Nelly's Hospital 3/6
The third part of the forty-third tale from Stories of Boys and Girls
“Not a bit; but it shall, if you and Mamma like to help me. I want four long bits of cane, a square of white cloth, some pieces of thin wood, and the gum-pot,” said Will, sitting up to examine the little cart, feeling like a boy again, as he took out his knife and began to whittle.
Upstairs and downstairs ran Nelly till all necessary materials were collected, and almost breathlessly she watched her brother arch the canes over the cart, cover them with the cloth, and fit in an upper shelf of small compartments, each lined with cotton wool to serve as beds for wounded insects, lest they should hurt one another or jostle out. The lower part was left free for any larger creatures which Nelly might find. Among her toys she had a tiny cask which only needed a peg to be water-tight: this was filled and fitted in before, because, as the small sufferers needed no seats, there was no place for it behind, and, as Nelly was both horse and driver, it was more convenient in front. On each side of it stood a box of stores. In one were minute rollers, as bandages are called, a few bottles not yet filled, and a wee doll’s jar of cold-cream, because Nelly could not feel that her outfit was complete without a medicine-chest. The other box was full of crumbs, bits of sugar, bird-seed, and grains of wheat and corn, lest any famished stranger should die for want of food before she got it home. Then Mamma painted “U. S. San. Com.” in bright letters on the cover, and Nelly received her charitable plaything with a long sigh of satisfaction.
“Nine o’clock already! Bless me, what a short evening this has been!” exclaimed Will, as Nelly came to give him her good-night kiss.
“And such a happy one,” she answered. “Thank you very, very much, dear Will. I only wish my little ambulance was big enough for you to go in—I’d so like to give you the first ride.”
“Nothing I should like better, if it were possible, though I’ve a prejudice against ambulances in general. But, as I cannot ride, I’ll try and hop out to your hospital tomorrow, and see how you get on,”—which was a great deal for Captain Will to say, because he had been too listless to leave his sofa for several days.
That promise sent Nelly happily away to bed, only stopping to pop her head out of the window to see if it was likely to be a fair day tomorrow, and to tell Tony about the new plan as he passed below.
“Where shall you go to look for your first load of sick folks, miss?” he asked.
“All round the garden first, then through the grove, and home across the brook. Do you think I can find any patients so?” said Nelly.
“I know you will. Good-night, miss,” and Tony walked away with a merry look on his face, that Nelly would not have understood if she had seen it.
Up rose the sun bright and early, and up rose Nurse Nelly almost as early and as bright. Breakfast was taken in a great hurry, and before the dew was off the grass this branch of the S. C. was all astir. Papa, Mamma, big brother and baby sister, men and maids, all looked out to see the funny little ambulance depart, and nowhere in all the summer fields was there a happier child than Nelly, as she went smiling down the garden path, where tall flowers kissed her as she passed, and every blithe bird seemed singing a “Good speed.”
“How I wonder what I shall find first,” she thought, looking sharply on all sides as she went. Crickets chirped, grasshoppers leaped, ants worked busily at their subterranean houses, spiders spun shining webs from twig to twig, bees were coming for their bags of gold, and butterflies had just begun their holiday. A large white one alighted on the top of the ambulance, walked over the inscription as if spelling it letter by letter, then floated away from flower to flower, like one carrying the good news far and wide.
“Now every one will know about the hospital, and be glad to see me coming,” thought Nelly. And indeed it seemed so, for just then a blackbird, sitting on the garden wall, burst out with a song full of musical joy, Nelly’s kitten came running after to stare at the wagon and rub her soft side against it, a bright-eyed toad looked out from his cool bower among the lily-leaves, and at that minute Nelly found her first patient. In one of the dewy cobwebs hanging from a shrub near by, sat a fat black and yellow spider, watching a fly whose delicate wings were just caught in the net. The poor fly buzzed pitifully, and struggled so hard that the whole web shook; but the more he struggled, the more he entangled himself, and the fierce spider was preparing to descend that it might weave a shroud about its prey, when a little finger broke the threads and lifted the fly safely into the palm of a hand, where he lay faintly humming his thanks.
The End, Part Three