Sidney never forgot her early impressions of the hospital, although they
were chaotic enough at first. There were uniformed young women coming and
going, efficient, cool-eyed, low of voice. There were medicine-closets with
orderly rows of labeled bottles, linen-rooms with great stacks of sheets
and towels, long vistas of shining floors and lines of beds. There were
brisk internes with duck clothes and brass buttons, who eyed her with
friendly, patronizing glances. There were bandages and dressings, and
great white screens behind which were played little or big dramas, baths or
deaths, as the case might be. And over all brooded the mysterious authority
of the superintendent of the training-school, dubbed the Head, for short.
Twelve hours a day, from seven to seven, with the off-duty intermission,
Sidney labored at tasks which revolted her soul. She swept and dusted the
wards, cleaned closets, folded sheets and towels, rolled bandages--did
everything but nurse the sick, which was what she had come to do.
At night she did not go home. She sat on the edge of her narrow white bed
and soaked her aching feet in hot water and witch hazel, and practiced
taking pulses on her own slender wrist, with K.'s little watch.
Out of all the long, hot days, two periods stood out clearly, to be waited
for and cherished. One was when, early in the afternoon, with the ward in
spotless order, the shades drawn against the August sun, the tables covered
with their red covers, and the only sound the drone of the bandage-machine
as Sidney steadily turned it, Dr. Max passed the door on his way to the
surgical ward beyond, and gave her a cheery greeting. At these times
Sidney's heart beat almost in time with the ticking of the little watch.
The other hour was at twilight, when, work over for the day, the night
nurse, with her rubber-soled shoes and tired eyes and jangling keys, having
reported and received the night orders, the nurses gathered in their small
parlor for prayers. It was months before Sidney got over the exaltation of
that twilight hour, and never did it cease to bring her healing and peace.
In a way, it crystallized for her what the day's work meant: charity and
its sister, service, the promise of rest and peace. Into the little parlor
filed the nurses, and knelt, folding their tired hands.
"The Lord is my shepherd," read the Head out of her worn Bible; "I shall
not want."
And the nurses: "He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me
beside the still waters."