CHAPTER XXVIII.

MISS LEONARD’S ILLNESS.

Salome saw that she was becoming greatly excited, and concluded not to argue the point any further just then.

“I am sure,” she said, after thinking a moment, “I will do the best I can for you, Miss Leonard; but you surely need medicine.”

“Well, perhaps I do, and I’ll take anything you think I ought to have; but I won’t have a doctor—so that is settled.”

Salome was deeply troubled. She did not dare to assume the responsibility of administering remedies without the advice of an intelligent physician, and yet it would not do to persist in calling one, for the woman would certainly work herself into a dangerous state if antagonized.

She went into Miss Leonard’s dressing-room and beckoned Harriet to come to her.

The girl followed, after a few moments, under pretence of renewing the wet cloth upon her mistress’s head.

“What shall we do, Harriet?” Salome questioned anxiously. “Miss Leonard is certainly very ill, and she must have medical attendance.”

“Well, I don’t know, miss; she’s had her say, and an eight-ox team wouldn’t move her now,” said the maid, in a positive tone.

“How would it do, I wonder, if I should go to some skilful physician, tell him exactly how the matter stands, and describe her symptoms. I could do that every day, and twice a day, if necessary, and perhaps he could then treat her through me,” Salome said musingly.

“Don’t you think you could do as well by yourself?” inquired the girl. “She’d be hopping mad if she should ever find it out.”

“I do not dare to trust my own judgment, unaided; and, Harriet, I am afraid she is going to be very ill.”

“Oh, dear, I hope not!” sighed Harriet. “Perhaps she will be better if we wait a day or two.”

“I do not dare to wait, Harriet; I am very much troubled by her symptoms,” Salome returned gravely.

“Then I guess you’d better work your plan—though how the bill will be paid is more than I can tell. No doctor would ever see the color of her money, if we should go contrary to her will,” said the maid gloomily.

“Well, I would rather work until I could earn the money myself than run any risk or assume the responsibility,” Salome returned with decision. “Do you know of a skilful doctor who lives near here?”

“Yes, there are the Doctors Minot—the old and the young man—just around the corner; they’re accounted first-class, but they charge awful!”

“I cannot help that. I shall put the case in their hands, tell them just how we are situated, and trust the result with Providence,” and Salome’s brow cleared somewhat as she arrived at the conclusion.

“Good luck go with you, Miss Howland; I’m sure you have a kind heart to be so interested for such a cross old woman.”

Harriet would have resented it if any one else had called her mistress that; but just now she was very much troubled by her perverseness in refusing to see a doctor.

“Don’t speak so, Harriet,” returned her companion gently. “She is one of the good Father’s children, the same as you or I, and perhaps she would have been very different if she had had a happier life. Now,” she added, “I am going to get my breakfast, after that to Dr. Minot’s. If Miss Leonard asks for me, tell her I have gone to the drug store for remedies—for I shall go there before I return.”

She ran up to her room and prepared for the street, then went to break her fast—for she was faint and hungry, from her three hours of labor and anxiety in the sick-room—and after she had eaten went directly out.

She found the physician’s office readily enough, and was kindly received by young Dr. Minot, who, by the way, was not so very young, being upward of forty, but was so styled because his father was still practising.

Salome stated her case plainly, and the physician seemed to appreciate the situation. He knew something of Miss Leonard, he said, and was not at all surprised at her refusal to see a doctor. He saw at once that Salome was intelligent, and had made the most of her training in the hospital, and he thought there would be no difficulty in treating the case through her if she reported regularly and faithfully.

He said, frankly, that he regarded Miss Leonard’s symptoms alarming, and thought that it would be best for her to report twice a day for the present; then he prescribed certain remedies, to be given during the next twelve hours, after which he politely accompanied her to the door, and bade her a courteous good-morning.

She procured what she needed from the nearest pharmacy, and then hastened home, greatly relieved to have her burden shared by a skilful physician. But although she eagerly availed herself of his advice, and faithfully followed it, there were weary days and weeks before her, for Miss Leonard had a long and tedious illness.

At first she seemed to be doing better than had been anticipated, and both doctor and nurse were congratulating themselves that she would soon be out of danger, when, one morning, the wilful woman insisted upon getting up, took cold, and then for three weeks lay very near death’s door, and unconscious most of the time of all that was going on around her.

Then, upon her own responsibility, Salome admitted Dr. Minot to his patient, and he came twice every day, until she began to come to herself, when he treated her through Salome, as before.

Then there were four weeks more of slow and tedious convalescence, during which the invalid tried the souls of her attendants to their utmost endurance.

