Part 5 (1/2)
”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,” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed 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 una.n.a.lytic.”
”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.”