“Oh, Mrs. Van Vorst,” exclaimed Nathalie, tears misting in her eyes in sympathy with the lady’s grief, “I know how you feel, but it is all right. I think you are both lovely, I am sure I have nothing to tell; of course, I know that your daughter does not mean what she says, she’s just spoiled.” A sudden thought came to the girl. “Don’t you think if you were to let her see people—that is girls of her own age—that she would be better? Oh, I am sure she would,” broke from the girl impetuously, “and it would make her so happy!”
“Do you really think so?” inquired Mrs. Van Vorst with a note of hope in her voice. “Would it not hurt her when people said rude things about her?”
“But no one would say rude things about her,” persisted Nathalie determinedly. “Every one would love her—she’s a dear, so sweet-looking—and then she would soon get over her spoiled ways; she would learn by seeing that other girls act differently.” Nathalie felt that she had spoken incoherently, but oh, it did seem such a shame!
“I don’t know about that,” replied Mrs. Van Vorst, her face hardening again to the same impenetrable mask that had puzzled Nathalie the first time she met her. “Well, we will not discuss it now—we’ll see how things turn out—only, Miss Page,” she grew stiff and formal, although a note in her voice betrayed that she was battling with her emotion, “I should like to ask you again to keep silent a little longer, not to tell—how foolish I was—” she broke off suddenly, and then she added, “of course, you have a right to tell; but let me explain that what Nita says is not true, she likes to tease me into getting her way. Sit down—oh—she has fallen asleep.” Mrs. Van Vorst opened the door softly and then closed it. “She always does when she cries that way.”
“Yes, I have been foolish,” she reiterated, “but I am not a criminal, and it is not altogether pride, because I have a deformed child, that makes me keep her secluded. It is because I want to save her, I would give my life for her happiness, but I can’t—” there was a hopeless wail to her voice. “That is my punishment!” And then, as if reminded of what she wanted to tell Nathalie, she continued more calmly, “It is true that I shut Nita in a dark room. I punished her—she has always had those temper spells—I never knew what to do with her. Some one told me I was too easy with her, so I put her in the room and when she stopped crying I thought she had fallen asleep, but oh, she tried to get out, she said some one was chasing her, and climbed out on the shed and fell off the roof! She broke—her back!” Mrs. Van Vorst buried her face in her hands, but although no sounds came, Nathalie could see the convulsive shivers that shook her frame.
The girl was dumb. What could she say? It was awful! Oh, but if she didn’t say something she would be boo-hooing herself in a minute. “But that was not your fault,” she cried with sudden inspiration. “It was right for you to punish her. Oh, Mrs. Van Vorst, I should consider it just an accident that you could not help.”
Mrs. Van Vorst lifted her face and gazed at the girl with wide, appealing eyes. “Oh, do you think that? If I could be led to believe I was not to blame! For years I have suffered the tortures of hell, doing penance.”
“Yes, and making yourself and your daughter miserable!” Nathalie spoke boldly, she couldn’t help it, the words came of themselves as it seemed to her. “But, Mrs. Van Vorst, look at it in another way, perhaps I should not speak this way to you, for I am just a girl, but I feel so sorry for you, and Nita, it does seem such a shame to shut her off from all pleasure just because an unfortunate thing happened. Why, Mrs. Morrow says we should regard trouble like clouds that we can’t blow away unless we fill the atmosphere with sunshine.” Nathalie came to a sudden stop, afraid she had gone beyond her depth. But in a moment she added, “Oh, if you would just think of it as an accident! Try to make Nita happy, and then you will be happy, and forget all about it!”
Mrs. Van Vorst’s eyes grew moist as she cried impulsively, “Oh, you are a dear girl to talk to me this way. I shall always remember it, always. Yes, you are right, I have been miserable and have been making my poor child so. Oh, I have been wrong!”
Before Nathalie could answer, Nita’s voice was heard shrilly crying, “Mother, I want Nathalie!”