Patricia St John Series

by Patricia St John

  How beautiful they are! she thought. I shall bring Jenny up here and we’ll pick them together.

  As she thought of Jenny, she began to wonder how they would all get on together. Their lives were so different. Once, when they had been growing up together, she and Elizabeth had been like sisters, but Elizabeth had married a rich man and had gone to live in his beautiful home. Jenny had been brought up surrounded by beauty and peace, and had had everything that love and money could give. Aunt Rosemary could have made her home with them, too, but while she was training to be a nurse she had felt that God wanted her to go to Africa to help people and to care for poor, ragged children. Elizabeth and her husband thought it was a foolish thing to do, and Aunt Rosemary had found it difficult to write and tell them about her life.

  Their letters had mainly been about Jenny, and every Christmas Elizabeth had sent Rosemary a photograph of her as she grew up, and Rosemary had kept them all in a little photo album. The last picture had been of Jenny on her pony. Rosemary wondered how Jenny would feel about the simple toys the Moorish children enjoyed. She was used to expensive dolls and proper beds and riding her pony about her father’s estate. She would probably get very bored. Feeling rather sad, Rosemary hurried back down the mountain with her flowers, collected a happy, sticky Kinza, and went home.

  She went to the toy cupboard and inspected it rather sadly. There were some shabby scrapbooks, faded puzzles, and chipped bricks, some scruffy little dolls, and a box of stubby chalk. They had all obviously been enjoyed by children who had never seen toys before, and all the toys were well-worn. Rosemary shut the cupboard with a sigh and went to the kitchen to make buns.

  By half-past four the little house was as bright as scrubbing and polishing could make it, and the sitting room was sweet with the scent of wildflowers. Tea was ready, the kettle was singing on the stove, and Rosemary and Kinza set out to meet the car in front of the hotel.

  It arrived punctually, a smart, streamlined vehicle, and the little boys surged around, fighting each other in their efforts to carry the luggage. Rosemary stood waiting for her relatives to get out, and above the pandemonium she heard a child’s voice cry out, “Oh, Mummy, look! What a sweet little girl! You never told me Aunt Rosemary had a little girl.”

  The moment they extricated themselves from the mob of little boys, Elizabeth, looking just as young as she had looked ten years before, was kissing her cousin warmly. Jenny was squatting on the ground, trying to make friends with Kinza.

  “Jenny,” said her mother sharply, “you haven’t greeted Aunt Rosemary.”

  Jenny got up, kissed her aunt politely, and turned back to Kinza. While the adults sorted out the luggage, passports, and forms, Rosemary stood quietly watching the child whom for years she had longed to see. An elfin-looking child, she thought, and went over to make friends.

  Jenny turned a troubled face to her aunt. “What is the matter with this little girl?” she asked. “I showed her my pretty brooch, and she just stared in front of her.”

  “I’m afraid she’s blind, Jenny,” said Rosemary gently. “But it doesn’t mean you can’t play with her. You must give her toys she can feel, and you must sing to her and let her touch you. She’ll soon love you.”

  Rosemary lifted Kinza’s tiny hand and passed it lightly over Jenny’s face and hair. “That’s how she gets to know people,” she explained, and then turned to speak to Jenny’s mother and father. But before she could say anything, Jenny had seized her mother’s hand and was looking up at her, her grey eyes brimming with tears.

  “She’s blind, Mummy,” she whispered, “like the little Christmas children.”

  “Never mind,” replied Mrs. Swift gently. “She looks like a very happy little girl, and we must find her a little present. Now, let’s come and see Aunt Rosemary’s house.”

  They set off across the market, the grown-ups walking ahead and Jenny leading Kinza, too interested in her new playmate to notice much of the town about her. She was happier than she had been all the holiday for, much as she loved her mother and father, she was only nine, and she longed for other children to play with. Most of all she longed for something to look after. She was too old for dolls, her pets had all been left at home, and she missed them dreadfully. But a curly-haired blind baby of three was far better than pets. She had never dreamed of anything so exciting.

