She opened the gate then, and walked boldly into the yard, and was going across to the man when he shouted to her again—
“Go right in, will you, please, miss? The door is unfastened right enough, only I had to shut it to keep the pigs out. Poor aunt is desperate bad to-day, worse than she has been all along, and she’ll just be downright glad to see you,” he called out. Then he had to give instant attention to Spider, as the creature was endeavouring to walk on its two hind legs, to the discomfort of the steady old animal to which it was yoked.
Nell’s heart gave a great bound of relief. If some one were ill in the house, they would be sure to let her stay and help, at least until daylight came again. So, with a nod to the man, she turned away, and walked up to the door of the house.
This opened straight into the family living-room, which was in a state of confusion such as Nell had never seen equalled. Dirty crockery was strewn on tables, chairs, and floor. Eatables of various sorts were also lying about in the same disorder. One pair of boots and a hat stood on the dresser, close to an untrimmed lamp and a basin half full of milk, while a loaf of bread, with a knife sticking in it, lay on a coat which had been flung down on a bench near the door.
“Oh, what a fearful muddle!” she murmured under her breath. And weary though she was she would have laughed at the scene before her, only she remembered there was a sick woman somewhere, and she had to find her quickly.
Three doors led out of this room, but instinct guiding her she opened the right one first, and walked into a stuffy chamber, the closeness of which seemed almost to choke her, coming as she did from the sweet fresh air of the forest.
A woman with a flushed face and tumbled grey hair lay on the bed, moaning and muttering. She took no notice when Nell bent over and spoke to her, but only moaned and muttered as before.
“She is delirious, that is what she is,” murmured Nell, pronouncing the long word with the careful satisfaction which she always seemed to derive from anything which came out of her much-studied dictionary. “Well, the other room must wait, and I’ll see to her first.”
Years before, when she was a little girl of eleven, she had helped to take care of her sick and dying father, so she was not so much at a loss, as some girls might have been, if thrust suddenly into a sick-room.
“COME RIGHT IN, WILL YOU, PLEASE, MISS?”
Her first move was to the window, which she opened as wide as it would go. Then she straightened the tumbled bedclothes, slipped a cool pillow under the sick woman’s head, and gently sponged the hot face.
In this room, as in the other, plates, cups, basins, and jugs were scattered about in confusion, most of them containing food in some shape or form.
Nell gathered them up as best she could, carrying them to the outer room, to be washed when she had leisure.
Finding a bucket of clean water standing in the little pantry, which opened from the general living-room, she carried a cup of it for the sick woman to drink.
“Ah, how good it is!” murmured the poor thing, opening her eyes and looking at Nell. But there was no surprise in her glance—it was just as if she had expected to see a girl in an old-fashioned blue frock waiting upon her, and with a grateful “Thank you, my dear,” she lay back on the cool pillow and closed her eyes again, only now she did not mutter or moan so much as before.
Having done what was most necessary in the sick-room, Nell stepped out to the other room, and attacked the confusion there. Having lighted the fire, which had gone out from lack of tending, she put a kettle of water on to boil, and then set to work to get the crockery ready for washing.
Absorbed in her work, she forgot how tired she was, and she was stepping briskly to and fro, when the outer door opened, and the man who had shouted to her entered with the dog at his heels.
He stopped short however then, and stared about him in genuine amazement, not at Nell, but at the wonders her hands had wrought in the matters of tidiness.
“My word, how you’ve slicked the place up, and you haven’t been long about it, neither!” he said, in a tone of deep admiration.
He had a stupid, good-natured expression, with a round rosy face like a schoolboy’s; but what puzzled Nell so much was that he talked as if he had been expecting her all day.
“I was beginning to think you weren’t coming to-night, and I’d the feeling that if poor aunt didn’t soon have a woman to tend her, she’d not stand much chance of pulling through. How do you think she is now?” he asked anxiously.
“She seems very ill, but she lay quieter after I had made her bed and put her comfortable. Perhaps she will seem better in the morning. How long has she been sick?” Nell asked.
“It’s a matter of a fortnight now since she was first took poorly, but she has only kept her bed a week, and the doctor he’s been twice. It is a desperate way, twelve miles for him to drive out and the same back. Did you walk all the way?”
“Yes,” murmured Nell, faintly, as, with a flash, it dawned upon her that the reason of her welcome was because she had been mistaken for some one else, some one who had not come, and probably would not on this night at least, for it was beginning to get quite dark.
But she could not tell this chubby-faced farmer about herself, not to-night at least, and since the need of a woman to help was so urgent, she was surely doing no harm in availing herself of the shelter of his house, if she did her duty by the sick woman.
“Well, if you’ve walked all that twelve miles, you certainly ain’t fit to be sitting up with poor aunt to-night,” he remarked, with a disappointed air.
“Oh yes I am, and to-morrow night too, if there is a need for it. But perhaps your aunt will be better in the morning. What did the doctor say she was to have to eat?” Nell asked.
She was still moving about the kitchen, putting things in order, yet going more slowly now because the work was almost done. The countryman, however, had dropped on to a bench near the stove, and looked quite worn out.
“Oh, gruel and milk, and messes like that. Poor aunt, she always did hate spoon victuals; so, when I came in to my dinner to-day and found she couldn’t eat the gruel I’d left for her at breakfast, I just fried her an egg and a bit of bacon, and tried to get her to eat that.”
“But that wasn’t right. Why, it might have killed her!” exclaimed Nell, in a horrified tone.
“Well, it didn’t, anyhow, for she couldn’t touch it, so I ate it myself. Have you had any supper?” he asked, with a wide yawn.
“No; I really haven’t had time to think about it yet. But you will be wanting yours, I should think; the kettle is almost boiling. Shall I make you some coffee, or would you rather have tea?” said Nell, who, despite her weariness, was rather enjoying the situation, because there was lavish abundance of everything to eat and to use in this little border farmhouse, compared with the pinching poverty of the Lone House on Blue Bird Ridge.
“I don’t care. I’ll have just which is easiest to make, or what you like the best; and there are bits of food littering round on plates that will do for my supper. I’ve mostly cleared up what poor aunt couldn’t eat, since she was took sick.”
“I put the bits all together on a dish, and set it in the pantry. I’ll bring it out for you, and make some coffee, then you can get your supper while I look after your aunt; and I expect you will be glad