Tomasos Fortune and Other Stories | Page 4

Gun busted, sir."
"Take him to my quarters," I said, wiping my instruments on my sleeve.
In a few minutes I followed, and on entering my little room the first thing I saw was a pair of yellow boots.
There was no doubt about the boots and the white duck trousers, and although I could not see the face, I knew that this was Sammy Fitz- Warrener come back again.
A woman--one of the nurses for whom he had pleaded--was bending over the bed with a sponge and a basin of tepid water. As I entered she turned upon me a pair of calmly horror-stricken eyes.
"OH!" she whispered meaningly, stepping back to let me approach. I had no time to notice then that she was one of those largely built women, with perfect skin and fair hair, who make one think of what England must have been before Gallic blood got to be so widely disseminated in the race.
"Please pull down that mat from the window," I said, indicating a temporary blind which I had put up.
She did so promptly, and returned to the bedside, falling into position as it were, awaiting my orders.
I bent over the bed, and I must confess that what I saw there gave me a thrill of horror which will come again at times so long as I live.
I made a sign to Sister to continue her task of sponging away the mud, of which one ingredient was sand.
"Both eyes," she whispered, "are destroyed."
"Not the top of the skull," I said; "you must not touch that."
For we both knew that our task was without hope.
As I have said, I knew something of Fitz-Warrener's people, and I could not help lingering there, where I could do no good, when I knew that I was wanted elsewhere.
Suddenly his lips moved, and Sister, kneeling down on the floor, bent over him.
I could not hear what he said, but I think she did. I saw her lips frame the whisper "Yes" in reply, and over her face there swept suddenly a look of great tenderness.
After a little pause she rose and came to me.
"Who is he?" she asked.
"Fitz-Warrener of the Naval Brigade. Do you know him?"
"No, I never heard of him. Of course--it is quite hopeless?"
"Quite."
She returned to her position by the bedside, with one arm laid across his chest.
Presently he began whispering again, and at intervals she answered him. It suddenly occurred to me that, in his unconsciousness, he was mistaking her for some one else, and that she, for some woman's reason, was deceiving him purposely.
In a few moments I was sure of this.
I tried not to look; but I saw it all. I saw his poor blind hands wander over her throat and face, up to her hair.
"What is this?" he muttered quite distinctly, with that tone of self-absorption which characterizes the sayings of an unconscious man. "What is this silly cap?"
His fingers wandered on over the snowy linen until they came to the strings.
As an aspirant to the title of gentleman, I felt like running away-- many doctors know this feeling; as a doctor, I could only stay.
His fingers fumbled with the strings. Still Sister bent over the bed. Perhaps she bent an inch or two nearer. One hand was beneath his neck, supporting the poor shattered head.
He slowly drew off the cap, and his fingers crept lovingly over the soft fair hair.
"Marny," he said, quite clearly, "you've done your hair up, and you're nothing but a little girl, you know--nothing but a little girl."
I could not help watching his fingers, and yet I felt like a man committing sacrilege.
"When I left you," said the brainless voice, "you wore it down your back. You were a little girl--you are a little girl now." And he slowly drew a hairpin out.
One long lock fell curling to her shoulder. She never looked up, never noticed me, but knelt there like a ministering angel-- personating for a time a girl whom we had never seen.
"My little girl," he added, with a low laugh, and drew out another hairpin.
In a few moments all her hair was about her shoulders. I had never thought that she might be carrying such glory quietly hidden beneath the simple nurse's cap.
"That is better," he said--"that is better." And he let all the hairpins fall on the coverlet. "Now you are my own Marny," he murmured. "Are you not?"
She hesitated one moment. "Yes, dear," she said softly. "I am your own Marny."
With her disengaged hand she stroked his blanching cheek. There was a certain science about her touch, as if she had once known something of these matters.
Lovingly and slowly the smoke-grimed fingers passed over the wonderful hair, smoothing it.
Then he grew more daring. He touched her eyes, her gentle cheeks, the quiet, strong lips. He slipped to