by Helen Wells
Old friends might be the best, but as dusk came, Cherry wished the visitors would not stay much longer. She had only an hour left before plane time. Finally, their neighbors understandingly left.
Then, with the living room cleared, and only the four Ameses occupying it, no one could think of much to say.
“Hope you have a good flight, Cherry.”
“I think I will, Charlie.”
A pause. Mr. Ames contributed: “The weather prediction is clear.”
“They’re not always right, though,” said Cherry’s mother. “Still, I see a star is out.”
The hands of the clock went around so slowly that Cherry realized, half-ashamed, how much she longed to be on her way. To be up to her ears in nursing and people! She said good-bye lightheartedly to her family.
“Good-bye, honey, and good luck—your new job sounds intriguing,” Cherry’s mother said. “But promise me you’ll be home for Christmas! You, too, Charles.”
They promised to try their best. Cherry quickly kissed her father and mother au revoir. Then Charlie drove her to Hilton Airport.
CHAPTER II
New Friends, Old Friends
CHERRY WOKE UP FRIDAY MORNING WITH A SLIGHT SENSE of dislocation. This must be No. 9, because hunched in the other twin bed she could see Gwen’s familiar red hair and a curve of freckled cheek. Cherry had let herself in sleepily after midnight and found the apartment dark, all her fellow nurses asleep.
“I’ll bet nobody even knows I’m here this morning,” Cherry thought. She sat up and rubbed her eyes. In that case she could beat the others into the one bathroom and squeeze in a shower.
“Good morning, Cherry,” Gwen yawned. “I see you’re back again.” She leaned over and whacked Cherry on the back. “Ha-ha! Your back again! Get it?”
Cherry groaned. “Please, not so early in the morning. How’s your aunt? Did she stuff you with turkey?”
“We gobbled the gobbler!” When Cherry said ouch, Gwen struggled to a sitting position. “Don’t blame me. It’s that punny Betty Lane. I caught punitis from her.”
Betty Lane was staying at No. 9 temporarily. She, too, had earned her R.N. at Spencer, but a year after Cherry and her friends had graduated. Therefore, Betty was only an honorary member of that august body, the Spencer Club. She was a pleasant girl, except for one thing, Cherry discovered—Betty had just beat her to the shower.
Cherry took one look at her wrist watch—she’d forgotten to turn it ahead an hour, upon returning east. Golly! No time for breakfast. She’d better hustle! Cherry washed in haste, practically jumped into her clothes, and called:
“Gwen? Ready to walk to the subway with me?”
“Gwen just left,” Vivian called from one of the other small bedrooms. “That’s what she gets for working way out on Long Island. Bertha said to tell you hello and good-bye.”
“Mai Lee? … Oh, she’s visiting friends, isn’t she?” Cherry pulled on her coat. “‘Bye, kids. See you at dinner.”
The remaining two, rushing for their own jobs, called mumbled good-bys to her. “Well,” Cherry thought, “I just hope the people at the department store aren’t all in this scrambled state.”
Cherry checked in at Thomas and Parke’s a little earlier than the crowd of employees. She walked quickly across the main floor toward the bank of elevators. What a surprise! Yesterday while the store was closed, the display artists had transformed the main floor into a Christmas festival. Giant artificial snowflakes sparkled and spun slowly overhead, while fantastic cherubim hovered high over the counters. The counters themselves were heaped with bright, plentiful new stock for the Christmas season, and there would be music as soon as the doors opened for business.
They were rushing the season, it seemed to Cherry, but all the stores now followed this calendar of merchandising. She felt a little relieved, all the same, to step out of the elevator on the sixth floor and find that it was still November here, without any trace of decorations.
Of course there was decoration and beauty enough in the glass cases and fine furniture of the antiques department, where the night watchman was making the last of his rounds. The big personnel department, at the far end of this floor, was already bustling with activity, hiring new employees for the seasonal rush.
“Good morning, Miss Ames, good morning,” her assistant sang out as Cherry entered the medical department. “How are we this morning?”
“Oh, just fine, I guess, Gladys. How are you?”
