Told in a French Garden August, 1914

II

THE TRAINED NURSE'S STO­RY

THE SON OF JOSEPHINE

THE TALE OF A FOUNDLING

The house was very qui­et next day. All the men, ex­cept the Crit­ic and the Sculp­tor, had made an ear­ly and hur­ried run to Paris. So we saw lit­tle of each oth­er un­til we gath­ered for din­ner, and the con­ver­sa­tion was calm--in fact sub­dued.

The Doc­tor was es­pe­cial­ly qui­et. No one was re­al­ly gay ex­cept the Young­ster. He talked of what he had seen in Paris--the silent streets--the moods of the wom­en--the sight of of­fi­cers in kha­ki fly­ing about in big tour­ing cars--and no one asked what had re­al­ly tak­en them to town.

The Trained Nurse and I had walked to the near­est vil­lage, but we brought back lit­tle in the way of news. The on­ly in­ter­est­ing thing we saw was _Mon­sieur le Cure_ talk­ing to a hand­some young peas­ant wom­an in the square be­fore the church. We heard her say, with a sob in her throat, “If my man does not come back, I'll nev­er say my prayers again. I'll nev­er pray to a God who let this thing hap­pen un­less my man comes back.”

“She will, just the same,” said the Lawyer. “One of the strangest fea­tures of such a catas­tro­phe is that it stead­ies a race, es­pe­cial­ly the race con­vinced that it has right on its side.”

“It goes deep­er than that,” said the Jour­nal­ist. “It strikes mil­lions with the same pain, and they bear to­geth­er what they could not have faced sep­arate­ly.”

“True,” re­marked the Doc­tor, “and that is one rea­son why I have al­ways mis­trust­ed the ef­fort of peo­ple out­side the ra­dius of dis­as­ter to help in any­way, ex­cept sci­en­tif­ical­ly.”

“That is rather a cru­el idea,” com­ment­ed the Trained Nurse.

“Per­haps. But I be­lieve or­ga­nized char­ity even of that sort is usu­al­ly in­ef­fec­tive, and weak­ens the race that ac­cepts it. I be­lieve vic­tims of such dis­as­ter are health­ier and come out stronger for fac­ing it, dy­ing, or sur­viv­ing, as Fate de­crees.”

“Keep off the grass,” cried the Young­ster. “I brought back a car full of books.” The hint was tak­en, and we talked of books un­til the cof­fee came out.

As usu­al, the Trained Nurse sat be­hind the pot, and when we were all served, she pushed the tray back, fold­ed her strong ca­pa­ble white hands on the edge of the ta­ble, and said qui­et­ly:

“_Messieurs et Mes­dames_”--

We lit our cigarettes, and she be­gan:

* * * * *

It was the first year af­ter I left home and took up nurs­ing. I had a room at that time in one of the Friend­ly So­ci­ety refuges on the low­er side of Bea­con Hill. It was un­der the aus­pices of an Epis­co­pal High Church in the days of Fa­ther Hall, and was rather En­glish in tone. In­deed its ma­tron was an En­glish­wom­an--gen­tle, round-​faced, lace-​capped, and very sym­pa­thet­ic. I was very fond of her. I had, as a seam­stress, a neat lit­tle girl named Josephine.

Josephine was a tiny crea­ture, all grey in tone, with mouse-​col­ored hair. She was a foundling. She had not the least no­tion who her peo­ple were. Her first rec­ol­lec­tions were of the or­phan asy­lum where she was brought up. In her ear­ly teens she had been bound out to a dress­mak­er, who had been kind to her, and, when her first em­ploy­er died, Josephine, who had saved a lit­tle mon­ey, and longed for in­de­pen­dence, be­gan to go out as a seam­stress among the wom­en she had grown to know in the dress­mak­ing es­tab­lish­ment, and went to live at one of the Chris­tian As­so­ci­ation homes for work­ing girls.

Ev­ery one knows what those board­ing hous­es are--two or three hun­dred girls of all ages, from six­teen up, of all tem­per­aments. All girls will­ing to sub­mit to con­trol; girls with their gay days and their trag­ic, girls of am­bi­tion, and girls with faith in the fu­ture, as well as girls of no luck, and girls with their sim­ple youth­ful ro­mances.

Ev­ery one loved Josephine.

