Molly Brown's College Friends Part 5

You are my G.o.dson and every day I am going to pray for you and think about you. I am going to send you presents and write you long letters and send you newspapers. The only trouble about it is by the time I get hold of English papers they will be weeks and weeks old.

I wonder if American magazines and papers would appeal to you. I wonder what kind of presents you would like,--not beaded antimaca.s.sars and not mouchoir cases surely. I will knit you a sweater maybe, but I am not very fond of knitting.

This business of being a Fairy G.o.dmother is a very serious one, more serious than being a real mother, I believe. A real mother can at least do something towards forming the character of her child, but a Fairy G.o.dmother has her child presented to her and takes it as the husband used to take his bride in the old English prayer book: "With all her debts and scandals upon her." The worst of it is that she is ignorant what those debts and scandals are. I don't even know what kind of smoke to send you. Are you middle-aged and sedate and do you smoke a corn-cob pipe? Are you young and giddy and do you live on cigarettes? A terrible possibility has entered into my mind! Are you one of those awful persons that uses what our darkeys call "eatin'

tobacco"? If so, I shall begin to train you immediately.

Perhaps you want to know something about me. There is not much to know. I am an orphan of independent means and character. Being the first, enables me to be the second, which sounds like a riddle but isn't. You see I have rafts and oodlums of kin, and if I did not have an income of my own they would step in and coerce me even more than they do. I said in the beginning that I was homeless. I am not really that, but the trouble is I have too many homes. I must spend the winter with Aunt Sally and the spring with Cousin Kate. Cousin Maria and Uncle Bruce want me to take White Sulphur by storm with them as chaperones; and so it is from one year's end to the other, kind relations planning for me. I am bored to death with it all and am even now preparing a bomb to throw in this camp of overzealous kin. But I'll tell you about that later,--that is, if you want to hear about it. I may be boring you stiff. If I am, it is an easy matter for you to repudiate me and tell Mrs. Johnson to get you a more agreeable G.o.dmother.

My numerous family does not at all approve of my being a G.o.dmother.

They think I am too young for the responsibility and have entered upon it too lightly. I even heard Aunt Sally whisper to Cousin Maria: "Just like her mother!" That means in their minds that I am headstrong and difficult. You see my mother was also of independent means and character. Also (I whisper this) she was not a Southerner.

That is as serious in a Southerner's eyes as not being British is in yours. They think it is very forward of me to be writing to a man what has not been properly introduced. Uncle Bruce suggests that you may not even be born. I tell him soldiers don't have to be born and that the bravest soldiers that were ever known sprang up from dragon's teeth.

I am sending you as my first present all kinds of tobacco, even plug. I must not let my prejudices get away with me. If my dear G.o.dson likes "eatin' tobacco," he shall have it. If you don't indulge in it, give it to some soldier less dainty. For my part, I should think the trenches would be dirty enough without adding to them.

I want to tell you that I like your name. I think Stephen Scott sounds very manly and upstanding, somehow. I am hoping for a letter from you just to give me an inkling of your tastes. Of course I know one of the duties of a Fairy G.o.dmother is not to worry her charge, and I don't want to worry you but to help you. I think of you in those damp, nasty ditches eating all kinds of food, served in all kinds of ways. (I am sure what should be hot is cold, and what should be cold is hot.) And when I sit down to batter-bread and fried chicken I can hardly force it down, I do so want you to have it instead of me.

Your affectionate G.o.dmother, POLLY NELSON.

The night nurse quietly folded up the first letter and slipped it back in its blue envelope. She had a whimsical, amused expression on her face.

"What are you smiling over? Don't you think that is a nice letter?"

"I didn't say it wasn't."

"But you didn't say it was. I think that is a sweet letter. I tell you it meant a lot to me. Of course, I am not the homeless Tommy she thought I was. I fancy I have as many Aunt Sallies and Cousin Marias as she has, but they happen to be in New England."

"You are not an orphan, then!"

"Oh, yes! I'm an orphan all right enough, but I am related to half of Ma.s.sachusetts and all of Boston."

"Did you tell your Fairy G.o.dmother that?"

"No,--that's what makes me feel so bad. I was afraid she would stop being my G.o.dmother if she found out I was--well, not exactly poor, so I--I didn't exactly lie----"

"You didn't exactly tell the truth, either," and the night nurse curled her pretty lip and looked disgusted.

"Oh, please don't be angry with me, too. I know she will be. I have simply got to tell her the truth about myself. I did let her know I am an American. I am going to write her a letter just as soon as I can see to do it. But go on with the next, please. You are sure it is not tiring you too much?"

"Sure," and the night nurse slipped out another.

MY DEAR G.o.dSON:

It was very nice of you to answer my letter so promptly. I am so glad you are an American and do not chew tobacco. You must not feel compelled to answer all my letters because you must be very busy and I have very little to do, so little that I am becoming very restless. I have thrown the bomb in the camp of the enemy, my kin.

