ‘ Oh, be careful! Remember how they want you to fold the spread over!’ . Kitty started and saved herself just in time, for Miss Brisbane was coming in at the west door, and Kitty’s carelessness in the making of beds was an old offence. It was very seldom that the girl failed in her duty to a patient. She grudged no amount of labor or painstaking where it touched upon the actual care of the sick, but against the thousandfold minutiae of hospital discipline, the exact rules and prescribed standards by which every act was supposed to be measured, she transgressed continually. Miss Donaldson’s constant watchfulness was beginning to have its effect but an occasional lapse on Kitty’s part proved that the watchfulness could not be relaxed for many days to come. ‘ Once again!’ Kitty whispered, when Miss Brisbane had passed on. ‘See how good I shall be after this! You’ll have no black marks on your books against mo for a fortnight!’ 'lt seemed verily, for a few days, that Kitty would redeem her promise. She remembered unimportant rules and observed them with a vigor that appalled those of her associates who were wont to find the best fun of the day in the news of Kitty’s fresh scrapes. She was on time to the minute; she never stopped on the stairs to chat; her aprons Kitty’s aprons were as subject to misfortune as a spoiled child’s pinaforesremained irreproachably spotless and uncrumpled against Miss Brisbane’s most searching glances. Flora Donaldson began to breathe more easily. If Kitty could only keep it up, and breast the tide somehow until she got her diploma, she would be a treasure as a private nurse; but her hospital life under Miss Brisbane and Dr. Garvin was too much of a nervous strain upon her friends. The fortnight was almost over. Kitty and Miss Donaldson were enjoying together the brief half-holiday which the hospital rules allowed them all too seldom. They had taken a trolley ride out past the green fringes of the park; they had stopped for ice-cream at a confectioner’s; they had lingered with delight over M. Jokari’s choice display of Oriental rugs and draperies, on exhibition in his temporary saleroom. At half-past three Flora turned her steps resolutely toward the car. ‘ I must go back,’ she said. ‘Goon to the library and the gallery, and have all the rest of the fun in my stead, Kitty. You remember I promised Miss Brisbane that I would be back in time to help Dr. Garvin with that case at four. 1 Bother Dr. Garvin!’ cried Kitty irreverently. ‘You ought to have your whole afternoon 1 Anyway, it is only a quarter after three. You have time to come with me and look at some underwear. See, there is the clock on the bank.’ Flora looked, decided that she had time to humor Kitty, and went with her. She spent not more than fifteen minutes, came down to the corner again, and took the first car going west. And yet, when, she ran up the steps of the hospital and gave one glance at the office clock as she passed on toward the elevator, her horrified hands told her that the hands were marking ten minutes after four. ‘Oh, Miss Brisbane!’ she exclaimed, meeting the head nurse in the corridor, ‘I am so sorry I am late.’ ‘So am I, Miss Donaldson,’ the older woman answered icily. ‘ Dr. Garvin was obliged to take Miss Fuller in your place. It is the second time that you have given offence to him lately. I had not expected him to overlook the former case; he certainly will make no allowance for this. You may go upstairs.’ ; Sent to hide her face in a corner, like a naughty child 1 _ Flora’s lips quivered. And it was not her own fault either time. Only because she had tried to befriend and shield and humor careless Kitty 1 Her own record in the hospital was flawless. She knew that Miss Brisbane would believe her now if she were to tell the exact facts in both cases; but she set her teeth, and went up the stairs silently, determined to stand by Kitty to the last. Kitty heard the whole story when she came home, flushed and radiant, at half-past five. Another nurse who had been at work in the corridor-, gave her an accurate report of Miss Brisbane’s tone and -words. ‘ Oh, my poor, splendid Flora ! ’ Kitty cried under her breath, turning pale. This time she wasted no words in protestation or prophecy. Her teeth chattered, ■ and her knees shook under her, , but she went straight to Miss Brisbane’s room and told the truth. Incidentally, she told the truth about the earlier incident. l lt was my fault both times,’ she said. ‘ I ought to have remembered that the bank clock had not been running for a week. I had known it, but I forgot. I made her late. I got her into the scrape with Dr. ' Garvin two weeks ago. She took it all on herself, as far as she could and tell the truth, to shield me. I wish you would send me home. But don’t, oh, don’t hurt Flora ’ Then Kitty Porter discovered to her amazement that Miss Brisbane’s stern face was broken into a tenderness that she never had seen before.

\ , You are a child, Miss Porter,’ the head nurse said abruptly. lou aren’t tit to be a nurse. But you are a brave girl. I don’t know which of the two of you is the sillier child. Go upstairs and keep Miss Donaldson company. i should like to send you both to bed without your supper, but it isn’t hygienic. No, lam not going to send you home; I am going to keep you here and make a nurse of you. And then, to cap the climax of the unprecedented. Miss Brisbane patted Kitty’s shoulder and kissed her. •It was never so hd after that. Whether the deeper insight into Miss Brisbane’s _ character made it more possible for careless, childish Kitty to love her, and to obey for love s sake whether it was the tonic effect of that ten minutes of genuine, unselfish heroism, when she dropped , e . shield of Mora’s friendship, and the added responsibility winch it laid upon her—is not easy to say. But at any late it is certain that Kitty Porter was a different girl from that hour. No longer by fits and starts, as a child may play at being good, but with a steady, womanly sureness, she took up the serious duties and the little vexing particulars of discipline, and bore them triumphantly to the end of her course. She was graduated in the class below rloras, taking her diploma with the hearty approval of every officer in the hospital ; and the telegram which she sent in response to Flora’s gift of roses on the great day, not waiting for the formality of notepaper and ink, was very sincere and Kitty-like: To Miss Flora Donaldson, Head Nurse, Mercy Hospital, Springfield. ’ ' Thanks, a heart full, from the nurse you made. Kitty.