Chapter EIGHT: Cubby Plays Nurse

Such a time as there was at The Lilacs when the two little wanderers were carried in. Mother, Grandma, and Aunt Elsie, of course, had thought them safe and sound at Miss Helen’s. So, when Dr. Daddy splashed up the walk, carrying big bundles of what looked like old clothes, with rosy faces peeping out the top, there was a great hubbub.

“Any old clothes to-day,--any old clothes to-day?” chanted Grandpa in a sing-song voice, as Grandma stood with open mouth, gazing at the roll of bathrobes and quilts that surrounded Wiggles.

“Why-for you all rolled up like a itty (little) baby?” piped Cubby, scurrying wildly to and fro, and getting in every one’s way.

“You poor little chickens!” exclaimed Mother and Grandma together, as the story was incoherently poured out by both excited children at once. Aunt Elsie was frantically dashing from room to room, running hot baths, slipping hot-water bottles into the beds, and making everything ready for their comfort, while trying to listen with one ear to the account.

“They looked more like drowned rats than chickens,” twinkled Daddy, appearing in the doorway with his blond hair on end, to see how preparations were going on. He could joke about it, now it was over, but it was a night he would never forget.

Oh, such hot baths as they were popped into, and such brisk rub-downs as they received! Then, as carefully as if they were bits of delicate porcelain, they were tucked into their cozy white beds and fed with delicious buttered toast and hot chocolate topped with whipped cream.

“Oh, it’s so good to be home!” sighed Wiggles. “I thought I’d never see my pretty forget-me-not room again.”

“Yes, doesn’t it look homey and cozy,” Jeannette replied, too comfortable even to turn her head as she spoke. “If I were a cat, I’d purr, I’m so comfy.”

“O dear, every bone in my body aches. I know now what people mean when they say that they ‘feel limp as a dish-rag,’” returned Wiggles, stirring restlessly, “for I feel sort of all limpsy, and jelly-fishy, if you know what I mean. Ouch, my foot throbs like a toothache!”

“I know it must,” Mother sympathized, appearing with a medicine-glass, “but the bandages that Daddy put on will soon make it better. Now I want you both to close your eyes and relax. Your nerves are all a-quiver from the shock, and you must calm down.”

“Yes,” agreed Wiggles uneasily, “I’ll try. But when the wind goes ‘Whoo-ooo’ and the rain dashes against the pane, it makes me feel sort of shivery.”

“And every time the lightning flares and the thunder growls, I think a tree’s going to fall,” quavered Jeannette. “I’ll try to relax; I will honestly, Mother, but it seems to me it’s an awfully _long_ storm.”

“And when I close my eyes I keep seeing the trees swaying, and the zigzags of lightning against the black sky, and feel that dreadful falling--falling----”

“Don’t think about it any more, Polly-Wiggles,” said Daddy, popping his head in to see what all the chatter was about. “Take some of this medicine, and try to make your mind a blank. I’ll pull down the shades so you can’t see the rain, although I’m afraid you’ll still have to hear it, as, unfortunately, the Weather Man isn’t a friend of mine, and refuses to stop the downpour. You’ve been good little soldiers and obeyed instructions so far, and I’m proud of you, so try now to carry out orders.”

As he spoke he slipped the screen about the beds and went out, closing the door softly. He was thinking with a shudder how the “carrying out instructions” might easily have caused their death.

I wish you could have seen those organdie dresses. Torn by bush and bramble, and covered with stains where the children had fallen, no one would have recognized the pathetic-looking rags as the dainty frocks the little maids had started out in, looking so crisp and cool. All three ladies cried a bit at the tale the sodden garments mutely told.

The tired-out children fell asleep almost immediately, but in the middle of the night Jeannette was aroused by a loud whisper.

“Jet,--are you awake?”

“Yes. Does your foot hurt you, Wiggles? Don’t you feel well?”

“Yes, just as comfy as can be,” returned Wiggles, snuggling deeper into the soft bed and listening to the beating of the rain outside. “I was only thinking about our new organdie dresses. We were going to keep them so clean and fresh, and they must look like mud pies,”--with a little giggle. Wiggles’ sense of humor could not be downed long.

Such lame, sore little girls as awoke next morning to a dreary world, for the storm had settled into a heavy downpour that flooded all outdoors.

Daddy was delighted to find that there were no signs of colds from the exposure, but declared that bed for two or three days was his prescription, and that it would be the end of the week before school could be resumed.

