Nancy could scarcely breathe, she was so frightened at the tone in which Orilla said that.
Her room!
“You see, these are all my things, and I come here whenever I get a chance,” Orilla confessed. “No one ever thinks of looking in here, and I never take anything away. I wouldn’t do that, you know,” she said very positively, as if fearing Nancy’s opinion.
“Your—room!” Nancy was too surprised to get past that unbelievable statement.
“Yes; and no one else cares for it or needs it.” Orilla was straightening around the brown reed chairs and patting the small table cover, and as she touched a thing, her affectionate interest in it was plain even to Nancy’s excited gaze.
“Doesn’t Rosa know?” Nancy asked finally.
“No. Rosa has been away a lot, you know, and besides, the Fernells only come here in summer. I was born in these mountains, and as a child mother brought me here. She’s a nurse, you know, and a wonderful mother.” Orilla sat down and pointed out a chair to Nancy, which the latter gratefully accepted.
Nancy knew little about Mrs. Rigney, but she guessed now that probably her love for Orilla had led her into the mistake of allowing her daughter to grow up believing Fernlode to be her own home.
As if divining Nancy’s thoughts, Orilla said almost that very thing.
“Mother was devoted to the real Mrs. Fernell,” she said, thereby disputing Lady Betty’s later claim, “and Mrs. Fernell was lovely to me. While Rosa was away at school I played around here as—well—you can imagine how I felt to be put out of this room!” she again challenged.