FullReads

It seldom is granted to a man on the same day to give his whole heart to a girl and to be patted on the back by his managing editor; and it was this combination, and not the drinks he dispensed to the staff in return for its congratulations, that sent Sam home walking on air. He loved his business, he was proud of his business; but never before had it served him so well. It had enabled him to tell the woman he loved, and incidentally a million other people, how deeply he honored her; how clearly he appreciated her power for good. No one would know he meant Sister Anne, save two people–Sister Anne and himself; but for her and for him that was as many as should know. In his story he had used real incidents of the day; he had described her as she passed through the wards of the hospital, cheering and sympathetic; he had told of the little acts of consideration that endeared her to the sick people.

The next morning she would know that it was she of whom he had written; and between the lines she would read that the man who wrote them loved her. So he fell asleep, impatient for the morning. In the hotel at which he lived the REPUBLIC was always placed promptly outside his door; and, after many excursions into the hall, he at last found it. On the front page was his story, “The Red Cross Girl.” It had the place of honor–right-hand column; but more conspicuous than the headlines of his own story was one of Redding’s, photographs. It was the one he had taken of Sister Anne when first she had approached them, in her uniform of mercy, advancing across the lawn, walking straight into the focus of the camera. There was no mistaking her for any other living woman; but beneath the picture, in bold, staring, uncompromising type, was a strange and grotesque legend.

“Daughter of Millionaire Flagg,” it read, “in a New Role, Miss Anita Flagg as The Red Cross Girl.”

For a long time Sam looked at the picture, and then, folding the paper so that the picture was hidden, he walked to the open window. From below, Broadway sent up a tumultuous greeting–cable cars jangled, taxis hooted; and, on the sidewalks, on their way to work, processions of shop-girls stepped out briskly. It was the street and the city and the life he had found fascinating, but now it jarred and affronted him. A girl he knew had died, had passed out of his life forever–worse than that had never existed; and yet the city went or just as though that made no difference, or just as little difference as it would have made had Sister Anne really lived and really died.

At the same early hour, an hour far too early for the rest of the house party, Anita Flagg and Helen Page, booted and riding-habited, sat alone at the breakfast table, their tea before them; and in the hands of Anita Flagg was the DAILY REPUBLIC. Miss Page had brought the paper to the table and, with affected indignation at the impertinence of the press, had pointed at the front-page photograph; but Miss Flagg was not looking at the photograph, or drinking her tea, or showing in her immediate surroundings any interest whatsoever. Instead, her lovely eyes were fastened with fascination upon the column under the heading “The Red Cross Girl”; and, as she read, the lovely eyes lost all trace of recent slumber, her lovely lips parted breathlessly, and on her lovely cheeks the color flowed and faded and glowed and bloomed. When she had read as far as a paragraph beginning, “When Sister Anne walked between them those who suffered raised their eyes to hers as flowers lift their faces to the rain,” she dropped the paper and started for telephone.