“Well anyway,” yawned Jeannette, “we’ll be back in time to vote for the King and Queen.”

“And this will be a good time to write our verses for school,” added the youthful poetess. “Ouchety, I’m so lame that I couldn’t get out of bed if I wanted to. I must have what Mandy calls ‘misery’ in my back, and my foot burns like fire.”

“I should think it would,” said her sister sympathetically. “Oh-h,”--with a shudder,-- “will you ever forget that ‘crack-crack’ that sounded when that tree was struck? I never shall.”

“Doesn’t it seem good to be safe at home,” said Wiggles in a dreamy voice. “I’m so thankful that I’m not a snake and have to live in the woods all the while. Well, if here isn’t Boots.”

“Does Boots want to hear all about his sisters’ adventures?” asked Jeannette, as the fluffy pussy jumped on the bed and patted her cheek gently with one velvet paw.

“He’s just trying to tell you that breakfast is on its way,” called Aunt Elsie, entering with a dainty tray, at which Boots licked his chops and fastened his green eyes intently upon the breakfast bacon.

“I’se done made you chilluns some ‘jams’ for breakfast,” beamed fat Mandy, popping a woolly head in the door to inquire after her beloved ‘white chilluns.’ “But I disremembered prezactly if ’twas corn ‘jams’ or grahme ‘jams’ you-all liked best.”

“Oh, _both_,” cried the invalids rapturously, sniffing with appreciation the steaming hot “gems” and strawberry jam that appeared. “No one can make them like you, Mandy.”

“Well, I done reckon I knows how to cook, seeing as I’se had a skillet in one hand and a mixing spoon in t’other evah since I was knee-high to a grasshoppah,” chuckled Mandy, rolling out, vastly pleased with herself. They could hear her throaty chuckle all the way down the hall, and her voice saying, “Yas, ma’am, I knew they’d like some o’ my ‘jams,’ Miss Jean”; for Mandy had been with the family ever since Grandma was a little girl, and never called Mother “Mrs. Eaton,” but the “Miss Jean” of her girlhood days instead.

Cubby pattered in a few minutes later, to snuggle down on the bed beside Boots, and fasten wistful eyes on the strawberry jam, although she had already eaten her breakfast.

In spite of the continued storm on Monday, Mother had to go into the city with Daddy to make a visit to the dentist, as one of her teeth had been grumbling all night, and it would not do to leave it.

“You be a good little nurse to your sisters,” she told Cubby, kissing them all good-by.

“Poor itty gurrls, so dreffle sick,” mourned Cubby, trotting from one bed to the other, to put sympathetic kisses on each small sufferer’s cheek, and greatly enjoying her own importance. It was very nice indeed to be the one in charge of the two older girls, instead of the other way about, for hadn’t Mother told her to take care of them?

“Ouch, Cubby, don’t lean against my back,” squealed Jeannette. “It’s so sore it feels as if it would break in two.”

“Want me to give ‘oo an al-colic rub?” volunteered the baby nurse, remembering the cooling alcohol sponges given to her when ill.

“No, thank you, Miss Nurse,” answered Jeannette, entering into the play. “I’m afraid you’re too little. Say, Woggsie, if Cub is a really-truly nurse, she ought to wear a uniform.”

“Sure enough,” returned that ingenious young lady. “Let me think. Cubby, you go get me two of Daddy’s handkerchiefs and I’ll fix you all up.”

Nothing loath, the wee bear left the room, to return in a few minutes with a beaming face, followed by Aunt Elsie with a little white apron and a scrap of white lawn in her hand.

“I thought I could fix up your nurse for you,” she suggested, pinning the lawn into a “sugar-bowl” cap, and fastening it to Cubby’s golden curls. One of Daddy’s handkerchiefs, folded and placed about her neck like a fichu, was adjusted next, and when the white apron-strings were tied about the plump little waist, the cunningest nurse stood before them that any patient could hope to have.

“I’se a horse-pital nurse,” announced Cubby, flying to look in the mirror.

“And we are your patients,” replied Jeannette. “Oh, nurse, nurse, I feel so ill. My fever is so high that my face has scorched the pillow.”

Cubby cast a startled glance at the pillow-slip, and then carefully felt her patient’s pulse.

“Derry, derry (very) sick,” said she with a frown, “with ’tile parenthis,” meaning infantile paralysis.

