AUNT JANE AUNT JANE BY JENNETTE LEE AUTHOR OF "UNCLE WILLIAM," "THE WOMAN IN THE ALCOVE," ETC. NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1915 COPYRIGHT, 1915, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS [Illustration] TO GERALD STANLEY LEE I "Aunt Jane, what are you thinking of?" The young man turned his head a little on the pillow to look inquiringly toward the door. It was the door of Room 24 leading into the Men's Ward. Aunt Jane had been standing there for five minutes, gazing intently before her into space. The serene face framed in the white muslin cap had a rapt, waiting look. It reminded the young man of a German madonna that he had run across last summer in an old gallery corner, whose face had haunted him. "Aunt Jane, what are you thinking about?" he repeated gently. She turned slowly toward him, the placid look breaking into twinkles. "I was thinking I'd better turn Mr. Ketchell's mattress the other end to, and put a bolster under the upper end. It kind of sags." For a moment the young man on the pillow looked a little bewildered. Then he lay back and laughed till the iron bedstead rang and the men in the ward pricked up their ears and smiled in sympathy. Aunt Jane smiled too, stepping leisurely toward him. "There, there," she said as she adjusted the sheet and lowered his pillow a trifle: "I don't know as I'd laugh any more about that. 'Tisn't so very funny to change a mattress the other end to." He raised a hand and wiped the laughter from either eye. "But you looked as if you were thinking of angels and cherubim and things, Aunt Jane." She nodded placidly. "I generally do," she responded, "but that doesn't hinder knowing about mattresses and bolsters.... I wouldn't laugh any more for a day or two if I was you. The bandages might get loose." She slipped a careless hand along his forehead, gathered up a cup and plate from the stand beside him, and slid plumply from the room. His eyes followed her through the door, down the long ward as she stopped here and there for a word or a question. Once she raised her hand sternly at a bed and sniffed. The cap strings bristled fiercely. "He's catching it," muttered the young man from the private room. "I knew he would. You can't keep a baccy-pouch in the same room with Aunt Jane." He sighed a little and glanced, without turning his head, toward the window where the spring clouds sailed and filled with swelling whiteness. A breath of freshness stole in softly. On the sill was a bowl of pansies. He lay looking at them idly. His lids fluttered and closed--and lifted again and fell shut.