Cherry Ames 22 Rural Nurse (20 page)

“Easier, I guess, than to attempt the job from the inside. That is,” Cherry said, “
if
he is the robber.”

“He used the same funny words. Why do you suppose he did such a stupid thing?”

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BEGINS

195

“He may have gotten excited when the women discovered him, and blurted it out. Just a minute more, Sue—”

Cherry continued to read. “This reporter learned today that the cashier, Jack Waldron, has not reported back to work, although his two-week vacation period is now over. Employees of the loan company stated that Mr. Waldron had planned to go on a camping trip during his vacation. A friend who was to have accompanied him was taken sick. Mr. Waldron told his fellow employees that he would go through with his plans, anyway, even though it meant camping alone.”

Sue urged Cherry to read the last paragraph.

“Friends of Jack Waldron expressed concern at his failure to report back to work. He was due back a week ago. Some feel it is possible that Waldron may be lost, or ill and alone in some woods. Others regard this as unlikely, since he is an experienced camper.

A few of his friends received picture postcards from him, postmarked June 10 and June 11. (The robbery occurred on June 14, when semimonthly payments were made.) These post cards were mailed from Lanesboro and Pleasant Mountain, small towns in northeastern Pennsylvania. No word has been received from Waldron since June 11.

“Telephone inquiries by this newspaper to these towns elicited the information that a young man who may be Waldron has been seen there. A grocery store owner recalls that the man, carrying a camper’s pack on his back, made a purchase about ten days ago, about 196

CHERRY AMES, CAMP NURSE

June 19 or 20, late in the evening. A hardware mer-chant made a similar report.

“A description of Waldron has gone out to police in this widespread area. He is about fi ve feet six, weighs approximately 150 pounds, has brown hair, and regular features. No photograph of him is available. Friends at the loan company, where Waldron worked for six months, say that he told them he had been raised in an orphanage, served in the Army, and had been honorably discharged, then worked in various account-ing fi rms and banks. He is unmarried and has no known relatives.”

That was the end of the newspaper article. Sue had been standing on one foot and then the other, until Cherry fi nished reading.

“Well, what do you think?”

“It certainly sounds as if he had a bleak, lonely life,” Cherry said. “Not that that would excuse an armed robbery—if he really came back to New York from Pennsylvania and did it.”

“Just three hours by train. Everything points to Jack Waldron,” Sue said. “Things couldn’t look much worse for him, could they?”

Cherry pretended to shiver. “I hope we don’t fi nd any armed desperadoes lurking around Camp Blue Water.”

“If we did,” said Aunt Bet, overhearing, “we’d probably put them to work painting the dock. Get your suitcases ready, everybody! We’ll be there in ten minutes!” In case you missed
Cherry Ames, Cruise Nurse ...

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c h a p t e r i

Waiting for a Letter

cherry opened one dark-brown eye and closed it again quickly. Shivering, she pulled the covers up until her black curls were hidden beneath the thick, crazy-quilt comforter.

Cherry had been dreaming. It was such a very pleasant dream she didn’t want to stop. She was dreaming that she was back in her own room in Hilton, Illinois.

She had cautiously opened one eye to make sure everything was exactly the same in the dream as it was in real life:

Her dressing table with its dotted-swiss skirts and brisk red bows; the crisp, ruffl ed white curtains tied back with bright-red ribbon; a stream of cold December sunlight pouring through the open window to bring out the varied colors in the hooked rug her grandmother had made.

199

200
CHERRY

AMES,

CRUISE

NURSE

Cherry sighed. If only the dream could come true.

But, of course, she wasn’t home. She was with the rest of the Spencer Club in Greenwich Village, New York City.

For one year and three months now Cherry had been a visiting nurse, sharing No. 9, the Greenwich Village apartment, with Josie, Gwen, Bertha, Vivian, and Mai Lee. They were all visiting nurses too. Thinking about the Spencer Club made Cherry realize more than ever that she must be dreaming. If she were awake she would hear them chattering as they dressed and breakfasted.

No one could sleep through the chatter and the clatter and confusion of an early working-day morning in No. 9. You couldn’t even dream through it, Cherry decided, and boldly opened both eyes. She sniffed ten-tatively.