“I have a fever in my feet,” announced Wiggles with a realistic groan that sent Cubby scurrying to her in alarm, “and my heart has stopped beating entirely.”

“I’ll cut you open with the sciddors (scissors), like this,” said the nurse in a bloodthirsty manner, snipping her fingers up and down like a pair of shears, “and then you’ll be all wite after the apperation.”

The third patient, who was purring loudly on the foot of Wiggles’ bed, was carefully looked over next.

“Him’s pults (pulse) derry bad,” mourned Cubby, holding one soft paw in her little hand.

“He has the ‘cat-tar,’ like Grandpa has,” explained Wiggles. “That’s the reason he snores. I do wonder why they named a disease after a cat. I must remember to ask Daddy.”

“Well, what does Nursie suggest for her little patients?” smiled Grandma, entering with a vase of golden daffodils that Marion’s grandmother had brought to the children.

“An al-colic rub,” replied Cubby firmly, “and some itty sugar pills.”

“That’s a very good prescription,” answered Grandma, kissing the wee nurse. “And you are looking after your sisters very well.”

“Oh,” replied that small damsel sweetly, “I don’t mind ’musing them for a little while, Grandma.”

They all laughed at this, for it seemed to be rather the other way about, but Cubby’s responsible air was too funny for anything.

“Aunt Elsie is downstairs with Mrs. West,” went on Grandma; “and I think, Cubby, that you had better run down and show them your costume while your patients take a nap until luncheon time. I am going to lie down myself, for my head aches rather badly, so the nurse may have an hour off duty.”

So the windows were opened wide to let in the fresh air, and Grandma tucked the little girls in their cozy nests for a little “snooze,” and then went out, taking Cubby with her.

Now Cubby had every intention of going directly downstairs into the library with Mrs. West and Aunt Elsie, so Grandma, after watching her trot down the broad stairway, went into her own room to rest.

But at the foot of the stairs was Dr. Daddy’s office, past which Cubby must go to reach the library, which was at the front of the big house, and a naughty idea popped into her mind as she peeped in the open door.

The girls had said that she was too little to give an alcohol rub, but her own Grandma hadn’t laughed, and had indeed seemed to think it a good idea. She just guessed that she would show them that she wasn’t a baby after all.

So into Daddy’s office she tiptoed quietly, although it was the one place in the house where the children were forbidden to go.

“’Cause,” whispered she, to soothe her guilty conscience, “I _must_ get the ‘al-colic.’”

Onto a tall chair she climbed, to reach the big bottles that stood on top of the glass case. Fortunately, Cubby knew better than to touch, or give to any one else, the pills of different colors, that looked so fascinating, even if some of the white dots did taste like “sugar-bowls,” as she called lump sugar. Daddy had instilled that “do not taste” idea very thoroughly in her baby mind, so now it was only the alcohol for which she searched, remembering the big bottle in which she had seen it when she had a “rub.”

“I’se my dear Muvver’s itty helper,” murmured she to herself, teetering back and forth on the high chair. “Won’t Muvver be ’sprised when she sees what I’se a-goin’ to do?”

She would indeed.

“Seems to be nuffin here but pills,” she went on in disgust, for Daddy’s big case, of course, was locked. Then suddenly her bright eyes spied a large bottle within easy reach of her eager little hands, on Daddy’s desk. Down she clambered, catching her white apron on the chair-back, and tearing a large hole.

“Such a tender apron,” she mourned, sticking her fist through the hole, and, of course, enlarging it.

All bottles containing liquid looked the same to the wee nurse, so, with a struggle, she hastily uncorked it and took a sniff.

“Smells bitter,” she declared, turning up her little nose and making a face, for anything of which she did not like the smell or taste was “bitter” to her.

The bottle happened to contain cod-liver oil, but this, of course, she did not know, and took it for granted that it was the desired alcohol.

It was an awkward shape to carry, and it took great perseverance to lug it up the long staircase, but, quiet as a creeping mouse, the little figure stole along.

In the library she could hear Mrs. West and Aunt Elsie chatting about the storm, and she hardly dared breathe until safely upstairs, where she peeked softly in the bedroom door.

Both Jeannette and Elizabeth were sleeping soundly, with Boots snoozing happily beside them.

With a satisfied gleam in her mischievous brown eyes, Cubby slipped stealthily in, and closed the door.