  They had reached the narrow backstreet where Rosemary lived, and Mrs. Swift was talking in a rather strained voice and trying not to look too horrified at the babies sitting on the cobbles and the ragged old beggar chanting in one of the doorways. Then she suddenly looked very horrified indeed, for Rosemary had stopped in front of the last house and was taking out her key. On the doorstep sat a very poor woman, holding something to her breast under her rags.

  Rosemary spoke to the woman, who pulled aside her rags and held out a baby, all skin and bones, half-dead with sickness and exhaustion. Mrs. Swift put out her hand to take hold of Jenny, but she was too late. Her child had stepped forward, and both she and Rosemary were stooping over the pathetic little creature, quite absorbed.

  “Jenny!” commanded her mother. “Come here!” But Jenny took not the slightest notice. She turned tragic eyes to her aunt.

  “Is it going to die?” she whispered.

  “I don’t know; I hope not,” replied Rosemary. “Let’s go in.”

  She opened the front door, led the woman into the room where she gave out the medicines, and told her to sit down while she turned back to her guests. Mrs. Swift was standing very still, recovering from her shock at finding such a wretched creature on Rosemary’s doorstep. She noticed that the young mother had a patient face, one used to suffering, with beautiful dark eyes that gleamed with hope as she lifted her baby toward the nurse.

  “Rosemary,” she urged, “don’t worry about us; we can look after ourselves. You go and see to that poor baby.”

  Rosemary hesitated. “Well, come upstairs,” she said, “and I can show you where the sitting room is. Tea is all ready, and the kettle is boiling.”

  It was a surprise to enter a house on that dingy street and find it bright with pictures and flowers, and a delicious meal set out on pretty china. Rosemary sat them down on the low mattress seats and made tea. Then she spoke rather shyly.

  “It seems awfully rude,” she said, “but would you mind if I left you just for ten minutes? You see, I know this woman. She’s lost four babies—this one is all she’s got.”

  Jenny slipped her hand into her aunt’s. “I’m going to help you,” she announced.

  “No, Jenny,” exclaimed her mother firmly. “It’s quite out of the question. Come and sit down and drink your tea.”

  Jenny flew into a passion at once.

  “I want to go!” she stormed. “I want to see that baby get well. I don’t want any tea! Say I can come, Aunt Rosemary—it’s your house. Daddy, say I can go. Mummy, you might let me—”

  Her father most unexpectedly came to Jenny’s rescue. “What is the matter with that baby?” he asked. “Has it got anything infectious?”

  “I shouldn’t think so,” answered Rosemary. “I’ve seen it before. She’s suffering from starvation and improper feeding.”

  “Then, Elizabeth, I would let her go, if Rosemary doesn’t mind,” said Mr. Swift. As Jenny left the room triumphantly with Rosemary, he turned to his wife. “Darling,” he said, “let her help all she can. She needs to help someone. It may make her a little less selfish to see that sort of thing, and I’m sure Rosemary will be sensible about infection.”

  “Perhaps so,” agreed Jenny’s mother, and she gave a little sigh. “If only she could have had younger brothers and sisters,” she added wistfully.

  Meanwhile, Jenny and her aunt were bending over the white-faced baby, and the mother was telling the usual tale of poverty, ignorance, and improper feeding. It seemed almost too late to help, but perhaps there was still a chance. Rosemary, nursing the tiny thing in a blanket, turned to Jenny.

  “Go upstairs
, Jenny,” she said, “and bring me a cup and a spoon and some sugar from the shelf above the stove.”

  Jenny obeyed, moving swiftly and lightly.

  “Now go and fetch the kettle,” commanded her aunt.

  Jenny was off in a flash.

  “Now bring me those white tablets on the third shelf over there,” her aunt went on, speaking very gravely, and Jenny had the uncomfortable feeling that her aunt disapproved of her.

  “Now please rinse out the cup and spoon with some of that boiled water. Crush up one tablet and mix it with a little water. Pass me that bottle.”