Salome, however, was very pitiful and tender, for during her delirium she had betrayed much which she had never meant any human being to know, and the girl had shed many tears over the sorrows and trials that had made her the crabbed and peculiar creature that she was. She resolved that nothing should make her get out of patience with her—that she would bear with her weakness and her crochets, and she even really began to feel an affection, such as a mother often experiences toward a feeble and fractious child.

She never allowed her to see a cloud upon her brow; she always greeted her with a smile, responded to her complaints with cheerful, hopeful words, and was ever gentle and considerate, even when she was almost worn out with her ceaseless watching and anxiety.

She often wondered that her own strength did not give out; but she was perfectly well, although very weary, and was conscious that she was steadily outgrowing the troubles that had threatened her before leaving Boston. She knew that the tide of health had turned strongly in her favor during those few weeks when she had been so happy in her husband’s home and love, and the good work was still going on.

One morning Miss Leonard seemed to be more than usually unmanageable, and was so rude and cross with Salome that she was obliged to make some excuse to leave the room, in order to conceal the tears she could no longer restrain.

Then Harriet, who had grown to love her very dearly during these weeks of mutual watching and anxiety, turned upon her mistress and gave vent to her indignation.

“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re thinking of, marm, to treat that angel so,” she cried hotly.

“Angel?” sneered the angry woman; “there are no angels in the world. I’ve lived in it for more than fifty years, and I never met one yet.”

“Well, you’ve got one in this very house,” retorted Harriet: “though I suppose you wouldn’t acknowledge it if the Virgin Mary herself should come down to serve you. But I’ll tell you one thing, if I lose my place for it, you’d have been under the sod long before this, if it hadn’t been for Miss Howland.”

“Pooh! Mind your own business, Harriet; I haven’t been as sick as all that,” scornfully returned Miss Leonard, who had never realized her danger.

“But you have, marm,” solemnly replied the girl; “seven days and seven nights we hung over you, and thought every one would be your last. The doctor said you couldn’t li——”

“Doctor?” screamed Miss Leonard wrathfully. “What doctor?”

Poor Harriet looked crest-fallen enough at this unlucky slip of the tongue; but the secret was out now, and she thought she might as well make a clean breast of everything, so she confessed the whole story to her mistress.

Miss Leonard’s brow was black with anger as she listened; she had been hoodwinked and outwitted.

While she had been lying unconscious and helpless in their care these two women had admitted, in direct opposition to her commands, a despised physician, and given her into his care to be experimented upon. True, the experiment had proved successful, but that she did not take into consideration at that moment.

“You shall pay for this, Harriet, when I get able to give you your just deserts,” she said fiercely, when the story was told.

“I can’t help it, marm,” the woman returned, with an independent toss of her head, and feeling relieved now that the secret was out; “your life was worth too much to be sacrificed to a mere whim. Perhaps you would rather we had let you die; come, now—would you?”

“But you disobeyed my strict orders,” began her mistress evasively.

“Yes, marm, and it was lucky for you we did,” Harriet said, gaining confidence in her defence; “but leaving yourself out of the question, can’t you have a little feeling for that poor young thing? What if she had taken the responsibility of treating you, as you ordered her, and you had died? ’Twouldn’t be very comfortable for her to think of all her life.”

“Humph! Who’s to pay the bills, I’d like to know,” snapped Miss Leonard, steering clear of all answers, as before.

“Miss Howland spoke of that, and said she would work to pay them herself, rather than run the risk of letting you die. I tell you, marm, there ain’t many people like her in the world. Can’t you see for yourself, how much flesh that patient girl has worn off for you? Look at her hollow cheeks, her sunken eyes, and thin hands; she hadn’t much to lose when she came here, goodness knows, but she has less now, and I don’t know as she had any special reason to work herself to death for you, either.”

Miss Leonard shot a startled look at her maid at this. She had been so full of her own aches and pains, that she had given no thought to anyone else; but now it occurred to her that Salome did look sadly worn—her face was hollow and thin.

A shiver of self-repulsion ran over her, and a flush, hot and burning, mounted to her brow. She knew there had been many days that had been an utter blank to her—when, probably, she had been near death, as Harriet had said. What if she had died!

These thoughts led to others, and much of her past life flitted before her, quickening her conscience and arousing remorse, and in her weakened state she fell to weeping nervously. Salome returned at this point and found her in an almost hysterical condition.

This of course would not do, and without even inquiring the cause of her tears, she set about diverting her mind into a more pleasant channel.

But from that day both Salome and Harriet began to observe a change in her.

It was very slight at first and marked only by little things—the sudden breaking off in the middle of a harsh sentence, supplementing her orders now and then with the courteous words “if you please,” insisting that both the nurse and maid should alternate in having a little rest every afternoon, instead of demanding increasing attendance all day long.

Toward the latter, too, she was less crabbed and arbitrary, and the woman began to notice and comment upon it to Salome.

