Small Acts of Amazing Courage by Gloria Whelan

Author:Gloria Whelan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books
Published: 2011-08-27T04:00:00+00:00

My first reaction was disbelief. I tried to shake the gate loose, but it didn’t budge. It was much too high to climb. The padlock was secure. I was shut away from the rest of the world. For a couple of minutes I stared through the gate at the stairs that would have taken me to safety, and then I turned and walked slowly back down the corridor and past the cabins with their frightening sounds of distress. I was surely walking toward my death. Now that I believed I would never see it, England seemed very pleasant. I thought of my mother and how terrible the loss of her only remaining child would be and how it would serve Father right for sending me away. I realized I was taking comfort in feeling sorry for myself.

I passed a cubbyhole of a stateroom with no one in it. Probably its occupants were among the scores of patients in the room that had been converted into a hospital. I was so anxious to crawl into a safe corner that I gave no thought to germs which might be lurking in the state-room, but only crept inside and closed the door, thinking I would hide from the disease. The room was full of reminders of its occupants. There was a neatly folded red sari. Red was a bride’s color, so perhaps a young girl was going to an arranged marriage in England with a young Indian man. I saw as well another sari of a more ordinary cloth and children’s sandals in several sizes, so the bride must be sharing her room with another woman and that woman’s children. They were all sick, maybe dead.

I realized how dangerous the room might be. The sickness, like a menacing beast, overcame them and even now might be lurking in the cabin, ready to attack me. I flung open the door and fled down the hallway to Mrs. Blodget.

When she saw me, she put her hands over her face as if to shut off the sight of me. When she took away her hands, there were tears in her eyes. “Rosalind, what are you doing here? What am I to say to your parents? They trusted me.”

I explained about the gate. At once she rushed over to an officer who was overseeing everything and began to plead with him. “She has only been here for a few minutes. She can’t be contagious.”

He looked unhappy, and I could see he wanted to let me go, but he was under orders. “I have instructions from the captain, and I cannot make an exception. If I made an exception, there would be a mutiny from all the other people down here who want to get away. She should have thought what she was doing.”

As if she could protect me from what was all around me, Mrs. Blodget put her arms about me and drew me close. I breathed in the smell of disinfectant and strong soap. “What will your parents think of me?” she said.

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