Lo, Michael! Part 42

Starr, frightened, struggling, sobbing, turned and looked at him.

"Michael! How did you come to be here? Oh, what is the matter with my father?"

"Go wash your hands and face quickly with this antiseptic soap," he commanded, all on the alert now, and dealing out the things the doctor had given him for his own safety, "and here! rinse your mouth with this quickly, and gargle your throat! Then go and change your things as quick as you can. Your father has the smallpox and you have been in there close to him."

"The smallpox!"

"Hurry!" commanded Michael, handing her the soap and turning on the hot water.

Starr obeyed him because when Michael spoke in that tone people always did obey, but her frightened eyes kept seeking his face for some rea.s.surance.

"The smallpox! Oh, Michael! How dreadful! But how do you know? Has the doctor been here? And how did you happen to be here?"

"I was pa.s.sing last night when your father came home and he asked me to help him in. Yes, the doctor was here, and will soon come again and bring a nurse. Now hurry! You must get away from the vicinity of this room!"

"But I'm not going away!" said Starr stubbornly. "I'm going to stay by my father. He'll want me."

"Your father would be distressed beyond measure if he knew that you were exposed to such terrible danger. I know that he would far rather have you go away at once. Besides, he is delirious, and your presence cannot do him any good now. You must take care of yourself, so that when he gets well you will be well too, and able to help him get back into health again."

"But you are staying."

"It does not matter about me," said Michael, "there is no one to care.

Besides, I am a man, and perfectly strong. I do not think I will take the disease. Now please take off those things you wore in there and get something clean that has not been in the room and go away from here as quickly as you can."

Michael had barely persuaded her to take precautions when the doctor arrived with a nurse and the promise of another before night.

He scolded Starr thoroughly for her foolhardiness in going into her father's room. He had been the family physician ever since she was born, knew her well; and took the privilege of scolding when he liked. Starr meekly succ.u.mbed. There was just one thing she would not do, and that was to go away out of the house while her father remained in so critical a condition. The doctor frowned and scolded, but finally agreed to let her stay. And indeed it seemed as if perhaps it was the only thing that could be done; for she had undoubtedly been exposed to the disease, and was subject to quarantine. There seemed to be no place to which she could safely go, where she could be comfortable, and the house was amply large enough for two or three parties to remain in quarantine in several detachments.

There was another question to be considered. The nurses would have their hands full with their patient. Some one must stay in the house and look after things, see that they needed nothing, and get some kind of meals.

Starr, of course, knew absolutely nothing about cooking, and Michael's experience was limited to roasting sweet potatoes around a bonfire at college, and cooking eggs and coffee at the fireplace on the farm. But a good cook to stay in a plague-stricken dwelling would be a thing of time, if procurable at all; so the doctor decided to accept the willing services of these two. Starr was established in her own room upstairs, which could be shut away from the front part of the house by a short pa.s.sage-way and two doors, with access to the lower floor by means of the back stairs; and Michael made a bed of the soft couch in the tiny reception room where he had twice pa.s.sed through trying experiences. Great curtains kept constantly wet with antiseptics shut away the sick room and adjoining apartments from the rest of the house.

It was arranged that Michael should place such supplies as were needed at the head of the stairs, just outside the guarding curtains, and the nurses should pa.s.s all dishes through an antiseptic bath before sending them downstairs again. The electric bells and telephones with which the house was well supplied made it possible for them to communicate with one another without danger of infection.

Starr was at once vaccinated and the two young people received many precautions, and injunctions, with medicine and a strict regime; and even then the old doctor shook his head dubiously. If those two beautiful faces should have to pa.s.s through the ordeal of that dread disease his old heart would be quite broken. All that skill and science could do to prevent it should be done.

So the house settled down to the quiet of a daily routine; the busy city humming and thundering outside, but no more a part of them than if they had been living in a tomb. The card of warning on the door sent all the neighbors in the block scurrying off in a panic to Palm Beach or Europe; and even the strangers pa.s.sed by on the other side. The grocery boy and the milkman left their orders hurriedly on the front steps and Michael and Starr might almost have used the street for an exercise ground if they had chosen, so deserted had it become.

But there was no need for them to go farther than the door in front, for there was a lovely side and back yard, screened from the street by a high wall, where they might walk at will when they were not too busy with their work; which for their unskilled hands was hard and laborious. Nevertheless, their orders were strict, and every day they were out for a couple of hours at least. To keep from getting chilled, Michael invented all sorts of games when they grew tired of just walking; and twice after a new fall of snow they went out and had a game of s...o...b..lling, coming in with glowing faces and shining eyes, to change wet garments and hurry back to their kitchen work. But this was after the first few serious days were pa.s.sed, and the doctor had given them hope that if all went well there was a good chance of the patient pulling through.

They settled into their new life like two children who had known each other a long time. All the years between were as if they had not been. They made their blunders; were merry over their work; and grew into each other's companionship charmingly. Their ideas of cooking were most primitive and had it not been possible to order things sent in from caterers they and the nurses might have been in danger of starving to death. But as it was, what with telephoning to the nurses for directions, and what with studying the recipes on the outside of boxes of cornstarch and farina and oatmeal and the like that they found in the pantry, they were learning day by day to do a little more.