She was by na­ture a lit­tle la­dy, dain­ty in her ways, in­dus­tri­ous, un­re­bel­lious, al­ways ready to help the oth­er girls about their clothes, and a mod­el of a con­fi­dant. Ev­ery one told her their lit­tle trou­bles, ev­ery one con­fid­ed their lit­tle ro­mances. They were sure of a good lis­ten­er, who nev­er had any trou­bles or ro­mances of her own to con­fide.

I don't know how old Josephine was at that time. She might have been twen­ty-​five, looked younger, but was per­haps old­er. She was so tiny, and such a mouse of a thing that she seemed a child, but for her en­er­gy, and her ca­pac­ity for si­lence.

It was, I fan­cy, three years af­ter I first knew her that she one evening con­fid­ed to a group of her in­ti­mate friends, as they sat to­geth­er over their sewing, that she was en­gaged to be mar­ried. There was a great ex­cite­ment. Lit­tle lone­ly Josephine, so dis­creet, who had sym­pa­thized with the ro­mances of so many of her com­rades, had a ro­mance of her own. Such a hug­ging and kiss­ing as went on, you nev­er saw, un­less you have seen a crowd of such girls to­geth­er. Ev­ery one was full of ques­tions, and there were al­most as many tears shed as ques­tions asked.

He was a car­pen­ter, Josephine told them. She had known him ev­er since she was with the dress­mak­er who took her out of the asy­lum. He lived in Uti­ca, New York. He had a good job, and they were to be mar­ried as soon as she could get ready.

So Josephine set to work with her nim­ble fin­gers to make her trousseau. Dur­ing the years she had worked for me, the Ma­tron at the Friend­ly So­ci­ety, and many of its pa­trons had come to know and love dear lit­tle Josephine, and in our house there was al­most as much ex­cite­ment over the news as there was at the As­so­ci­ation at the South End. All the girls set to work to make some­thing for lit­tle Josephine. Ev­ery one for whom she had worked gave her some­thing. One la­dy gave her black silk for a frock. All the girls sewed a bit of un­der­wear for her. She had sheets and ta­ble linen, and all sorts of dain­ty things which her girl friends loved to count over, and ad­mire in the evening with­out the least bit of en­vy. By the time Spring came Josephine had to buy a new trunk to pack her things away in.

Then she told us all that she was go­ing to Uti­ca to be mar­ried. What was the use of his spend­ing his mon­ey to come east for her, and pay his ex­pens­es back? That seemed rea­son­able, and the day was fixed for her de­par­ture.

Her trunks were packed.

She took a night train so that we could all go to the sta­tion to see her off, and I am sure that the crowd who saw us kiss­ing her good-​bye are not like­ly to for­get the scene.

Then the girls went home chat­ter­ing about “dear lit­tle Josephine.”

In due time came a let­ter from a place near Uti­ca, where she was, she said, on her lit­tle “wed­ding trip,” and “very hap­py,” and “he” sent his love, and it was signed with her new name, and she would send us her ad­dress as soon as she was set­tled.

Time went by--some months. Then she did send an ad­dress, but she did not write of­ten, and when she did, she said lit­tle but that she was hap­py.

As near­ly as I can re­mem­ber, it was a year and a half af­ter she left that news came that Josephine had a son. By that time a great many of the girls she had known were gone. Changes come fast in such a place. But there was great re­joic­ing, and those who had known her found time to make some­thing for dear lit­tle Josephine's ba­by, and the send­ing of the things kept up the in­ter­est in her for some months.

Then the let­ters ceased again.

I can't be sure how long it was af­ter that that I re­ceived a let­ter from her. She told me that her hus­band was dead, that she nev­er re­al­ly had tak­en root in Uti­ca, and now that she was alone, with her ba­by to sup­port, she longed to come back to Boston, and asked my ad­vice. Did I think she could take up her old work?

I took the let­ter at once to the Ma­tron of the Friend­ly So­ci­ety--I hap­pened to be rest­ing be­tween two cas­es--and we de­cid­ed that it was safe. At least be­tween us we could help her make the tri­al.

A few months lat­er she came, and we went to the sta­tion to meet her. I could not see that she had changed a bit. She did not look a day old­er, and the bounc­ing ba­by she car­ried in her arms was a dar­ling.