The crisp, cold air was laden with the delicious blend of freshly perked coffee and thick slabs of bacon frying on the stove in her mother’s kitchen. Cherry pinched one red cheek and then the other. She was awake. She wasn’t dreaming! She was
home!

And then it all came back to her. She remembered that two weeks ago the dizziness had suddenly gotten worse; so much worse that everything went black for a minute. The dizzy spells, she had known for a long time, were due to fatigue.

Cherry had been making a report about a contagious disease that had suddenly broken out in her district:

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201

Mumps—nothing very serious, but should they try the new inoculation?

“The Lerner children are all down with it,” Cherry was stuttering. Her tongue felt thick and dry in her mouth. Her head ached. Her back ached. Her legs ached from knee to toe. Her feet were weighted down with the iron clamps of complete exhaustion.

She stared across the desk, trying to focus her eyes on Miss Dorothy Davis, her supervisor. And then all of a sudden Miss Davis’s face began to dance and whirl.

Nausea fl ooded over Cherry. She gripped the edge of the desk with sweating fi ngers.
She wasn’t going to
faint.
Nurses don’t go around fainting. Nurses can’t even spare the time to be sick. Not when they know that in one year in New York City alone the Visiting Nurse Service gave nursing care to almost fi ve million people!

But Cherry did faint. Everything went black for a minute. When she came to, Miss Davis had pushed Cherry’s head down between her knees. Now she handed Cherry a glass of water into which she had stirred a teaspoon of aromatic spirits of ammonia.

“Drink up,” Miss Davis said briskly. “You’re going to be all right, Ames. You’re overtired. Need a vacation.

Take your work too seriously.”

Cherry drank up and felt better. The dizziness ebbed away, but the ache had spread to every bone and joint in her body. She struggled to her feet. Miss Davis tucked Cherry’s hand in the crook of her arm.

202
CHERRY

AMES,

CRUISE

NURSE

“I’m sending you home in a cab,” she said. “A relief nurse will cover your district while you’re gone. And you’re going to be gone for one whole month.”

“Oh, no, please,” Cherry had protested weakly. “Mr.

Morvell . . . Mrs. di Pattio . . . the Lerner children—” The supervisor snapped her fi ngers, her brown eyes fl ashing. But her smile was warm. “Listen to me, Cherry Ames. You’re not the only visiting nurse in the world. Run-down and exhausted as you are, you’re not really much good to us. You’re a liability right now.” She grinned to take the edge off her words. “A month’s leave of absence and you’re an asset again. We need assets. Your boss’s orders. See?” Cherry had managed a sickly laugh. “Yes, ma’am, but—”

And then Mrs. Berkey, the assistant supervisor, appeared on the scene. She was tall and capable looking, and her gray eyes were grim. “I’m taking you home, Ames,” she said. “Now. Have an errand downtown anyway. Cab’s waiting. Hustle into your coat and rubbers.

I’m a busy woman.”

Cherry meekly obeyed. Orders were orders. She was too weary to argue further anyway.

Outside in the street, Mrs. Berkey, holding Cherry fi rmly by the arm as they walked toward a waiting cab, said, “Miss Davis and I have had our eyes on you for the past month. You need a good long rest.
And
a change.” During the ride downtown Mrs. Berkey had said something else which even now Cherry couldn’t quite believe. She’d said that what Cherry needed was

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203

a Caribbean cruise. Miss Davis was going to try to arrange it. Her brother, Dr. Fowler Davis, was in the medical department of one of the big steamship lines.

There was, however, a long waiting list. Cruise jobs were prized by nurses, exhausted by long hours and understaffed hospitals. But Cherry, Mrs. Berkey said, should spend a couple of weeks at home before taking on any new duties anyway. And then it would be the holiday season. A great many nurses on the list might withdraw their names, preferring to spend Christmas at home . . .

Cherry sat up in bed and tugged the comforter around her shoulders. It was too good to come true.

A Caribbean cruise! The round trip would take twelve days. Almost two weeks of warm weather and sea air.

A stopover at the exciting-sounding island of Curaçao in the Netherlands West Indies; then on to Venezuela and Colombia in South America.

But there was a long waiting list. That, Cherry decided, was the catch. There must be hundreds of other overtired young nurses ahead of her on the list.