They are shattered into smithereens. I am going to enter a hospital, take training, and just as soon as I am capable go to France with the Red Cross nurses. I should like to go immediately but I want to be a help not a hindrance, and they say all the untrained persons who b.u.t.t in on the war zone are a nuisance. Six months of training should make me fit, don't you think? But how should you know?

I am very happy at the thought of being of some use. I owe it all to you, my dear G.o.dson. If I had not been presented with you I should never have thought of such a thing. Just as soon as I realized that over in the trenches was a human being who wanted to hear from me and whom I could help, I began to take a new interest in the war and all the soldiers, and then I began to feel that maybe I, insignificant little I, might be of some use to those poor soldiers, some use besides just knitting foolish caps and mittens and sending the _Sat.u.r.day Evening Post_ and cigarettes. I only wish I could go immediately. My training begins to-morrow. Aunt Sally and Cousin Maria feel that it is a terrible blot on the family name. They are sure someone will say that I am doing this because I am not a success in society, although they say over and over that I am. I don't know whether I am or not, all I know is that society is not a success with me. Uncle Bruce is rather nice about it all.

There are so many I's in this letter I am mortified. I believe writing to a G.o.dson in the trenches is almost like keeping a diary.

I am sending you some cards and poker chips (but you mustn't play for money). I'd hate to think that my presents exerted a poor moral influence on my dear G.o.dson. Would you mind just dropping a hint as to what kind of presents would be most acceptable? I have never been in the habit of giving presents to men and the kinds of presents some of my friends give would not be very appropriate, it seems to me. Silver match boxes and cigarette holders would not be very useful, nor would silk socks with initials embroidered on them be much better. Do you like chocolate drops and poetry?

Your affectionate Fairy G.o.dmother, POLLY NELSON.

The night nurse laughed outright at the close of the letter and Stephen Scott reached out for the packet from which she was extracting a third blue envelope.

"If you are going to make fun of them, you can stop."

"I wasn't making fun. I was just thinking what funny presents girls do give men."

"Well, so they do, but my little G.o.dmother gave me bully presents,--cigarettes to burn, home-made mola.s.ses candy and beaten biscuit. She had lots of imagination in the presents she sent and the blessed child never did burden me with a work-box but sent me a gross of safety-pins that beat all the sewing kits on earth. I don't believe you like my G.o.dmother much."

"Don't you? Well, I do."

"You should like her because somehow you remind me of her."

"Oh! Have you seen her?"

"Only in my mind's eye. I begged her for a picture of herself but she has never sent it. She has promised it, though. You see I got to answering her letters in the same spirit in which she wrote to me, only I was not quite so frank, I am afraid. She told me everything about herself while I told her only my thoughts. I never did tell her I was not a homeless soldier of fortune. She thinks I am absolutely friendless and dependent on my pay as a private for my living. Sometimes I wish I didn't have a sou--at least I have felt that way--but now----"

"But now what?"

"But now I don't think it is so bad to have a little tin," and he held one of the little stained hands in his for a moment.

She gently withdrew it and opened a third letter. This was full of hospital experiences and so were all that followed. The tone of them became more intimate and friendly. The desire to serve was ever uppermost--just to get in the War Zone and help.

"I got awfully stuck on her, somehow," confessed the man. "She was so sweet and so girlish--I did not say so for fear of scaring her off, but I used to write her pretty warm ones, I am afraid."

"Why afraid?"

"Don't you know?"

"How should I know?"

"Why, honey, you must see that I am head over heels in love with you. I oughtn't to be telling it to you when I have written my little G.o.dmother that as soon as the war is over I am going to find her and tell her the same thing. But, somehow, I was loving her only on paper and in my mind; but you--you--I love you with every bit of my heart, soul and body." He caught her hand and all of the poor little slim blue letters slipped from the twine and scattered over the floor.

"Oh, the poor little letters!" she cried. "Is that all they mean to you?"

"Oh, honey, they meant a lot to me and still do, but they are just letters and you are--you."

"But how about the letters you wrote Miss Polly Nelson? Are they just letters to her and nothing more? Don't you think it is possible that she may have treasured your letters, especially the pretty warm ones, and be looking forward to the end of the war with the same eagerness that you have felt up to--say----"

"The minute I laid eyes on you. At first I used to dream maybe you were she, but I began to feel that she must be much--younger--somehow, than you. You are so capable, so mature in a way. She is little more than a child and you are a grown woman."

"I am twenty-one--but the war ages one."

"I don't mean you look old--I just mean you seem so sensible."

"And Miss Nelson didn't?"

"I don't mean that, I just mean she seemed immature. But suppose you read the last letter. And couldn't you do it with one hand and let me hold the other?"