“I hope she won’t get too good,” she dryly remarked one day, when her mistress had been more kind than usual. “I ain’t used to it, you know; I rather think, on the whole, it gives a spice to life, and keeps my spirits up, to have a little tiff with her now and then.”

Salome had a hearty laugh over this characteristic remark, but thought she enjoyed Miss Leonard far more without the “tiffs.”

She surprised them both one day by sending a message to Dr. Minot, requesting him to call.

She had never exchanged a word with Salome regarding his attendance upon her, although the young nurse had expected, after Harriet’s revelation, to be called to account for it; but she felt she had done right, and so had no anxiety over the matter.

Dr. Minot came, as desired, and Miss Leonard received him graciously, which, considering her hatred of the sex, greatly surprised her attendants.

She had a long conference with him, during which the physician expressed his unbounded admiration for the manner in which Salome had attended her during her protracted illness. He told her frankly that she must have died, but for the excellent nursing she had received, although he did not undervalue his own services.

Miss Leonard did not express herself regarding Salome’s merits, but she curtly informed her visitor that she “never had any faith in doctors, though she supposed there were times when they were useful,” and concluded by asking the amount of his bill.

Dr. Minot, with a shrewd twinkle in his eyes, named a very moderate sum.

Miss Leonard, without relaxing a muscle of her grim face, immediately filled out a check for double the amount and passed it to him.

Dr. Minot looked at it and knit his brows. He had expected that she would object to even the small sum he had named.

“I think you have made a mistake, madam,” he remarked; “the amount I stated was exactly half of what you have written here.”

“Excuse me, sir, if I have burdened you,” the woman replied, with exaggerated politeness, “but charity should be extended to those who need it. If I have overpaid you, pray use the surplus for such objects.”

Dr. Minot pocketed the check without further comment, but he shook hands cordially with his patient as he took his leave, and went out with a peculiar smile on his honest face.

“She’s like a chestnut in some respects, I imagine,” he muttered; “you’ll generally find a good kernel if you can get inside the burr, but it takes either frost or hard knocks to accomplish that.”

The following morning Miss Leonard asked Salome if she would be willing to accompany her upon an extended trip.

Salome expressed a cheerful willingness to do so. Indeed she had begun to fear that she had made a mistake in remaining in New York, for she was liable to meet Dr. Winthrop when he should return, and she felt that she should never have strength for such an encounter.

“Where do you propose to go?” she asked of Miss Leonard.

“Well, that doctor of yours”—this with a little significant emphasis—“thought I’d better try a sea-voyage if I had the courage for it, and I’ve about made up my mind that I will take a run over to England and France if you and Harriet will go with me. It’s many years since I visited Europe.”

Harriet, who was really attached to her mistress, in spite of her peculiarities, was ready to go anywhere she desired, and the date of their departure was fixed for the first of June.

During the few weeks previous to their start Miss Leonard continued to improve physically and spiritually. It really seemed as if her illness had changed her nature, for she was kinder and more considerate toward every one, while she exhibited a constantly increasing fondness for Salome.

They rode together every morning when the weather was fine; during the evening they entertained themselves with reading, music, and backgammon, and every day grew more fond of each other.

One night, after they had spent an unusually pleasant evening, Salome approached Miss Leonard as she was about to retire, and said, while a soft flush arose to her cheeks.

“Dear Miss Leonard, while you were ill I never went away to rest without kissing you good-night, for some times I was afraid I should not find you when I came back. May I keep up the custom now that you are well?”

She held up her lips as she ceased speaking, and they were so tremulously sweet and tempting that the woman involuntarily stooped and gave her the caress she craved.

“Heaven bless you, child!” she said heartily. “I begin to believe there is a soft spot in my heart after all, and you have been the first one to find it.”

And Salome was sure there was a suspicious moisture in her eyes as she turned away from her.

She never left her after that without bidding her the same affectionate good-night. The lonely girl craved love; it was natural to her to give expression to the tenderness of her own heart; and so, little by little, she twined herself about the affections of this strange woman.

Two days before Miss Leonard was to sail she sent for her lawyer, and was closeted with him during the whole forenoon; and when Harriet was summoned after his departure, she found her mistress pale and grave, but with a softer light in her keen eyes than she had ever seen in them before.

“Harriet,” she said abruptly, “I’ve made my will to-day, and, if anything happens to me while we are away, the document will be found in the hands of Mr. Travis. If you live longer than I do, you’ll find, my good girl, that I haven’t forgotten you.”

“Thank you, marm,” was all that the astonished Harriet could say. She had never dreamed of such a thing as being remembered in her mistress’s will, or that she would ever show any especial appreciation of her services. She gave her fair wages, and they were always promptly paid—more than this she had never expected.