They must have signed up ages ago for ship’s-nurse jobs on luxury ocean liners cruising to glamorous Caribbean ports. What chance did Ames have?

Ames, Cherry admitted ruefully, had waited too long.

She had known a month ago that she was suffering from fatigue and needed a vacation, if not a change.

“I was silly,” Cherry scolded herself now. “As Miss Davis said, I’m not the only visiting nurse in the world.”

204
CHERRY

AMES,

CRUISE

NURSE

Well, she had learned her lesson. She had been relaxing now for almost two weeks and felt fi ne. But it still seemed like a dream to be home.

Breakfast in bed. Window-shopping with Midge, home too, for the holidays. Long, satisfying talks with Midge’s father, Dr. Joe. And best of all, wonderful, quiet evenings around the fi re with her mother and father.

They talked very little as they munched buttered pop-corn and lazily cracked nuts, watching the smoldering logs crumple into dying embers. But the very peace and quiet of those happy evenings had gradually stopped the dull ache in her tired body. And now that Charlie was home on vacation too, life was perfect.

“In bed from nine to noon,” Dr. Joseph Fortune had ordered, affectionately stern. He had ushered Cherry and her twin brother, Charlie, into the world. It was Dr. Joe who had inspired her to become a nurse.

Dear Dr. Joe with his beautiful, sensitive face and luminous eyes! “He was really worried about me when I tottered off the train and practically collapsed into Dad’s arms.”

Charlie had been worried too, Cherry knew; almost as upset as her parents had been, although she had gained back a few pounds before his arrival. But he hid his anxiety under a steady stream of teasing:

“If you don’t get those red cheeks back soon, Nurse Ames, we’ll have to change your name to Lily.” Charlie was the only one to whom Cherry had confi ded her dream of a Caribbean cruise. Cherry felt certain that her parents and Dr. Joe would have strenuous

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205

objections if she so much as mentioned it. It would be hard to convince them that she was well and strong now; that the trip actually would be good for her.

But Charlie understood. Charlie was as fair as his twin was dark, but they both had the same pert features. And Charlie was as much in love with prepar-ing for his engineering career as Cherry had been with hers.

“Of course, nothing may come of it,” Cherry had told him one night as they crunched through the snow on their way home from an early movie. “But I can dream, can’t I
?
A ship’s nurse on a luxury liner complete with swimming pool! You and Dad shoveling snow while I’m taking sun baths on the promenade deck.”

“Wait a minute!” Charlie had stopped and swung her around so fast that her overshoes skidded on an icy patch in the sidewalk. “Let me get this straight. Are you working your way to South America or going as a passenger?”

Cherry giggled. “Both. I understand the work’s not too hard except when there’s an epidemic of seasickness or an emergency of some sort. Besides, I like to work. I’d be bored to death lying in the sun and dunk-ing myself in the pool all day long.” Charlie chuckled. “You’ll run into seasickness, honey, the fi rst night out. But good. Rough seas when you hit the Gulf Stream around Cape Hatteras. Wouldn’t be surprised if you landed in sick bay yourself.” Cherry pretended to pout. “You’re just jealous, you landlubber you!”

206
CHERRY

AMES,

CRUISE

NURSE

“Seriously, honey, it’s a wonderful idea. I hope you get the job. You deserve it, and the change will fi x you right up. You’ll be as good as new when you come back; fat and brown with those fabulous red cheeks of yours.”

“Keep your fi ngers crossed, Charlie, please.” Cherry had tucked her arm affectionately through his. “There’s a long waiting list.”

There it was again. That disheartening little phrase: just three simple words, “Long waiting list!” Now Cherry jumped out of bed, closed the window, and popped into the warmth of the bathroom to brush her teeth and dash icy cold water into her face, “I won’t think about it any more,” she resolutely mumbled into the towel. “I’m almost halfway through my month’s vacation now. If word doesn’t come soon I wouldn’t be able to take the job anyway.”

She snatched up a warm bed jacket of quilted blue silk and hopped hack into bed, obeying Dr. Joe’s orders to the letter. Then counting on her fi ngers she said out loud:

“I’ve already had twelve days. The round-trip cruise is another twelve days. Twelve and twelve make twenty-four. One month is four weeks. There are twenty-eight days in four weeks . . .”