ANN'S ANGEL
by
CQB
CHAPTER
3
THE CHAPTERS
The small hospital was
very quiet when the dark-haired girl arrived.
Not being familiar with the medical facility, she made her way to a
desk where an official looking person sat.
“Excuse me,” she
said to the woman at the desk.
“May I help you,
young lady?” Mabel Johnson
questioned.
“Yes Ma’am,” the
girl replied. “I’m looking
for my friend. Her parents
brought her here two or three days ago because she was really sick.”
Mabel smiled.
“What is her name?”
“Ann Webber,” the
girl answered.
The receptionist looked
up the girl’s name in her files. She
frowned when she found Ann Webber’s name.
“Your friend must be
very sick,” Mabel told the girl. “According
to her chart, she is in isolation.”
“Isolation?
That means whatever made her sick is contagious, right?”
“Yes, I’m afraid
so,” the receptionist replied. The
young girl in front of her sighed deeply.
Mabel noticed the wrapped gift in the girl’s arms.
“Is that for Ann?”
the woman asked.
“Yes,” the
sixteen-year-old replied. “It’s
what she wanted the most for Christmas.”
“Wait here a
minute,” Mabel said and disappeared into a nearby door.
A few moments later, another woman followed the receptionist back
to the desk.
“I’ll be right
back, Cheryl,” Mabel told the other woman, and then she looked at the
teenager.
“Come with me,
dear,” Mabel
instructed leading the way to the elevator bank.
*
* *
“You’d think by now I’d know how much to buy,”
Gertrude Hardy said to the elderly owner of the fabric shop.
“We try to keep this material in stock for you every
Christmas, Miss Hardy,” the woman replied.
“I very much appreciate your efforts, Mrs. Spencer,”
Gertrude replied, paying for her purchase.
She gathered her package and headed out the door.
She turned back to the elderly woman and said, “Have a
wonderful Christmas, my friend.”
*
* *
Thirteen-year-old Frank Hardy took a deep breath before he
stepped into the guest bedroom. His
brother moved in quickly behind him.
“There’s the ball,” Joe said, pointing to the corner of
the room, near the sewing machine. Frank
nodded and moved forward.
“Wow.” Frank heard his brother softly exclaim.
He turned to see what Joe was so awed about.
Joe was standing at the foot of the big, queen size bed.
Frank stared at the bed, trying to grasp what he was seeing.
“Wow,” Frank echoed Joe’s earlier reaction.
The two boys were so transfixed by what they saw, that
neither heard the door open behind them.
*
* *
The isolation area of
the hospital was on the second floor.
Mabel Johnson led the young woman down a hall to a large waiting
area.
“If she has family
visiting, they’ll be in here,” the receptionist offered.
“Thank you so
much,” the girl smiled warmly. “I’ll
go and see.”
Mabel started back
toward the elevators when she overheard two nurses talking.
“Such a shame,” one
nurse was saying. “She was
only sixteen. This will be so
hard on the family. I certainly hope none of the rest of the family comes
down with meningitis.”
“It’s never easy to
lose a child, but on Christmas Eve!” commended a second nurse.
Mabel stopped and went
to the nurses. “What’s the
name of the child that died?”
Nurse Nan Shaffer
looked up at the woman and recognized her from the reception desk.
“Hello Mabel. We’re
really not supposed to say, but since it’s you…well, the girl’s name
was Webber; Ann Webber.”
*
* *
Fenton Hardy heard his sister coming in the back door of
their house. He went to help
her with her package.
“Thank you, Fenton,” Gertrude said, giving her brother a
rare smile. He placed the
package on the kitchen table.
“I’m almost done,” she announced.
“You’ll help me make my deliveries?”
“Don’t I always?” the dark-haired man replied with a
warm smile.
Retrieving her package, Gertrude thanked him and started for
the stairs. She hesitated and
turned back to face her brother.
Setting the package back on the table, she reached over and
embraced her younger brother.
Fenton was taken aback, but quickly recovered and returned
the hug.
“What was that for?”
“For all these years of supporting my project and never
asking me about it, “Gertrude replied.
“One day soon, I’ll tell you.
It’s…been too difficult, but it does get easier every year.”
She picked up her package and went up the stairs.
When she saw the guest room door open, Gertrude gasped
softly. She knew her two
nephews well enough to know they would never go into the room without
permission. Why was the door open?
She walked up to the door and pushed it open all the way.
“Oh dear!” Gertrude cried as she saw the two boys
standing at the foot of the bed.
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The Hardy Boys belong to Simon and Schuster and the Stratemeyer Foundation. The Hardy Boys Fan Fiction authors of the Hardy Detective Agency have just borrowed them for an adventure or two. The authors promise to put the boys back when they are done with them. The authors do claim copyright to the original characters in this story. Please do not borrow original characters without express permission of the authors.