  Jenny forgot her temper, forgot her aunt, and forgot herself. She knelt perfectly still on the mat, only conscious of the weak gurgling sound as the baby tried to swallow. Almost drop by drop the medicine disappeared and the baby was not sick. After a few more spoonfuls of sweetened water, Rosemary began talking to the mother in Arabic, explaining that she must sit quietly for an hour and then they would give the child another drink.

  “It must get better,” muttered Jenny to herself. “It must! It must!”

  And then Rosemary did something that surprised Jenny. She pointed to the picture on the wall of Jesus holding a child in His arms, and told the woman all about it. Then she prayed aloud for the sick little baby. Jenny could not understand what her aunt was saying, but she knew she was praying.

  I wonder if that really does any good, thought Jenny, and she, too, glanced up at the painting on the wall. Somehow the sight of the child in the picture being held so closely made the real baby seem safer.

  “It’s sure to get better,” breathed Jenny to herself, bending over it again. And as she watched, the weak eyelids fluttered, and the baby opened her eyes.

  A Light Begins to Shine

  They didn’t need to make any further plans, for Jenny announced firmly that they were going to stay in the town until it was time to go home to England, and she was going to be Kinza’s nurse and help Aunt Rosemary every day with the sick babies in the clinic.

  Mr. Swift laughed comfortably and then wondered what he was going to do with himself in a remote mountain village for two weeks. Mrs. Swift sighed anxiously and insisted that Jenny should gargle three times a day. Jenny herself was openly thrilled, and Rosemary was secretly very happy. She felt the holiday was going to be a complete success.

  It was Sunday afternoon, and on Sunday no one came to the clinic. There had been a meeting for women in the afternoon, and Jenny watched them leaving, walking slowly down the street with their babies tied tightly on their backs under the white outer garments that covered them from head to toe.

  “They look like camels with humps, carrying their babies like that,” remarked Jenny. “You’d think their babies would be suffocated, wouldn’t you? Why don’t they have baby carriers like ordinary people?”

  “They couldn’t afford to buy them,” replied Rosemary, smiling. “But it certainly isn’t a very good way to carry them. A lot of babies grow up with weak lungs through lack of fresh air. You’ve noticed how pale some of them look.”

  “And spotty and thin and dirty,” added Jenny, wrinkling her small nose. “It’s a pity there aren’t more people like you to teach them how to look after their babies properly. You know, Auntie, I’ve been thinking. I’ve decided that when I grow up I’m going to be a missionary too. I’m going to come out here and have a clinic and make all the sick people better like you do. I think it’s such fun.”

  Rosemary looked down into Jenny’s brown, confident face, and she didn’t answer for a moment or two.

  “You couldn’t be a missionary unless something very important happened to you first, Jenny,” she said at last.

  “Why not, Auntie?” inquired Jenny, surprised. “I could learn to be a nurse and how to look after babies. I wouldn’t need to know anything else, would I?”

  “Yes, I think you would,” replied Rosemary with a smile, “but I’m not going to tell you here in the passage. Let’s take a picnic tea to the Tower Gardens, and then we can talk about it. Kinza will be awake by now, and she loves the Tower Gardens.”

  “Ooh, lovely!” cried Jenny, and pranced up the stairs two at a time to get things ready. “Mummy said I could stay to tea if you invited me. I specially asked her.”

  “Did you now?” said Rosemary, laughing. “Would you like to get Kinza ready while I get the picnic? Then we can go.”

  Ten minutes later Rosemary, Jenny, and Kinza were climbing the steps to the Tower Gardens. They were so beautiful that the little group stood still for a moment, gazing at everything silently.

  “Don’t let Kinza fall in the pond,” warned Rosemary. “You just hang on to her while I spread out the tea.”

  She unpacked the basket and then sat for a few moments quietly watching the two children at play. Kinza was growing into a beautiful little girl now, strong and sturdy. Who was she, and what would become of her? It’s time some practical plan is made about her future, thought Rosemary, if she is to grow up useful and clever with her hands. And Jenny—was she going to grow up careless and selfish? Rosemary hoped not.

