CHAPTER XIV
THE CHARM
It was a wonderful charm—that picture of a little boy and his pet hen. Nanny carried it about during the day and felt almost safe and easier of heart. She wondered what had become of all her old happiness, the carefree joy that had been hers before she met the boy who came from India and who did not understand women.
Ever since that day on the hill top Nanny's life had been troubled. She was haunted with strange, vague fears. She woke up one morning with the knowledge that she had dreamed the night long of the boy from India. That afternoon she found herself unable to think of anything but him.
A panic seized her. She began to be afraid of herself. She caught herself looking out of the windows and down the dusty summer roads, at first unconsciously and then with a curious expectancy that grew to a longing so real that she could not help but understand.
It came to Nanny with a terrible shock—the knowledge that at last she loved a man. She remembered then the eyes of the men who had loved her and whom she had so carelessly sent away. She understood then the hurt they had carried away with them and hoped penitently that each had found the comfort and love he had craved.
She wondered how and where she was to look for comfort. She saw with something very much like horror that, unlike the men who had sought her, she dared make no plea, could not by word or look give any sign of what had befallen her.
If others came to know, her misery would be unbearable. The terrible thought came that perhaps Cynthia's son might come to see. At that the earth seemed to go soft beneath her feet and her world lay blurred in a mist of amazed misery.
She was wretched and gay by turns. The day came when her father and brother noticed this and spoke of it. Then it was that Nanny turned white and walked away to Grandma Wentworth's. She had half a mind to tell Grandma and perhaps through that wonder-wise soul find her way back to peace and sanity. But Grandma had teased too and so Nanny held on desperately to her secret, wondering how she was to go on enduring.