The midland journal., 1917-03-02

I'm not 0DS0iureIy useless where 4
am, va know, Max" he said. I've
raised three tomato plants and fam
lily of kittens this summer, helped to
plan trousseau, assisted in selecting
wallpaper for the room just inside
did you notice it?-and developed a
boy pitcher with ball that twists
around the bat like a COLES fracture
around a splint!"
Wilson rose and flung his cigarette
into the grass.
81 wish 1 understood you'll" he said
irritably.
X. rose with him, and all the sup
pressed feeling of the interview was
crowded into his last words.
"I'm not as ungrateful as you think,
Max" he said. 1-you've helped a
lot. Don't worry about me. I'm as
we'll off as deserve to be, and better.
Good night"
"Good night"
Wilson's unexpected magnanimity
put K. in a curious position-left
him, as it were, with a divided allie
glance. Sidney's frank infatuation for
the young surgeon was growing. He
was quick to see it. And where before
he might have felt justified in going
to the length of warning her, now his
hands were tied.
Sidney went on night duty shortly
after her acceptance. She tumbled
into her low bed at nine o'clock in the
morning, those days, with her splen-
did hair neatly braided down her back
and her prayers said, and Immediately
her active young mind filled with
mages-Christine's wedding, Doctor
Max passing the door of the old ward
and she not there, Joe-and she puz-
zled over Grace and her kind.
On her first night on duty girl
had been brought in from the Avenue.
She had taken poison-nobody knew
just what. When the internes had
tried to find out, she had only said :
"What's the use?"
And she had died.
Sidney kept asking herself, "Why?"
those mornings when she could not get
to sleep. People were kind-men were
kind, really-and yet, for some reason
or other, those things had to be.
Why?
Carlotta Harrison went on night
duty at the slime time-her last night
service, as it was Sidney's first. She
accepted it stoically. She had charge
| of the three wards on the floor just
below Sidney, and of the ward into
which all emergency cases were taken.
1t was difficult service, perhaps the
most difficult in the house. Carlotta
merely shrugged her shoulders.
'Pve always had things pretty hard
here" she commented briefly. 'When
l go out, I'll either be competent
enough to run q whole hospital single
handed, or I'll be carried out feet
first"
| Sidney was glad to have her so near.
She knew her better than she knew
the other nurses. Small emergencies
were constantly arising and finding her
at a loss. Once at least every night
Miss Harrison would hear a soft hiss
from the back staircase that connect
ed the two floors, and, going out, would
see Sidney'S flushed face and slightly
crooked cap bending over the stair
rail.
'I'm dreadfully sorry to bother you,"
she would say, "but So-and-So won't
have fever BATH" or, "I've woman
here who refuses her medicine" Then
would follow rapid questions and
equally rapid answers. Much as Car
lotta disliked and feared the girl over
head, it never occurred to her to re-
fuse her assistance. Perhaps the an
gels who keep the great record will
put that to her credit.
Sidney saw her first death shortly
after she went on night duty. 1t was
the most terrible experience of all her
life-it seemed to her that she could
not stand it. Added to all her other
new problems of living was this one
of dying.
She made mistakes, of course, which
the kindly nurses forgot to report
| basins left about, errors on her rec
ords.' She rinsed her thermometer in
| hot water one night, and startled an
inferno by sending him word that Mary
McGuire's temperature was 110 de-
grees. She let a delirious patient escape
from the ward another night and go
airily down the fire escape before she
| discovered what had happened! Then
she distinguished herself by flying
down the iron staircase and bringing
the runaway back Single-handed.
For Christines wedding the Street
threw off it's drab attire and assumed
a wedding garment. In the beginning
it was incredulous about some of the
details. The wedding was to be at
five O'Clock. This, in itself, defied all
traditions of the Street, which was
either married in the very early morn
ing at the Catholic church or at eight