Read Online Nightingale by Susan May Warren - Free Book Online Page A

Common Supplies” and closed the
Textbook of Surgical Nursing
.
    â€œLet me read the letter.”
    â€œNo. Shh, don’t wake Sadie.” She cast a look at her sleeping daughter on Caroline’s bed, her little mouth open, drooling into her rabbit.
    Caroline’s expression softened and she cut her voice to a whisper. “I love her curly hair.” She touched her own, tied into silky brown rag curls around her head.
    â€œShe can already read. I’m telling you, I gave birth to a genius.”
    â€œOf course you did. Now—let me see the letter.”
    Esther made a face.
    â€œIt’s only fair—I tell you about my dates with Teddy.”
    â€œI can assure you, your dates are far more exciting. It says nothing, just an encouragement to continue my studies, and a quote from
Huckleberry Finn
.”
    â€œA quote from
Huckleberry Finn
? Are you sure he’s a doctor?”
    â€œHe’s also a farm boy from Iowa. One who seems to have seen the world.”
    Caroline raised an eyebrow.
    â€œOkay, fine. Here you go.” She slid out the aerogram then got up to pour herself a cup of sludge from the coffeepot on the stove. The afternoon sun pressed through the window, creeping across the wooden floor, the rag rug. The July breeze tickled the eyelet curtains, tangy with the smells of fresh-cut grass and summer roses.
    â€œThank you, by the way, for letting me study in your room.” She stood at the window of Caroline’s second-story boardinghouse and bit into a strawberry, captured by the sparkle of the sun on the limey grass, the way the peonies in the front yard exploded in pink and white, the daylilies, tall and sleek, the bleeding heart and its fragile pink blossoms weeping in the front lawn. And right outside her window, a yellow climbing rose, its heady scent meandering into the room. “No more victory gardens?”
    â€œAre you kidding me? Mrs. Delano spent last week planting a late crop of potatoes. And I weeded the strawberry bed for an hour to earn this paltry basket. She’s downstairs, sweat caught in the cracks in her neck, fanning herself as she stirs up strawberry jam. I fear victory gardens are here to stay.” Caroline began to untie the rags from her hair, the sun sweet on her face. “I hope the curls stay. My hair is taking forever to dry.” The hair fell out, one spiral curl at a time. “Your Peter sounds handsome. Just the way he describes himself.”
    â€œI simply said that I wanted to picture him as he sat in the dark next to Linus, in my mind, and he assumed I wanted a description. Who knows what he must think of me.”
    â€œI think he’s grateful for your letters. Why do you write to him?”She ran her fingers through her curls. “Do you like him?”
    Esther shot her a look. “Of course not.” Except, yes, maybe something stirred inside her this morning when she discovered his letter in her box, neat and crisp, like a gift.
    But probably, simply the sense of someone wanting to know more about her dulled the blade of loneliness inside. At least for the few minutes it took for her to read—no, savor his letter.
    Caroline held up her hand. “Calm down, it’s me. He seems smart—like you. And what does he mean by the Elbe? Where is that? Ohio?”
    â€œI don’t know. Maybe it’s a place in the South. Or maybe in Europe. He did say theaterplatz—what’s that? Funny, his quote—I actually remember that passage, ‘We said there warn’t no home like a raft, after all. Other places do seem so cramped up and smothery, but a raft don’t. You feel mighty free and easy and comfortable on a raft.’”
    She looked over her shoulder to catch Caroline’s smirk. “I don’t do a Mississippi accent very well.”
    â€œNo, you don’t. But it’s sort of strange that you can both quote the same book.”
    â€œMaybe it’s