Part 35 (1/2)

CHAPTER XXVIII

BEAUTIFUL BEULAH

Nan did not know very much about it. She had a dreamy remembrance of the first day or two of her sojourn in what the girls called ”the sick bay.”

She remembered Dr. Larry's kind face leaning above her; and she realized that he was there a great deal at first.

The fact was, the physician made a hard fight to ward off the threatened attack of pneumonia that he feared. Nan had been in a receptive state for sudden illness when she slipped into the icy water that morning--worried in mind, and having eaten little for several meals.

Then was added to this the mental shock of Linda's accusation.

Her mind wandered, and Dr. Prescott and Mrs. Cupp heard a great deal about a ”black ghost” and a ”boy in black” who were trying to get Linda Riggs' necklace away from Nan. This troubled the girl greatly in her first delirium.

Then she wandered to Scotland and took up the burden of her parents'

financial troubles. She tried to get them home on the boat, but they had no tickets, and the captain would not trust them for their pa.s.sage.

These and many other imaginary troubles helped to confuse the poor girl's mind.

But finally the delirium settled into one thing. Nan wanted Beulah!

At first the princ.i.p.al thought she meant _her_. Dr. Prescott knew, of course, that her girls called her in affection ”Dr. Beulah.” She came to the bedside as often as Nan cried out the name. But soon it was apparent that the princ.i.p.al's kind and beautiful face did not a.s.suage Nan's longing.

The girl talked intimately to ”Beautiful Beulah” about ”Momsey” and ”Papa Sherwood.” ”If we were only back, all together again, in the little dwelling in amity,” weakly cried the sick girl. ”Oh, Beulah! I haven't been nice to you. I've been ashamed of you! I was afraid of what the girls would say, and that Mrs. Cupp would think I was a baby.”

”What can the poor child mean?” demanded the worried princ.i.p.al, of the matron. ”Dr. Larry says that this worrying over the mysterious 'Beulah'

is doing her more harm than anything else.”

Mrs. Cupp's face was very grim. She was not a sympathetic looking woman at best. Now she looked more severe than ever. She marched out of the sick room without a word. She had already removed from about Nan's neck the fine gold chain and key. In a few minutes she marched in again, to Dr. Prescott's unbounded surprise, and laid a wonderful, big, pink-cheeked doll beside Nan in the bed.

Mrs. Cupp, it seems, had a pretty exact knowledge of everything hidden at the bottom of the girls' trunks, after all.

When Nan aroused the next time, there was Beautiful Beulah right in the crook of her arm. She smiled, hugged the doll close to her, took her medicine without a murmur, and went at once to sleep again.

”Poor little girl,” said good Dr. Larry when he was told about it. ”Of course that wasn't what has been really troubling her, Dr. Prescott. But the doll is connected with a happier time, when she was at home with her absent parents. With that wax beauty in her possession all troubles look smaller to her youthful mind.”

”I did think Nancy Sherwood was too big for doll-babies!” sniffed Mrs.

Cupp, refusing to show any further tenderness.

”I can see how she feels,” said Dr. Prescott, understandingly. ”I'm tempted to play with that beautiful thing myself. Nancy loves babies, and is as kind as she can be to the smaller girls. It would not hurt some of the girls older than she if they 'played dolls' again. They are altogether too grown-up.”

Bess was at the door of the sick room morning, noon and night. As soon as the physician said there was no danger, Nan's chum was allowed in the room. When she saw the big doll on the pillow beside Nan's head, she uttered a large, round ”O!”

”Didn't you ever see it before, Elizabeth?” asked the princ.i.p.al, curiously.

”Oh--why! It's Beautiful Beulah! Beg pardon, Dr. Prescott! it isn't named after you. Nan had it ever so many years ago. My! I never suspected it was in existence. And to bring it to school with her! My!”

Nan's vitality brought her out of the ”sick bay” in a short time. She lost only a week from her books altogether. That, she told herself, did not so much matter when her time at Lakeview Hall was to be so short.

But she was faithful, and hurried to make up the lost recitations. Linda Riggs was in retirement, disgraced before the whole school. She had been obliged to publicly deny the story she had started about Nan Sherwood and the lost necklace. And, too, the necklace had been sent by registered post to Mr. Riggs with a sharp letter from Dr. Prescott reminding him that the girls of Lakeview Hall were not allowed to wear such jewelry.

Some of the girls were inclined to poke fun at Nan's big doll, which was brought up into Room Seven, Corridor Four, and given a place of honor there. But it was gentle fun, for the whole school was sorry for Nan now. They knew that she must leave the Hall at the end of the term because of financial reverses, and the girls were beginning to find out how lovable she was, and to remember how kind she had been to everybody.