Gladys Green was a brand-new, young R.N., bouncing with enthusiasm. This was her first job and Cherry wished Gladys were a shade less determined to do good. She had, Cherry saw, rearranged the first-aid cabinet, the nursing instruments, and even, in the small partitioned room beyond, moved the two cots.
“Better, isn’t it?” Gladys said cheerfully.
“It’s very nice, though you’ll have to show me where you’ve put things.”
The infirmary, like most store infirmaries, was small and compact enough for her to be able to find things. Only small emergencies were treated here; anyone seriously ill would be treated by Dr. Murphy, whose office was around the corner. Absences due to illness were checked by the personnel department working together with the State Bureau of Compensation. Nursing here, Cherry reflected as she changed into white uniform and cap and white shoes, did not call on the more difficult nursing skills, like surgery or obstetrics, but it did place her on her own in full charge. Sound judgment about people and rapid, right decisions about health were the main requirements.
Gladys Green rose respectfully, to permit Cherry to occupy the one desk.
“Thanks, Gladys. Did you have any emergencies during the few days I was away?”
“Honestly, it was so quiet I didn’t know what to do with myself! To tell you the truth, that’s half the reason why I moved the equipment around.”
Cherry grinned. “May I see the daily report sheets?”
Gladys gave them to her, then stood reading them solemnly over Cherry’s shoulder.
“You did very well,” Cherry said, reading: a cut finger; a sprained ankle; a head cold; a few other small emergencies. Then there was a woman customer who fell on the escalator, and a man in the shipping room who received a deep cut from broken glass. Nurse Green had administered first aid and sent them, with a store escort, to Dr. Murphy.
“I’ll bet you I could have treated them perfectly well myself,” the young nurse said.
“I’ll bet you couldn’t. I’ll bet I couldn’t. Any nurse who tries to play doctor isn’t a very responsible nurse, you know.”
“That’s just what Ann Powell told me.”
“Cheer up, Gladys, we won’t have many slow periods now that Christmas shopping is starting.”
“You’re right. Listen.” The hum of many people walking and talking, the metallic click of elevator doors, telephones ringing, indicated that the store was open now to customers.
This was a good chance, Cherry said, for them to check on supplies, and put the medical department in shipshape order. And Cherry took care to praise her assistant, who was trying so hard to do a good job.
The two nurses had been working for about an hour when someone knocked on the open door. It was Tom Reese, holding by the hand a small, tear-smudged boy.
“Good morning, Miss Ames. How would you like to take care of a young fellow who got separated from his mother?”
Cherry smiled at Tom Reese who looked startingly like her, vividly dark, lively, quick-moving—like more of a twin than Charlie. Then Cherry smiled at the youngster and held out her hand.
“I was just wishing for a boy to help me count boxes. What’s your name?”
“Bobby. I want my mamma.”
“Your mamma will be here in a few minutes. How high can you count, Bobby?”
The small boy stopped to think. “Twenty-five. Have you got more’n twenty-five boxes?”
“Well, we’d better go see. First, Miss Green, let’s help Bobby off with his heavy coat, and giv
e him a drink of water.”
Gladys took charge of Bobby for the moment, and Cherry turned to Tom Reese. He explained that the child’s mother would quickly be located via the store’s loudspeaker system. Then he said:
“I can count to a million or so, if you’ll need another helper. Did you have a good trip home?”
“Awfully good, thank you.”
Tom Reese’s dark eyes sparkled with friendliness. “Brace yourself for the big rush. If you need me, remember my office is right next door.”
As he left, Gladys looked up from washing Bobby’s face, a knowing grin on her face. Cherry pretended to pay no attention, and Bobby declared,
“That man’s nice!”
Bobby’s mother arrived soon afterward, and then a small stream of minor casualties kept Cherry and her assistant occupied. A man from the upholstery department came in holding a handkerchief over one eye. Cherry carefully, deftly, removed the lint particle which could cause surprising pain. Then she applied a soothing hot compress. “Don’t rub your eyes,” she cautioned the patient, “and don’t use eye cups. Their pressure is harmful, and they can carry infection. If your eye feels sensitive, come back and I’ll bathe it with a weak boric acid solution—using a sterilized eye dropper.” The man thanked her and said he’d learned something.
