Gloria and Treeless Street | Page 8

by a circle of blue hills! So many things can happen to a person in a matter even of days--when the person is a busy District Nurse, with a city to take care of.
Gloria, back in her favorite piazza-chair, surveyed the world with rested vision. Very soon she would take up her adopted worries about barren streets and rickety houses, but for the moment she would rock and smooth Abou Ben Adhem's beautiful back.
"You've been lonesome, Old Handsome--needn't tell me! I don't believe you purred a note while I was gone. And I never missed you, sir!" She pulled the low, far-set ears gently. "There was a lovely cat at the hotel," she added with deliberate malice. "He purred grand operas." But in her lap the great cat sat unjealously. Gloria's gaze wandered across the street. She wished she knew which was the District Nurse's window. "I'd wave you at it, Abou Ben, just to show her I've got home --but there, she may be district-visiting, and you'd be wasted. We'll watch for her."
[Illustration: "I'd wave you at it, Abou-Ben."]
At that very moment the District Nurse was in Rose's room helping to cut out a tiny calico dress. Rose herself was running little sleeves together in a motherly way.
"Tell me some more," she pleaded. "Is she pretty? Does she do up her hair? What kind of eyes has she?"
"One at a time! You take my breath away," laughed Miss Winship over her calico breadths. "Yes, she is pretty--I think you will say so. Her hair? I'm sure I don't know what kind of hair she has. Now you may begin again, my dear."
But Rose's eyes were wistfully musing. They were beautiful eyes, but the rest of Rose, oh, how pinched and meager!
"I kind of thought," Rose said, "I didn't know but--there now, the idea! Of course I don't want her to be like me!" Rose's voice quivered. "I'd be ashamed of myself to want her to be like me. I was only thinking, that's all. It isn't bad to think, is it? And anyway, we're both Rosies, you say. But they call her Gloria. But she has Rose for one name. I've got that to be glad of!"
Snip--snip--the scissors cut steadily through the crisp cotton goods. "Yes, indeed, you've got that!" the District Nurse said with loving tenderness. She did not look up from her work; at that minute she did not want to see the small, stunted figure sewing tiny sleeves for Dinney's baby.

CHAPTER V.
It was a beautiful morning, and Gloria and the cat were occupying the broad piazza. At last Abou Ben Adhem slid with a soft thud to the piazza floor. It was his signal that no more petting was desired for the time. Gloria, too, got out of the big rocker and went into the house.
"Aunt Em, would you want to be a District Nurse and never get home? I've watched till I'm 'blind of seeing.'"
"It can't be a very desirable position, dear--you won't ever be one, will you?"
"I'm going to 'be one' to-morrow!" Gloria laughed. "Have to get used to it, auntie. You can't change my mind--it's set. The next to-morrow that ever is, I am going to begin!"
"Dear! dear!" sighed Aunt Em. She felt anxious again. Here was the child back just where she had left off. What good, then, all the traveling about and the getting tired and hot? A wave of fresh weariness and travelstrain seemed to sweep over the dear little woman. Close upon it like a cool breeze came the recollection that in October Gloria would go back to school. Then, at any rate, this undue, unwelcome fascination for grimy streets would terminate. It was mid-August now.
The next morning Mrs. McAndrew opened the door to Gloria's room. The girl lay smiling among the pillows.
"If you are to be a District Nurse, dear, it might be well for you to get up to breakfast."
"Well, I'm prepared to go to even that length! You'll hear a bird, auntie, and simultaneously you'll hear me getting up!"
Gloria was as good as her word. Mrs. McAndrew met her with a smile. Gloria's face was good to see; it was grave with purpose, but the light of youth and happiness softly irradiated the gravity. But the studied simplicity of the girl's costume that morning rather surprised Mrs. McAndrew as her eyes fell upon it.
Gloria laughed. "Aunt Em, you're unprepared for the grown-up appearance of the new District Nurse," she said. The neat coils of brown hair were quite disquieting to Aunt Em. She was not ready for Gloria to be a woman; her gentle heart misgave her.
"Dear child, let your hair down again--let it down!" she pleaded.
"Auntie! As if--after I've been to all this work and used twenty-three hairpins! I thought you'd approve of me. I