Later, this question did come up, for when the chickens and pig were domiciled at the Corners' and Daniella had become used to her surroundings, she realized that if she would be like the rest she must know much more than she did. At first she was like some little wild animal, and could not be kept in the house, saying she could not breathe there. She was shy of every one but Nan and Mary Lee, and fled at the approach of strangers. She did not know how to wear the clothing provided for her, nor had she ever been inside a church. Shops were a marvel and a school was something that had to be elaborately explained, but in time she came to understand that she was unlike the rest of the world and that if she would be in it she must be of it. Then she told Nan she wanted to know what was inside books, and she would go to school. One day of the routine was enough for her. She escaped before the morning was half over to Nan's mortification.
"You ought at least to have stayed till noon," she said, chidingly.
"I couldn't, I couldn't," replied Daniella vehemently. "I felt like a wild creetur in a trap, and them gals starin' and snickerin' made me feel like a fool thing. I ain't goin' to set alongside o' babies, an' I ain't no right with gals my own size. I don't want to hev nothin' to do with none of 'em, 'scusin' you an' Mary Lee. If I never l'arns nothin', I ain't goin' to be cooped up lak a po' trapped rabbit or a bird in a cage. I don't keer if I don't know nothin'. Maw'll love me jest the same."
Nan was quite distressed. She had felt a real missionary spirit in rescuing Daniella from the depths of her ignorance. She dreamed of the day when she should be proud of her, when pretty little Daniella would appear as well as any girl, but now her hopes were blasted. She thought long upon the subject. She discussed it with her sisters, with her Aunt Sarah, with Cousin Polly and Cousin Mag but no one could seem to offer a solution to the problem. It was cruel, every one thought, to send a girl to school who felt so keenly about it. Why make her miserable for the short time she was living in a civilized community? After a while she would have to return to her wild life, then where would be the good of having made her unhappy?
But Nan felt differently about it. She had a scheme of teaching Daniella herself, but the mountain girl spurned it, and said she wasn't goin' to hav no gal her own size l'arnin' her, though if the truth were known, she really did not want to give Nan the task. So at last Nan took her difficulty to her Aunt Helen, and here she found a friend in need, for Miss Helen declared that nothing would interest her more than to teach Daniella for an hour or two a day.
"She is like a blank, unwritten page," she said. "And I'd like the experience of putting my mark upon her. I should like to try some of my own theories. You say she is bright, Nan?"
"Real bright. Not like schooly brightness, but in a queer way, that shows she thinks a lot more than you suppose."
"So much the better. I can try to bring out what is in her, by my own methods."
Then Nan, by coaxing and arguing induced Daniella to try the experiment of going to Uplands for an hour each day, and after her very first trial it seemed that Miss Helen had solved the problem, and that Daniella's education had fairly begun.