"DISTRICT NURSE"

Wairarapa Times-Age, 24 January 1939, Page 10

"DISTRICT NURSE"

PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT.

COPYRIGHT.

BY

FAITH BALDWIN.

CHAPTER XX.—(Continued). Carolyn, her brow wrinkled over her reports, glanced up from her desk. ‘Neither,” she replied briefly. If I had been born with a caul or something I would probably wouldn't have to struggle through my State Boards in order to become a ministering angel.” But an unimportant memory teased at Ellen’s mind. “Just the same, last spring when the talk was all Eugenie, you predicted Florentine tarns or something. Here they are . . Borgia bonnets for lady prisoners. How come you’re so far in advance of the styles?” “You may notice I never take advantage of my knowledge,” Carolyn said, laughing. The truth is, I’ve two sisters. One’s stylist; and one’s a buyer. Gowns; millinery. They have their ears to the ground. Emily —that’s the stylist —says by spring we’ll be going back to padded shoulders and tailored suits. Not that that means anything to me.” Ellen returned to her own work smiling and reflective. She worked with Carolyn every day, yet although she had known vaguely that she had several sisters and brothers, she knew nothing whatever about them. How little she knew about any of her associates although she saw them, now and then, outside of work. Funny to be with people day after day, and not to know, she thought. It was the people who were in a sense complete strangers to you from whom you learned the most intimate and secret details of their curious lives, she reflected.

The telephone rang presently. It was for her. She rose to answer as Miss Renwick nodded to her. A girl’s voice came faintly over the wire. “It’s Gladys—Gladys Markey. Could you come see me?” asked Gladys, “I gotter talk to some one. Quick.” CHAPTER XXL Ellen looked over at Miss Renwick, the grey hair brushed back smoothly, the sagacious unastonished eyes behind the horn-rimmed glasses, the capable clever hands. Glady’s hadn’t asked for her advice professionally. Or had she? In any case there might be something they could do. She went over and sat down beside Miss Renwick’s desk and spoke to her, briefly, frankly. Miss Renwick nodded. They’d get together on it, she said, if the girl was willing to put her case in their hands. Meantime Ellen had a free hand to do what she could.

Ellen managed to see Gladys during the morning. Ellen found herself going dispiritedly up the stairs wondering if before Gladys were willing to follow up her impulse toward confidence the mother would interfere. She knocked and Gladys’s voice said, “come in.” She was alone, huddled near the window in a chair. The mother was not in evidence. She saw Ellen’s quick glance around and tried to smile . . “She’s not home, she went out, she won’t be back till night,” Gladys reassured her. She looked wretched. Ellen sat down, beside her, and asked her a few entirely practical questions. “What are you going to do, Gladys?” she said. “I want to get away somewhere, anywhere, until —until it’s all over,” Gladys told her hysterically. “I tell you I can’t stand it any more. Mother nags at me all day. I’ve gotta get away “It can be arranged, I think,” Ellen said quietly. “There is a very good place. But you will have to stay six months afterwards, and work out your time. Those who can’t pay have to work. The child will then be sent out for proper adoption, if you wish.” Gladys made a gesture of despair. “What else can I do?” she muttered. “I need money,” Gladys went on wildly.” “If I had money I wouldn’t have to stay in that place. I gotta have money. But . . .” She looked down at her hands. “I haven’t worked since last summer,” she said. “Someone'said something ... I was fired.” “Have you seen the man again?” Ellen asked her. Gladys shook her head, and her disordered hair masked for a moment her expression; then she pushed it back from her forehead with both hands. “I telephoned," she admitted after a while. “I used to sneak out and walk and walk until I got somewhere where people wouldn’t be likely to know me and gb into a booth.” She stopped a moment and Ellen could see her, standing in a booth, sweat running down her forehead, her hands wet with it. "I called his office. There was always a girl answered on a switchboard. I’d ask to speak to him. What name shall I say?’ or ‘Who is calling?’ she’d ask me. I wouldn’t tell. Tie’ll know, all right, let me speak to him,’ T came back at her. And twice I got some one else after that. A secretary, I suppose. The second time I told her straight, ‘Tell him it’s Gladys—Gladys Markey,’ I said, ‘and he’ll talk. He’s gotta.’ But he didn’t. He was there, though. I heard her say to him . . ‘lt's some one called Gladys Markey; she says you know her.’ And she comes back to the phone, ‘Mr Bartlett says he does not know you. Can you give me the message?' ” The blood rushed to Ellen's face, receded. She felt faint. She thought, silly, as if there weren’t a hundred — She asked, pulling herself together. “Where did you meet him, Gladys?" “In the cafeteria near where I worked. He come in one day and sat at my table. We got talking. Pass the salt, or something. You know how it is .. .” She laughed without mirth. “He said he hadn’t never been there before. He said he was glad he come." She was slipping back into her mother’s way of talking as she leaned for-