Of course she could not go back to the As­so­ci­ation. That was not for mar­ried wom­en. But we found her a room just across the street, and in no time, she dropped right back in­to the place she had left. Ev­ery morn­ing she took the ba­by boy to the _creche_ and ev­ery night she took him home, and a bet­ter cared-​for, bet­ter loved, more wise­ly bred young­ster was nev­er born, nor a hap­pi­er one. Ev­ery one loved him just as ev­ery one loved Josephine.

There I thought Josephine's sto­ry end­ed, and so far as she was con­cerned, it did.

But when the ba­by was six years old, and for­ward for his age, the Ma­tron of the Friend­ly So­ci­ety came in­to my room one day, when I was there to take a longer rest than usu­al, af­ter a very try­ing case, and told me that she was in great dis­tress. A friend of hers, who had been her pre­de­ces­sor, and was now the Ma­tron of an Or­phan Asy­lum in New York State, was go­ing to the hos­pi­tal to have a cataract re­moved from her eye, and had writ­ten to ask her to come and take her place while she was away. She begged me to re­place her at the Friend­ly So­ci­ety while she was gone. As her as­sis­tant was a ca­pa­ble young wom­an, and my re­la­tions with ev­ery one were pleas­ant I was on­ly too glad to con­sent. She had al­ways been so good to me.

She was gone a month.

On her re­turn I no­ticed that she was dis­tressed about some­thing. I taxed her with it. She said it was noth­ing she felt like talk­ing about. But one evening when Josephine had been sewing for me, af­ter she was gone, the Ma­tron, who had been in my room, got up, and closed the door af­ter her.

“I've re­al­ly got to tell you what is on my mind,” she said. "And I am sure that you will look on it as a con­fi­dence. You know the asy­lum where I have been is not far from Uti­ca, where Josephine went when she was mar­ried. Well, one day, about a fort­night af­ter I got there, I had oc­ca­sion to look up the record of a child in the books, and my at­ten­tion was at­tract­ed by a name the same as Josephine's. The co­in­ci­dence struck me, and I read the record that on a cer­tain day, which as near as I could cal­cu­late, must have been a year af­ter Josephine left, a per­son of her name, writ­ten down as a wid­ow, a mem­ber of the Or­tho­dox Church, had adopt­ed a male child a few months old. I was in­ter­est­ed. I did not sus­pect any­thing, but I asked the as­sis­tant ma­tron if she re­mem­bered the case. She did, clear­ly. She said the wom­an was a dear lit­tle thing, who had come there short­ly be­fore, a young wid­ow, a seam­stress. She was a lone­ly lit­tle thing, and some one con­nect­ed with the asy­lum had giv­en her work, which she had done so well that she soon had all she need­ed. She had been em­ployed in the asy­lum, and loved chil­dren as they did her. The child in ques­tion was the son of a wom­an who had died at its birth, from the shock of an ac­ci­dent which had killed the fa­ther. It took a fan­cy to Josephine, and she want­ed to adopt it. The com­mit­tee took the mat­ter up. The cler­gy­man spoke well of her, as did ev­ery one, and they all de­cid­ed that she was per­fect­ly able to care for it. So she took the child. All of a sud­den, one day, Josephine went, as she had come. There was no mys­tery about it. She told the cler­gy­man that she was home­sick for her old friends, and had gone east, and would write, and she al­ways has.

“Of course I was puz­zled. There was no doubt in my mind that it was our lit­tle Josephine. Nat­ural­ly I was dis­creet. Luck­ily. I spoke of her to sev­er­al peo­ple who re­mem­bered her, and they all called her 'dear lit­tle Josephine' just as we had. I talked of her with the cler­gy­man and his wife. I asked ques­tions that were too nat­ural to rouse sus­pi­cions, when I told them that I knew her, that the ba­by was the dear­est and hap­pi­est child I knew, and what do you sup­pose I found out, more by in­fer­ence than facts?”

No need to ask me. Didn't I know?

Josephine had nev­er been mar­ried. There had nev­er been any “He.” It all seemed so nat­ural. It did not shock me, as it had the Ma­tron, and I was glad she had told no one but me. Dear lit­tle Josephine! Sit­ting there in the As­so­ci­ation with­out fam­ily, with no friends but her pa­trons, and those girls whose lit­tle ro­mances went on about her! No ro­mances ev­er came her way. So she had made one all of her own. I proved to the Ma­tron eas­ily that what she had dis­cov­ered by ac­ci­dent was not her af­fair, that to keep Josephine's se­cret was a virtue, and not a sin. I was sure of that, for, as I watched her af­ter­wards, I knew that Josephine had played her part in her dream ro­mance so well, that she no longer re­mem­bered that it was not true. She had for­got­ten she had not re­al­ly borne the child she car­ried so lov­ing­ly in her arms.

