A TWILIGHT STORY FOR GIRLS.
OUTSIDE it was raining heavily. Inside—well, inside the weather was threatening, to say the least. One of the nurses, going to the linen-room with an armful of fresh towels, shook her head sympathetically at another who was just going into the ward. “I pity ourselves to-day,” she said. “I know—it will be hard to keep the children bright,” the other answered. A nurse was taking temperatures and marking the charts which hung at the head of each white bed. She stopped a moment, and looked down at one specially listless face pressed soberly against the pillow. “Don’t you want some of the scrap-books to look over, Jennie?” she asked. Jennie’s weak voice was utterly disinterested. “No,” she answered. The nurse’s voice kept its brightness in spite of her discouragement. “Then don’t you want me to bring you one of the puzzles? You could play with it nicely, there.” “No, I don’t want any,” Jennie answered wearily. A hand pulled at the nurse’s skirt and she turned quickly. The thin, pain-sharpened face of the girl in the next bed smiled up at her cheerfully. “Don’t bother about Jennie; I guess I can make her do something,” she said in a low voice. The nurse bent over her with a swift, caressing touch. “Thank you, little assistant,” she said tenderly. She went on about her work, but it did not seem so hard or so hopeless any more. Maggie lay thinking for a few minutes. In the room outside, where the patients’ clothes were kept in a case full of pigeon-holes, was one bundle shabbier than the others; that was Maggie’s. In one of the beds were some queer, cruel-looking weights, which meant suffering far greater than most of the little invalids there could imagine, and they were11Maggie’s, too. Perhaps in all the long roomful, she had the fewest things to make her glad; but what of that? God teaches us how to make our happiness, if we will; God and Maggie together made hers. She opened her eyes when the sharpest pain had passed, and called across to the next bed,— “What is it?” Jennie asked listlessly. “Jennie, let’s see those things; we haven’t for ever so long. You wanted to the other day, you know.” “Well,” Jennie answered doubtfully, “you’ll have to begin, tho.” “O, yes, I’ll begin! Well, then, I see some great red roses just as soft and dark as velvet; and they feel all cool when you touch them, and they smell—my, don’t they smell sweet!” “I know somethin’ prettier than that,” Jennie answered. “It’s vi’lets—a lady gave me some once. They ain’t anythin’ like ’em, velvet nor nothin’ else. I ’most cried when they withered. That’s prettier than yours, Maggie Dulin!” “But I see somethin’ else,” Maggie went on. “It’s a great green place, and the grass is all nice and thick under your feet, and it’s full of the beautifulest flowers—yellow and white, and all colors, and there ain’t no sign up to keep off the grass—you kin jest lay and roll in it all day long. And there’s birds in the trees, and you never heard nothin’ sing like them; and you kin see the sky, just miles of it, and you kin ’most taste the air, it’s so sweet.” Round the ward word sped quickly, “Maggie’s seein’ things.” Children who could walk went to her corner; wheeled chairs rolled there; from some of the cots eager patients sent messages to her, and waited for hers back again. The dull day was forgotten, and the long room was crowded with visions. Flowers bloomed there, and birds sang, and happy girls went to parties, or cherished wonderful dolls. The gladness of the world was theirs, as God meant it to be, and all because one girl knew how to keep fresh in her life every bit of beauty she had seen. The doctor smiled as he went his rounds. “She’s as good medicine as the sunshine,” he said. “Poor little thing!” the nurse answered, with a loving glance toward the corner. The doctor corrected her: “It’s the heart that makes one rich or poor—rich little thing!” he said.