I ward, more animated, as it helped her to tell, as if in a way she were proud of telling. “He was a wiseacre," said Gladys, reminiscently. “He kept me laughing: he certainly could clown." She paused, remembering, and then went on, "I kidded him back, see? He said, ‘You eat here often?’ and I said, ‘Sure, big boy, every day except when my car calls to take me to the Ritz.’ And he laughed and said, ‘You’re a wise-cracker, aren’t you?” And then he said —I was getting ready to go—l’ll be seeing you.” “And then?” Ellen prompted. “He came back, not the next day, but the next. He told me then who he was.” Ellen made a little gesture and then sat back, waiting. But Gladys went in, “Then he started meeting me for lunch. Other places. You know, funny places downtown, where there’s sand on the floor, and little booths, like. He said, ‘We can be quiet here.’ Then he got me to go out to dinner “He never came to your house?” “Who—him? Not likely,” said Gladys in sincere astonishment, “he —he’s a big man. He’s a lawyer . i .” Ellen said faintly, “what was his name Gladys said after a minute, “I said I'd never tell. But I sort of gave myself away a while back, didn’t I?” She added, after a moment, matter-of-fact-ly, “Bartlett, Frank Bartlett.” Ellen thought, “It isn’t possible. I’m not sitting here, in this room, listening ... It was a nightmare, it was madness. She looked at Gladys, dimly trying to see, trying to understand that the ravaged features were not what he had seen; trying to remember that Gladys had been pretty and pert; a wisecracker .. . She thought she cried out —No —No. But she hadn’t moved or spoken. “Gee, you look funny,” Gladys said curiously. “Do you know him?” Ellen said slowly, “Perhaps. Are you sure? Sure of the name and—" £he .couldn’t go on. Gladys said impatiently, “Of course, I’m sure. You can look him up in the book. I seen his card once. The name, the address ...” “Have you written him?” Ellen asked. She thought, “I’ve got to get away from here, got to go somewhere and think, I must ” “No,” said Gladys, “that secretarydo you think I want every one knowing my business? I been down a couple of times, hanging around there, waiting. But I never seen him. Ellen said, perfectly aware that she was not asking merely professional questions, aware that she had to ask, had to drag out of this girl every last litle detail, had to know, had to kill herself knowing. “He —said he was in love with you? . . Promised to marry you?” “Who —him?” Gladys was amazed again. “No ... I mean, he said he loved me . . and that some day . .” She went on while Ellen’s throat grew more and more constricted with the tension she put on herself, the suicidal restraint. “He was married, see? I mean, not living with his wife, or anything. They didn’t get along. He hated her, he said. They were separated . . . She wouldn’t divorce him.” Not Frank, it couldn’t be Frank. And yet . . what proof had she that Frank wasn’t married —separated from his wife? Or, had he lied to Gladys? Or was it to he he had lied?

“Look here,” said Gladys desperately, “I don’t want to get him in no trouble, see? I went into it with my eyes open. I wasn’t born yesterday. I —if he’d help me, if he’d give me the money to get away, that’s all I ask, all I want. But I’m afraid of Ma. She knows something, or pretends she does. I haven’t no letters, or anything. But —l’m afraid she’s got some way of finding out. If she does, she’ll go to him—or to the cops—or something. Blackmail,’ said Gladys darkly. “I know her game. All she thinks of is the money.” “And he’s a gentleman,” Gladys added. Ellen rose and touched the girl’s shoulder. She loathed doing it, she forced herself, her hand was leaden. She said, after a moment, “I’ll do what I can. I’ll go with you to him if that seems necessary. Give me a little time to think this over. Then I’ll let you knew and we'll see. What time does your mother get in from work?” Gladys told her. Ellen said, “I’ll get in touch with you, Gladys, and we’ll do what we can.”

The girl stammered, there were tears in her eyes. She had been strong enough to bear what she had had to bear all these months. But now she was weak, frightened. Ellen had strength. Ellen would, somehow, see her through. Ellen went out and down the stairs. She found herself fighting for breath clinging to the dirty railing, unheeding. She thought, “I’ve got to go through with it." She thought, “It can’t be true, it isn’t." It couldn't be, the name alone would prove nothing, or even the profession. There must be other men by the same name —but the address? “It wasn’t, it couldn't be. But what, after all, did she know of him? Her mother had been right Jim had been right, every one had been right, but herself. Still, she thought, her brain, bruised, it didn’t all fit in . . not with Bill. even. But why not? Why couldn't he play up to Bill, to her . . . if he saw fit? Why couldn't he even like Bill, want to help him? Men who murdered, raised gardens, and men who robbed women were kind to animals .. . She laughed hysterically and people passing looked at her curiously After a long time, during which her work managed to get itself done, she made up her mind. She went into a

telephone booth and called Bartlett's office. The booth was close, stifling. She stood there waiting, listening to the faint ringing along the wires, waiting and thinking. (To be Continued.)