* * * * *

“Is that all?” asked the Jour­nal­ist.

“That is all,” replied the Trained Nurse.

“By Jove,” said the Doc­tor, “that is a good sto­ry. I wish I had told it.”

“Thank you, Doc­tor,” laughed the Trained Nurse. “I thought it was a bit in your line.”

“But fan­cy the clev­er­ness of the lit­tle thing to do all the de­tails up so nice­ly,” said the Lawyer. “She dove­tailed ev­ery­thing so neat­ly. But what I want to know is whether she planned the ba­by when she planned the make-​be­lieve hus­band?”

“I fan­cy not,” replied the Nurse. “One thing came along af­ter an­oth­er in her imag­ina­tion, quite nat­ural­ly.”

“Poor lit­tle Josephine--it seems to me hard luck to have had to imag­ine such an ev­ery day fate,” sighed the Di­vorcee.

“Don't pity her,” snapped the Doc­tor. “Poor lit­tle Josephine, in­deed! Lucky lit­tle Josephine, who ar­ranged her own ro­mance, and risked no dis­il­lu­sion. There have been cas­es where the joys of the imag­ina­tion have been more dan­ger­ous.”

“You are sure she had no dis­il­lu­sion?” asked the Crit­ic.

“I am,” said the Nurse.

“And her name was Josephine?” asked the Di­vorcee.

“It was not, and Uti­ca was not the town,” replied the Nurse.

“Per­haps her dis­il­lu­sion is ahead of her,” said the Jour­nal­ist. “'Say no man'--or wom­an ei­ther--'is hap­py un­til the day of his death.'”

“She _is_ dead,” said the Nurse.

“I told you she was lucky lit­tle Josephine,” ejac­ulat­ed the Doc­tor.

“And she died with­out telling the boy the truth?” asked the Jour­nal­ist.

“The truth?” re­peat­ed the Nurse. “I've told you that she had for­got­ten it. No wom­an was ev­er so loved by a son. No moth­er ev­er so grieved for.”

“Then the son lives?” asked the Doc­tor.

The Nurse smiled qui­et­ly.

“Good-​night,” said the Doc­tor. “I am go­ing to bed to dream of that. It is a pity some of the rest of us child­less slack­ers had not done as well as Josephine. She took her risk. She was lucky.”

“She did,” replied the Nurse, “but she did not re­al­ize any­thing of that. She was too sim­ple, too un­an­alyt­ic.”

“I won­der?” said the Crit­ic.

“You need not, I know.” Her eyes fell on the Lawyer, and she caught a laugh in his eye. “What does that mean?” she asked.

“Well,” said the Lawyer, “I was on­ly think­ing. She was re­li­gious, that dear lit­tle Josephine?”

“At least she al­ways went to church.”

“I know the type,” said the Vi­olin­ist, gen­tly. “Ac­cept­ed what she was taught, be­lieved it.”

“Ex­act­ly,” said the Lawyer, “that is what I was get­ting at. Well then, when her son meets her _au dela_--he will ask for his fa­ther--”

“Or,” in­ter­rupt­ed the Vi­olin­ist, “his own moth­er will claim him.”

“Don't wor­ry,” laughed the Crit­ic. “It's dol­lars to dough­nuts that she was 'dear lit­tle Josephine' to all the Heav­en­ly Host half an hour af­ter she en­tered the 'gates of pearl.' Don't look shocked. That is not sac­ri­le­gious. It is in­ten­tions--mo­tives, that are im­mor­tal, not facts. Be­sides--”

“Don't push that idea too far,” in­ter­rupt­ed the Doc­tor from the door.

“Don't be alarmed. I was on­ly go­ing to say--there are Ik Mar­vels _au dela_--”

“I knew that idea was in your head. Drop it!” laughed the Doc­tor.

“Any­way,” said the Vi­olin­ist, “if Life is but a dream, she had a pret­ty one. Good night.” And he went up to bed, and we all soon fol­lowed him, and I imag­ine not one of us, as we looked out in­to the moon­lit air, thought that night of war.