Sioux County pioneer. (Fort Yates, Sioux County, N.D.) 1914-1929, 1914-12-04
. 4. Stokes Company

NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.
ck 4. Stokes Company
Ting hedge of Latin phrases. Emma
McChesney hurdled it at leap.
Never mind" she said. 81 know"
She looked at the faces of those four
strangers. Sympathy-real, human
sympathy-was uppermost in each.
She smiled a faint and friendly little
smile at the group. And at that the
housekeeper began tucking in the COW
ers at the foot of the bed, and the lanl
waitress walked to the window and
pulled down the shade, and the bell
! boy muttered something about ice wa
ter. The doctor patted her wrist light
ly and reassuringly.
You're all awfully good" said EN-
ma McChesney, her eyes glowing with
something other than fever. I've
something to say. It's just this. If
I'm going to be sick I'd prefer to be
sick right here, unless it's something
catching. No hospital. Don't ask me
why. ] don't know. We people on
the road are all alike. Wire T. A.
Buck, Jr, of the Featherloom Petticoat
company, New York. You'll find plenty
of clean nightgowns in the left-hand
tray Of my trunk, covered with white
tissue paper. Get a nurse that doesn't
snift1e, or talk about the palace she
nursed in last, where they treated her
like a queen and waited on her hand
and foot. For goodness sake, put my
switch where nothing will happen to
it, and if I die and they run my pic
ture in the Dry Goods Review under
the caption, Veteran Travelling Sales
woman Succumbs at Glen Rock I'll
haunt the editor" She paused a mo.
ment
Everything will be all right" said
the housekeeper, soothingly. you'll
think you're right at home, it'll be so
comfortable. Was there anything else.
now?"
eyes," said Emma McChesney.
"The most important of all. Ny son,
Jock McChesney, is fishing up in the
Canadian woods. A telegram may not
reach him for three weeks. They're
shifting about from camp to camp. Try
to get him, but don't scare him too
much. You'll find the address under
J. In my address book in my handbag.
Poor kid. Perhaps it's Just as well he
doesn't know"
Perhaps it was. At any rate it was
true that had the tribe of McChesney
been as the leaves of the trees. and
had it held a family reunion in Emma
McChesney's little hotel bedroom, it
would have mattefed not at all to her.
For she was sick-do ctor-three-times-
a-day-trained-nurss Observation-Disclosures
side sick, her head, with its bright hair
rumpled and dry with the fever, toss
ing from side to side on the lumpy
hotel pillow, or lying terribly silent
and inert against the gray.white 81 the
bed linen. She never quite kntAy haN
narrowly she escaped that picture in
the Dry Goods Review. -;-.s5:
Then one day the fever began to re.
cede, slowly, whence fevers come, and
the indefnable air of suspense and re-
preston that fingers about a sick
room at such crisis began td.lift i'm
perceptibly. There came time. when
Emma McChesney asked in a weak
but sane voice:
"Did Jock come? Did they cut off
my hair?"
mot yet, DEAR" the nurse had an
swered to the first, "but we'll hear in
day or so, I'm sure" And, Your
lovely hair! Well. not if know it,"
to the second.
The spirit of small-town kindness
took Emma McChesney in it's arms.
The dingy little hotel room glowed
with flowers. The story of the sick
woman fighting there alone in the ter
rors Of delirium had gone up and down
about the town. Housewives with a
fine contempt for hotel soup sent
broths of chicken and beef. The local
members Of the U. G. T. sent roses
enough to tax every vase and wash
pitcher that the hotel could muster,
and asked their wives to call at the
hotel and see what they could do. The
wives came. obediently, but with sus-
pASAO0 0AA OA6Ilu6L III tA01I eyes, anu
remained to pat Emma McChesney's
arm, ask to read aloud to her, and to
indulge generally in that process
known as cheering her up" Every
travelling man who stopped at the lit
tie hotel on his way to Minneapolis
added to the heaped.up offerings at
Emma McChesney's shrine. Books
and magazines assumed the proper
lions Of q library. One could see the
hand Of T. A. Buck, Jr., in the cases
Of mineral water, quarts of wine, cum
ming cordials and tiny bottles of
liqueur that stood In convivial rows on
the closet shelf and floor. There came
letters. too, and kilograms with such
phrases as 'let nothing be left undone"
and spare no expense" under T. A..
Buck, Jr's., signature.
So Emma McChesney clliabed the
long, weary hill of illness and pain,
reached the top. painting and almost
spent, rested there. and began the
easy descent on the other side that