MARION MARLOWE’S NOBLE WORK - The Tragedy at the Hospital E-Book

Grace Shirley

• Herausgeber: Abela Publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

It is 1900 and Marion Marlowe is now a nurse at the Charity Hospital. She had passed through many trials since she came to the city, acting the part of heroine on several occasions, yet each time withdrawing herself and her noble deeds as rapidly as possible into the background so as not to attract too much attention. Her sister, Dollie, has also moved into the city where she has found work as a secretary with a company of lawyers. An old friend Bert decides to visit Dollie and calls upon her at the office, where social calls are frowned upon. She finds Bert has been rescued from poverty and has been adopted by a wealthy gentleman, who offers him the world. He is in town to find Marion and intends proposing to her – now that he is being educated and will soon be wealthier than he could imagine. However, Bert is disappointed to find Marion is already spoken for. Dollie has not quite realised that her employer, Mr Atherton, is sweet on her and could be blindly walking into what could become a messy social situation. Marion finds Dollie at lunch with her employer, whose intentions she challenges. Only then does Dollie realise what is going on. Dressed down and found out, Mr Atherton retreats. An old gentleman overhears the exchange and congratulates them on their win. But who is George Colebrook? What happened between him and Marion and what has he played in their past and what role will he play in their futures? 10% of the profit from the sale of this book will be donated to charity. ============= KEYWORDS-TAGS: Marion Marlowe, Noble, Deeds, Works, Allyn, Archie, Ass, Atherton, Belle, Bert, Beauty, Body, Breasts, Brookes, cat, carriage, doctor, Dollie, employer, friend, girl, Greenaway, heart, Horseless Carriage, Charity Hospital, hospital, Island, Jackson, laughing, lawyer, lawyer, love, Manhattan, Marion, Marion’s, Marlowe, money, Motor Car, nurse, poor, prison, pussy, Ralph, Ray, Reginald, sister, sweetheart, wife, woman, young, Grace Shirley

Leseprobe

Marion Marlowe’s Noble Work

Or

The TRAGEDY AT THE HOSPITAL

The Marion Marlowe MysteriesBy Grace Shirley

An Extract From

Originally Published by

Street & Smith, New York City.

[1900]

Resurrected byAbela Publishing, London

[2018]

Marion Marlowe’s Noble Work

Typographical arrangement of this edition

© Abela Publishing 2018

This book may not be reproduced in its current format in any manner in any media, or transmitted by any means whatsoever, electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, or mechanical ( including photocopy, file or video recording, internet web sites, blogs, wikis, or any other information storage and retrieval system) except as permitted by law without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Abela Publishing,

London

United Kingdom

2018

ISBN-13: 978-X-XXXXXX-XX-X

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Abela Publishing

CHAPTER I.A Trio Of Doctors.

The College of Physicians and Surgeons, or the “P. & S.,” as it is usually called, had just graduated a large class of promising young doctors, and the morning after the commencement exercises the big building looked deserted. As Dr. Reginald Brookes, a handsome young man of twenty-two, passed down the steps, dress suit case in hand, he came face to face with two of his classmates.

“Hello, doc. What did you get, Charity or Bellevue? I hear you competed,” called one of the young doctors.

“Neither one,” said Dr. Brookes, with a smile of amusement, “I got a berth in the Penitentiary, Greenaway!”

“Oh, that’s too bad!” said Dr. Fielding, a pleasant-faced gentleman. “You’ll rust in that place—they never have anything interesting! Why, the best you will see will be a few contusions and a case of cholera morbus or eczema of some kind.”

Reginald Brookes still smiled, although he knew his friend was speaking truthfully.

“I’m going to Bellevue, and I’m mighty glad of it,” said Fielding, enthusiastically. “For if there is anything going they get it at Bellevue.”

“Yes, they catch it all, there,” was Dr. Greenaway’s answer, “and it’s not so far from the world as the Island, either.”

“Then there’s any number of pretty nurses to flirt with,” he said, laughing. “No lack of either fun or work in the wards of old Bellevue.”

“I’m sorry for you, Brookes,” exclaimed Dr. Fielding again. “Why, you poor chap, you’ll hardly see a pretty face where you are going, for I understand that the prison women do about all the nursing.”

“Yes, ‘Big Belle, the Confidence Queen,’ is head nurse there now, I believe,” laughed Brookes, “or at least she is guardian of the woman’s ward just at present. I expect I’ll have to leave my watch and money outside when I go on duty. She might try her skill on me, just to keep in practice.”

“Well, I am sorry for you, doc; still it is better than no berth at all,” said Greenaway, sadly, “I didn’t get a thing, and I’m the poorest man in the college.”

“By Jove, that’s too bad!” said Reginald Brookes, with feeling. “But, say, what are you going to do; you can’t go into general practice without capital.”