  Jenny caught sight of the picnic laid out and, taking Kinza’s hand in hers, came running up. Kinza was given a bun, and Jenny helped herself to a sandwich and turned a questioning face to her aunt.

  “What else would I have to know to become a missionary?” she asked, as though the conversation had never left off.

  “It depends on what you want to do,” replied Rosemary steadily. “If you simply want to heal people’s sickness, then you must train to be a nurse or a doctor. But most people here are so poor that they will probably get ill again very quickly, and in any case none of our bodies lasts very long. The part of people that really matters is the part that lasts forever, their real proper selves, which we call their spirits. You can really only help them and make them happy by leading them to the Lord Jesus, and you can’t possibly do that unless you know Him yourself. So it isn’t really what you know, but who you know.”

  “But you spend such a long time each day giving them medicine,” said Jenny. “Why couldn’t I just do that?”

  “You could,” said Rosemary, “but the reason I do it is not just to make them better. I give it because I want them to see that Jesus lives in me and He cares about their pain and wants to help them. You have got to show the love of Jesus by doing good things. He isn’t on earth anymore, but His Spirit lives in the hearts of those who love and trust Him, and He works through them. So the first thing you have to be sure of is that Jesus is actually there, loving through you. Otherwise it’s just like taking an empty lantern out in the dark.”

  “Well, how do you know if He’s there or not?” asked Jenny.

  “How does the light get into the empty lantern?” asked Rosemary. “It’s a matter of opening a door and placing a candle inside. Jesus is the Light, and He wants to come in. If the glass of the lantern is clean, the light shines out clearly, but if the glass is cloudy and dirty the light will be very dim. If we really want Him to, Jesus will make us clean and new inside, like clear glass, by helping us to stop being bad-tempered and impatient and disobedient. Then the light of Jesus’ love will shine through, and people will be attracted to Him. He is the important part, not the lantern.”

  There was another pause.

  “So I suppose only very good people can be missionaries?” Jenny said thoughtfully.

  “It’s not exactly that,” said Rosemary. “Many people are very good and kind without Jesus, just like golden lanterns when you put them in the sun. But in the evening the sun sets. Our own goodness lasts only as long as we do—until we die. The love and life and goodness of Jesus last forever, and the people who have His light in them will last forever as well. It is called eternal life, and of course it’s a far stronger sort of goodness than the other kind.”

  “There are Mummy and Daddy coming into the garden,” exclaimed Jenny suddenly, and she jumped up and ran along the path toward them. She was rather glad to escape from this conversation, fo
r Aunt Rosemary was saying some quite disturbing things, and Jenny did not really like being disturbed. But whatever happened, Jenny knew she would always be by far the most important person in the world to her mother and father.

  Rosemary followed, leading a rather dirty Kinza. She smiled at Elizabeth over Jenny’s head—it was wonderful to see her running about and strong again. One of the best parts of the holiday for both women had been the renewing of their old friendship, which now felt as strong and sure as it had been before their very different ways of life had seemed to separate them.

  Elizabeth had to admit that her cousin was not altogether wasting her time. The look on the face of the sick baby’s mother had taught her that, and in spite of the germs and the sores at the clinic, she trusted Rosemary with Jenny as she had never trusted anyone before. And this was strange, for a few weeks ago she would have been horrified at her little girl having anything to do with poverty and illness.

  There are different sorts of beauty, she thought. Healing and helping and loving and giving are beautiful. I want Jenny to grow up good and unselfish, and I think Rosemary can help her in that way.

  When she spoke to her husband about it, he agreed. “She’s learning something practical in that clinic,” he said, “and she may find she’d make a good nurse.”

  “Rosemary,” said Elizabeth, cuddling Kinza against her, “couldn’t you desert your little ones just for once this evening, and come and have supper with us at the hotel?”

  “They don’t come on Sunday,” replied Rosemary. “It’s my day off, except for the afternoon meeting. I’d love to come.”

  “Oh, Mummy, look!” cried Jenny. “That peacock has spread open its tail.” And she hurried her parents off to see, while Rosemary and Kinza made their slow way home.