A brief lull was interrupted by a saleswoman who complained of a sore throat. Cherry checked the woman over and said, “That ‘sore throat’ looks to me like strep throat, Mrs. Crane.” Strep was infectious and everyone in this woman’s department might catch it. “I’d like you to visit Dr. Murphy at once, Mrs. Crane. I’ll phone him, and Miss Green will make out a medical pass for you to give your supervisor—”
So it went, all day Friday. Nothing crucial, but every case was important.
The next day there was no free time. Cherry and Gladys Green treated an assortment of customers and employees for minor ailments. Tom Reese poked his head in the door around noon to say:
“The main floor is beginning to look like a football scrimmage. Busy in here?”
“Well, I’d say we’re earning our salaries,” Cherry smiled back at him. “But I’m glad to be on a comparatively quiet floor. Antiques, apparently, are too costly to attract crowds.”
“You should see the toy department. That reminds me! I’ll have some toys sent here, because you two gals are going to have lots more mislaid children.”
“Thank you, Mr. Reese.”
“Everybody calls me Tom.” He waved and was gone.
By Saturday evening Cherry was glad enough to go home to No. 9 and just sit down in the one comfortable armchair.
Only Bertha and Gwen were there, the others having gone out to a favorite restaurant around the corner. Bertha, who was No. 9’s best and therefore chief cook, seemed rather hurt.
“Never mind,” said Cherry to the big, handsome girl who still retained the wholesome outdoor look of a farm girl. “The three of us will rustle up something better than they can buy.”
Gwen kicked off her shoes and flopped down on the sofa. “Jeepers, what a day! I like lab work, all except the standing up part. No, you know I can’t work properly perched on a stool. Dr. Hall still doesn’t believe that!”
They chatted a bit about their respective jobs. Bertha was in charge of a children’s hospital ward and loved it. Privately they agreed they would not enjoy Betty Lane’s job as nurse companion to a well-to-do elderly woman. They’d rather do real nursing. Somehow talking together quickened their professional pride and erased the day’s trivial annoyances. Cherry turned on the radio for music, and Gwen, with a grandiloquent air, passed a tray of tomato-juice cocktails. Presently Bertha rustled up supper. They were having such a comfortable time as a threesome that it startled them when the telephone rang.
Gwen’s aunt was calling from Long Island, with an interesting offer. Gwen relayed it to Cherry and Bertha.… “Yes, I’m listening to you, Aunt Kathy.… Hey, kids, she wants me and one of you Spencer Clubbers to stay with her for a while!”
“Where?” Cherry murmured. She felt an interest, since she and Gwen were old tried-and-true roommates.
“Long Island.… Where is Uncle John going on Sunday? … Arabia? Good heavens!”
Bertha muttered something about Gwen’s uncle being in the oil business. Gwen’s face changed expression so rapidly that the other two could not figure out the rest of the conversation. Gwen hung up.
“Aunt Kathy is a love. She says she wants young company in that big house, and whichever two of us—”
A scrambling at the door interrupted them. The door suddenly swung open and Vivian, Mai Lee, and Betty Lane all but fell in. “I told you someone would forget to lock it again!” Vivian insisted, picking up her hat from the floor. Cherry had to smile at the sight of them. Mai Lee was tiny, like an ivory figurine; Vivian was a pretty girl of middle height; while Betty Lane rose to six feet, managing to look stately and dignified—which she wasn’t.
“Good morning, welcome home, and good evening, Cherry,” said Mai Lee and composedly sat down.
Betty Lane inquired if everybody’s Thanksgiving had been as happy as hers.
“Terrific, except that’s ancient history by now.” Gwen moved over and made room on the sofa. The young women commenced to chatter.
“Has anyone seen Ann Evans this week? Are she and her husband back from Boston yet?”
“Who’s the stunning young man who drives you home from work, Betty? You never told us you have a beau.”