Fred Greenaway shrugged his shoulders and frowned slightly.

“I used up all I had on my education,” he said, briefly, “but I’ll catch on to something. I’m not worrying about it.”

Dick Fielding rushed away at that moment in answer to a call from a friend, and in a flash Dr. Brookes put his hand on Greenaway’s shoulder.

“Let me lend you five thousand to start with, old chap! I can do it as well as not, and you can give me an I. O. U. for security.”

Fred Greenaway looked up at the handsome fellow in amazement.

“Great Cæsar! Do you mean that, doc?” he asked, excitedly.

“Certainly,” said young Brookes, briefly, as he drew a check book from his pocket. “Why the deuce didn’t you tell me you were hard up before. I thought you considered me your friend, you rascal!”

Fred Greenaway did not speak for the space of a minute. Such generosity as this was totally unknown to him, and just at this time it was doubly and trebly grateful.

“I guess I should have gone to the wall in spite of my grit,” he said slowly, as Brookes folded and handed him the check. “I haven’t five dollars in my pocket this minute, and as there wasn’t a ghost of a show in sight for me to practice my profession, I was starting out to apply for a job as motorman on a street car, or something of that sort.”

“Let me know how you get on,” said Brookes, as he waited for the I. O. U. that Greenaway was scribbling. “I’ll be on the Island for a year, I suppose, unless I find, as Fielding says, that I am actually rusting.”

“But why do you go there, Brookes?” asked his friend, rather anxiously. “With your money, what is to hinder your going straight into practice?”

Reginald Brookes did not answer the question immediately; he appeared to be a little embarrassed.

“I’ll tell you, Fred!” he blurted out finally, “but don’t give me away, old man, or the boys will say I lack ambition; but the fact is I’m in love—desperately in love, and it is with a sweet little nurse who is ‘on probation’ in Charity.”

“I see,” said Greenaway, with a smile of amusement. “And you can’t bear the idea of having the East River roll between you! Well, I don’t know that I blame you, doc, for after all, what’s the good of money if you can’t be independent!”

“It is just this way,” said Brookes, seriously, as the two friends started slowly up Fifty-ninth street. “She is a beautiful girl, a country lass, and fresh as a daisy. I’m sure I don’t know how she can endure that place, but she is determined to stay there and take care of those poor wretches, and some way I thought she would be happier if I went over and helped her.”

“Oh, how generous we are!” said Greenaway, laughing. “You mean you knew you would be happier on Blackwell’s Island with her than you would on Fifth avenue with any other woman.”

“I see you know how it is,” said young Brookes, with a grin of sympathy. “You are in love yourself, old boy, or you couldn’t speak so feelingly.”

“I admit it,” said Greenaway, a sad look crossing his face. “I’m in love all right, but that is all the good it will ever do me.”

“Who is she?” asked Brookes, with a sudden keen interest.

The frown deepened on Greenaway’s face and his voice fell lower as he answered: “Her name is May Osgood, and she is an actress,” he said, slowly. “I have loved her for some time—I can’t seem to get over it.”

That there was a reason why he should get over it was very apparent by his words, but Reginald Brookes was too cultured to dream of asking his secret.

“Well, my little sweetheart is only seventeen,” he said gayly, “and, between you and I, she has not accepted me yet, so you see I have a double reason for wishing to be near her.”

As they parted at the L station, Greenaway spoke rather suddenly.

“I’ll turn my life insurance over to you if anything happens, Reg; but, by the way, what is your sweetheart’s name? I seem to have a feeling that I ought to know it.”

Reginald Brookes glanced at him in a little surprise.

“Her name is Marion Marlowe,” he said, very slowly, then, as Greenaway ran up the stairs, he looked after him curiously.

“He’s a funny chap,” he muttered, uneasily. “Now, why the deuce did he feel that he ought to know my little sweetheart’s name? Confound the fellow! He has no business with such feelings!”

CHAPTER II.A Word Of Warning.

Augustus Atherton, attorney-at-law, was seated in his office looking over some papers.

Suddenly he tapped a bell upon his desk and his office-boy entered.

“Tell Sands to bring me a copy of Halstead’s testimony, Bob,” he said, shortly, “and tell him to hurry; I want it this minute!”

“Mr. Sands is out to lunch, sir, won’t be back for half an hour,” said the boy, respectfully, “but Miss Marlowe has the copy; shall I tell her to bring it?”

“Yes, at once,” said the lawyer, wheeling around in his chair.

In less than a minute his “typewriter girl” entered the office.

“Here is the paper, sir,” said a sweet, low voice.

Mr. Atherton looked up and then stared a little. It was the first time he had really taken a good look at the new copyist.

The young girl who stood before him was very beautiful. She had a sweet, oval face, lighted by violet eyes, and her rippling golden hair shone like threads of sunshine.