And then, one blessed day, the dear nurse Morton walked in and took off her things and stayed. Morton had been on a long-delayed visit to her old father in Scotland that winter; but when she saw in the papers the notice of the calamity that had befallen the house of her old employer, she packed her trunk and took the first steamer back to America. Her baby, and her baby's father needed her, and nothing could keep Morton away after that.

Her coming relieved the situation very materially, for though she had never been a fancy cook, she knew all about good old-fashioned Scotch dishes, and from the first hour took up her station in the kitchen. Immediately comfort and orderliness began to reign, and Starr and Michael had time on their hands that was not spent in either eating, sleeping, working or exercise.

It was then that they began to read together, for the library was filled with all the treasures of literature, to many of which Michael had never had access save through the public libraries, which of course was not as satisfactory as having books at hand when one had a bit of leisure in a busy life. Starr had been reading more than ever before this winter while with her aunt, and entered into the pleasant companionship of a book together with zest.

Then there were hours when Starr played softly, and sang, for the piano was far from the sick room and could not be heard upstairs. Indeed, if it had not been for the anxious struggle going on upstairs, these two would have been having a beautiful time.

For all unknowing to themselves they were growing daily into a dear delight in the mere presence of one another. Even Michael, who had long ago laid down the lines between which he must walk through life, and never expected to be more to Starr than a friend and protector, did not realize whither this intimate companionship was tending. When he thought of it at all he thought that it was a precious solace for his years of loneliness; a time that must be enjoyed to the full, and treasured in memory for the days of barrenness that must surely follow.

Upstairs the fight went on day after day, until at last one morning the doctor told them that it had been won, that the patient, though very much enfeebled, would live and slowly get back his strength.

That was a happy morning. The two caught each, other's hands and whirled joyously round the dining-room when they heard it; and Morton came in with her sleeves rolled up, and her eyes like two blue lakes all blurred with raindrops in the sunlight. Her face seemed like a rainbow.

The next morning the doctor looked the two over before he went upstairs and set a limit to their quarantine. If they kept on doing well they would be reasonably safe from taking the disease. It would be a miracle, almost, if neither of them took it; but it began to look as if they were going to be all right.

Now these two had been so absorbed in one another that they had thought very little about the danger of their taking the disease themselves. If either had been alone in the house with nothing to do but brood it would have probably been the sole topic of thought, but their healthy busy hours had helped the good work on, and so they were coming safely out from under the danger.

It was one bright morning when they were waiting for the doctor to come that Michael was glancing over the morning paper, and Starr trying a new song she had sent for that had just come in the mail the evening before.

She wanted to be able to play it for Michael to sing.

Suddenly Michael gave a little exclamation of dismay, and Starr, turning on the piano stool, saw that his face was white and he was staring out of the window with a drawn, sad look about his mouth and eyes.

"What is it?" she asked in quick, eager tones of sympathy, and Michael turning to look at her vivid beauty, his heart thrilling with the sound of her voice, suddenly felt the wide gulf that had always been between them, for what he had read in the paper had shaken him from his happy dream and brought him back to a sudden realization of what he was.

The item in the paper that had brought about this rude awakening was an account of how Buck had broken jail and escaped. Michael's great heart was filled with trouble about Buck; and instantly he remembered that he belonged to the same cla.s.s with Buck; and not at all in the charmed circle where Starr moved.

He looked at the girl with grave, tender eyes, that yet seemed to be less intimate than they had been all these weeks. Her sensitive nature felt the difference at once.

He let her read the little item.

Starr's face softened with ready sympathy, and a mingling of indignation.

"He was one of those people in your tenements you have been trying to help?" she questioned, trying to understand his look. "He ought to have been ashamed to get into jail after you had been helping him. Wasn't he a sort of a worthless fellow?"

"No," said Michael in quick defense, "he never had a chance. And he was not just one of those people, he was _the_ one. He was the boy who took care of me when I was a little fellow, and who shared everything he had, hard crust or warm cellar door, with me. I think he loved me--"

There was something in Michael's face and voice that warned Starr these were sacred precincts, where she must tread lightly if she did not wish to desecrate.

"Tell me about him," she breathed softly.

So Michael, his eyes tender, his voice gentle, because she had cared to know, told her eloquently of Buck, till when he had finished her eyes were wet with tears; and she looked so sweet that he had to turn his own eyes away to keep from taking the lovely vision into his arms and kissing her.

It was a strange wild impulse he had to do this, and it frightened him.

Suppose some day he should forget himself, and let her see how he had dared to love her? That must never be. He must put a watch upon himself. This sweet friendship she had vouchsafed him must never be broken by word, look or action of his.

And from that morning there came upon his manner a change, subtle, intangible,--but a change.

They read and talked together, and Michael opened his heart to her as he had not yet done, about his work in the alley, his farm colony, and his hopes for his people; Starr listened and entered eagerly into his plans, yet felt the change that had come upon him, and her troubled spirit knew not what it was.

CHAPTER XXVII

All this while Michael had been in daily communication with Sam, as well as with Will French, who with Hester's help had kept the rooms in the alley going, though they reported that the head had been sorely missed.

Sam had reported daily progress with the house and about two weeks before Michael's release from quarantine announced that everything was done, even to the papering of the walls and oiling of the floors.