A Pearl Among Princes Read Online Free Page B

taken him to hospital,” Nora Baker shouts, her fat freckled arms sunk deep in dough. “Wher’ve ya been, ya goosey girl? Go!”
    Nora’s words cut me even though I know she doesn’t mean to be cruel. Father always says it’s just Nora’s hard way, like bread left too long in the oven.
    I tear across the field and up the road to the hospital, a dreary grim building I’ve not been to since I pulled the top off a double-decker pot and boiling steam burned my neck. A good salve took the pain away, but not the memory. I am no fan of cooking pots.
    Heart pounding, body sweating, I reach the entrance and push open the heavy wooden door, nearly knocking down Captain Jessie Tru, on the other side.
    â€œOh, sorry, sir,” I say, catching my breath.
    â€œGrace,” he says, bowing forward in a sweetly chivalrous manner. Rising up he looks in my eyes, his face soft with emotion as if he knows me, and yet we’ve never met. How does he know my name?
    No time for small talk. “Are you okay, sir? Here, sit for a moment.” I motion him toward a bench.
    â€œYer like a gale force, you are,” he says with a laugh that deepens the wrinkles on his wind-battered face. He coughs a deep garrulous cough.
    â€œAre you sick, Captain Jessie?” I say. “You’ve only just arrived and . . .”
    â€œBit of a toe fungus is all,” he says, raising his left boot. “Nature of the job. Some days ya just can’t get dry at sea.”
    I nod as if I understand and then, assured he’s all right, I set off to find my father.
    There is no one at the front desk. I start down the hall, ducking my head in first one, then another, then a third room. “Father!” I race to his bedside.
    His eyes are closed but his thick chest moves up and down as he snores.
    â€œThank heavens.” I wrap my arms about him and let the sobs come.
    A nurse comes into the room. “ Shhhh ,” she admonishes, finger stamping her tight pinched lips. She motions for me to join her in the hallway.
    There is a wool blanket at the base of Father’s bed. I pull it up over him to keep him warm. “Be right back,” I whisper, kissing his cheek.
    Out in the hall I say, “I’m Cook’s daughter, Grace- pearl.”
    â€œYes,” says the nurse coldly.
    â€œWhat happened?” I ask.
    â€œA heart attack,” she says, sallow-faced and bird thin as if she hasn’t had a good meal in years.
    â€œHow can that be? He was fine this morning.”
    â€œI am not the doctor, miss. You may speak with Dr. Jeffers when he makes his evening rounds, but I would say it has something to do with your father’s . . . fondness for food.” She shakes her head disapprovingly. “He’s got more blubber than the whales that used to fuel every lamp on Mira—”
    â€œHow dare you speak of my father like that!” My face flushes hot. “What is your name? I’ll have you reported . . .”
    â€œNurse Hartling,” she says with a sniff, adjusting her starched white cap. “And my apologies, miss, but you would do well to put your father on a diet.”
    I resist the urge to slap this brazen bird. I take a breath and let it out slowly, the temper-taming trick Father taught me. “Will he be all right, Nurse?”
    â€œThat’s for Doctor to judge,” Nurse Hartling says, checking her watch, “but he’s been resting with ease for some two to three hours now, with no further round of pain, and that is generally a good sign.”
    Dear Father has been lying in this hospital bed for three hours while I was sparring with fool Humpty in the garden? My throat clenches. I gulp back tears. “May I stay with him?”
    â€œIt’s best you let him sleep,” the pinch-nosed nurse says. “He should not move or try to speak or be troubled by any . . . emotional outbursts from visitors. The longer he rests, the