“Whoever took my thermometer by mistake,” Vivian said plaintively, “please give it back by tomorrow. Somebody here has two.”
Gwen raised her voice to announce that her aunt had room for an extra, unspecified Spencer Clubber and in the interests of democratic procedure she, Gwen, was giving one and all present a chance to accept. No one heard her, except Cherry.
“Shall I make my announcement all over again?”
“No, please don’t—because I’d like to live out on Long Island with you,” Cherry said. “I love being cramped in No. 9, but—”
“I was hoping for that.” Gwen’s crinkled-up eyes seemed to dance. “Commuting, I warn you. Though you’re welcome to use my car out there. Now, how soon can you get a day off to move out there?”
“I’ll find out. What day is good for you?”
Gwen and Cherry compared dates. Bertha and Betty argued about the merits of a new prosthetic device, while Mai Lee and Vivian shared the telephone in a visit with Ann.
“The Spencer Club,” said Cherry to Gwen, “won’t realize two of its tenants are going until we’ve actually gone. Try again to tell them, why don’t you? And you know—I’m just delighted.”
After a good rest on Sunday, Cherry reported for work bright and early Monday morning. Her eager young assistant was in first again. “I suspect you sleep here.” Cherry smiled at Gladys Green, who had already dusted and straightened up the medical department.
It was a good thing Gladys had made everything ready, because on Monday mornings, as a rule, people seemed to be accident and ailment prone—and this Monday was no exception. A regular procession of sneezes, splinters, bad scratches, upset stomachs, and headaches went on all morning. Even Tom Reese’s secretary, the calm-as-a-lake Miss Josephson, came in for an aspirin. Cherry was more out of breath than alarmed. At half past twelve the medical department quieted down and Cherry tried to catch up on her paper work. She sent Gladys out for lunch hour, asking her to bring back a sandwich and milk. Gladys offered to remain.
“You stayed in while I was in Hilton, so now it’s my turn,” Cherry said.
Later it seemed to Cherry as if some sixth sense had warned her that she would be needed.
She was busy making out reports when she happened to turn and look out into the wide corridor. Mrs. Julian, supported by the small elderly woman who worked with her in the antiques department, was walking slowly, uncertainly toward the medical department.
Cherry hurried out and helped Mrs. Julian to a cot. She w
as crying a little and seemed dazed. She kept saying in a low, hysterical voice:
“But I don’t know, I simply don’t know! Please believe me, of course I didn’t! Please—please—”
“What happened?” Cherry whispered to the elderly woman.
“She started to faint, right there on the sales floor, then she started babbling—”
“I see. Lie down, Mrs. Julian, please try to relax. Don’t talk.” Cherry helped her to a supine position and drew a light blanket over her. The woman was tense and trembling. Cherry chafed her wrists and removed her shoes.
“Why did she faint? Has she been ill, Mrs.—”
“I’m Miss Lamb, Janet Lamb. No, she hasn’t been ill that I know of. Mrs. Julian has had a distressing morning. Such a shock and ordeal for her—”
“Bad news? Family troubles?” Cherry checked the woman’s pulse and breathing; this was not a heart attack, thank heavens.
“No, Nurse, not family. I don’t think she has any family left. A bad experience here in the store. Will she be all right?”
Cherry hesitated. “Well, we’ll let her rest for fifteen minutes, and then if she isn’t quieter, I’ll call a doctor.”
Poor Miss Lamb looked pale and upset herself. Cherry advised her not to worry.
“If there’s anything more you can do, I’ll call you, Miss Lamb.”
“Thank you. I—It’s so unlike Mrs. Julian to lose her self-control. She’s such a reserved young woman. Well, then, I’ll go back and tell Mr. Dance and Adam Heller that she probably will he quite all right soon.”
Cherry watched her patient carefully for the next five minutes. She did not believe the reassuring fib she had told Miss Lamb. The patient was young, but she was a person of frail constitution and high-strung nerves, judging by the slight frame under the blanket and the finely drawn face. A person of this sort could be made gravely ill by shock.
“Please—please—I don’t know,” the woman repeated. “I can’t imagine where it went to—”
