The little one looked so pathetically small as she lay there, just a heap of bones, black skin, and woolly hair, with the tears still glistening on the black lashes, that Nathalie’s heart was stirred with pity.
Mrs. Morrow now came forward and quickly felt her pulse, crying as she did so, “Oh, you poor little black baby! Yes, she is all right!” she nodded assuringly, “but Helen, what is the matter with her leg?” Her sharp glance noted that it lay rather limply on the ground.
“I am not sure,” said Helen with bent brows as she touched it softly, “but I am afraid it is broken. That is why I waited for you and Nathalie, I did not like to move her for fear of hurting her.”
“But we shall have to,” returned Mrs. Morrow as she finished examining the injured limb, “for it is broken, and we must get her home as soon as possible, for it will have to be set.”
As Helen and Mrs. Morrow attempted to take hold of the child to lift her on the stretcher the girls had made, she opened her eyes wide into the strange faces bending over her. Then she closed them quickly, and as the little black face wrinkled in fear she let forth such a howl of absolute despair that the girls were all on the verge of joining with her in their keen sympathy.
“Oh, Rosy,” cried Nathalie springing hastily forward and taking the child’s hand softly in hers, “see, it is Mrs. Page’s little girl. Don’t you remember when you called me that—Mrs. Page’s little girl?” She repeated softly as she saw the child had stopped her crying and was staring up at her. But the black eyes closed again and the little form shivered as a prolonged howl answered the questioner.
But Nathalie, who loved children, lifted up the little head with its pigtails and laid it against her breast as she tried again. “There dearie, don’t you want to go in the choo-choo cars to see Mamma?”
These words had the desired effect, and the howl was arrested as two big black eyes stared with awakening interest while Nathalie caught hold of the stretcher and choo-chooed it back and forth. “Come, Rosy!” she cried in a third attempt, “and we will go in the choo-choo cars to see Mamma, and—oh, yes, the little rag-dollie I made for you, don’t you remember what a lovely time we had?”
The black eyes opened wide, stood still for a wee second, and then twinkled into a smile as their owner cried, “Oh, yes, I knows youse; youse de Story Lady!”
“Yes, I’m the Story Lady,” quickly answered Nathalie, her face breaking into a smile; then as Rosy smiled back, “but how did you get here, Rosebud, so far away from home?”