Clinch Valley News

NATHALIE.
I saw her first carrying a great fat baby, apparently heavier than herself—a thin, small-faced girl, looking about ten years old, but, as I afterward found out, nearly thirteen. I shall always think Nathalie was stunted by a perpetual baby burden, for her aunt, with whom she lived, had a frequent addition to her family, and Nathalie had nursed babies since she was seven years old.
About that time her mother died, and the little orphan was thrown upon the tender mercies of her aunt.
Madame Poisson was stout, red-faced, loud-voiced, and with one ruling passion, that all around her should earn their salt by constant work.
She would have liked to rise at midnight, and set her household their tasks, but as that was impossible, she contented herself with beginning at dawn.
Her husband was a farmer and miller near the little town of Mapleton; her two eldest sons worked in the fields with the other laborers, and woe to any of them who did not obey the imperious dame. She did not spare herself, for constant employment was her religion; but she had a frame like iron, and the strength of a strong man.
As for Nathalie, had it not been for the babies she was required to keep out of the way, she would have been driven to the grave by tasks impossible for her puny frame to perform.
As it was, she ate her hurried meals with the everlasting baby on her lap, whom she was expected to feed at intervals, and attend to the wants of the twins, about two years old, who sat beside her. She was then driven out, with the three children, to be kept out of the way until dinner-time.
"I treat the little one well!" Madame Poisson would say to her gossips. "She is my poor sister's child, and I have pity for her. I work myself. I work my children; but for Nathalie, all she has to do all day long is to play in the woods with the little ones. It is play, play all the time for her, and eat and drink of the best."
Madame Poisson believed faithfully what she said.
It was during one of these "play" times that I first made the acquaintance of Nathalie. I had been walking through the pretty little woodland which surrounded the town of Mapleton, where I was spending the summer with a friend.
Suddenly I came upon two stout, stolid-looking children, looking more like Dutch dolls than anything else.
Their laps were full of flowers, and in front of them was lying the baby, crowing and kicking on its heels.
Nathalie was going through a kind of acrobatic performance for the amusement of her charges, while the twins gravely stared at her with their big expressionless blue eyes. I have seldom seen any one so active and daring as Nathalie was, as she sprang from one grape-vine to another, and danced a kind of pas seul on them.
I was hidden behind a clump of bushes, where the children did not see me; but I noticed the little girl's face was pale, and big drops stood on her forehead from fatigue. Whenever she stopped to rest, the Dutch dolls set up a howl.
"Oh, hush, Manette, hush, Marie, or Tante Poisson will come after us! Then she will not let us come here any more.
I am going to play again for you. Now look, look, and see me fly!"
She made a spring to a high vine, which hung far above the one on which she was sitting. She missed it, and fell to the ground. In a moment I was beside her, and lifting her up.
"Are you hurt?" I asked.
"I don't know," she said, rubbing her head. "My head hurts, but it has hurt me all day. Oh, Bebe, don't cry!" The baby was yelling at the top of its voice, and the chorus was swelled by the Dutch dolls, who were frightened by my sudden appearance. "Don't cry, my darlings! Thalie is coming to you."
She rose to her feet, and sank down again with a sharp cry.
"Ah, my foot is broken! I cannot walk! What will Tante Poisson say? What shall I do? Oh, what shall I do?"
"You will do nothing but lie here till I come back," I said. "It is a short walk to your aunt's and I will go and tell her, so that she can send for you.
Perhaps these children will let me take them home." But as I approached the twins, they threw themselves flat on their backs, and yelled as if I had been the Giant Blunderbore, ready to eat them up.
"They don't like strangers!" Nathalie gasped. "O madam, I must try to walk." But as she raised herself, she sank back almost fainting with agony.
I walked rapidly to the house, and, as I neared it, saw Madame Poisson in the front yard, washing some clothes. I knew her well by sight, and as I called her name, she raised her monstrous, dripping arms from the suds, and turned to me.
"What does madame want," she asked curtly.
"Your little niece has hurt herself yonder in the woods. She has either sprained or broken her ankle. She cannot walk."
"Oh, the miserable creature!" cried the woman. "Forever and forever doing something wrong! And nothing to do but amuse herself all day! Has she hurt my children?" turning upon me fiercely.
"No, but she is badly hurt."
"Saints be praised it is not my angels!
Nathalie is a stubborn, ungrateful girl.
And now to lay herself up, and leave me all to do! Pity she hadn't broken her neck at once!"
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Madame Poisson!" I cried, indignantly. "If you do not intend sending help to the poor child, I will do so."
"And where does madame think I can get help? Call the men out of the field at this hour, and lose so much time? No; if anyone goes, I must!"
She strode off, and I followed her, for somehow the idea of a dove in a vulture's claws pursued me when I thought of poor, trembling little Nathalie borne in the arms of the unfeeling giantess.
When I reached them, she had the girl by the arm, and had lifted her to her feet.
"None of your airs," she cried. "If you try to walk, you can.
You are pretending. Stand up!"
I caught the child as she fell back, and at that moment I saw a man whom I knew well coming down the road in his cart.
"Ah, here is Pierre Lagrange!" I cried, joyfully. "I know he will take the child home."
Pierre was a good, humane fellow, more than willing to do a kind act, and lifted Nathalie into his cart at once.
Madame Poisson, growling like a bear, had taken herself off with the baby in her arms, and the Dutch dolls toddling after.
"But then this is a bad business for you, Nathalie," Pierre said, as he jogged along.
"That old fire-cat is going to give you hard times."
"I never have easy times, Monsieur Pierre," she answered, with her patient voice, the tears rolling down her white face. "I would wish to be dead, and with mamma, if it was not for the children, but I love them, and they love me."
"Love you! Just listen to her! The little vampires that suck her life-blood.
The tyrants that get her more beatings than I can count! And, madame, you hear her say she loves them?"
"Yes, they do love me," she sighed.
"Monsieur Pierre, they are all I have in the world. Tante Poisson is not always cross. She has good days, you know, and is kind, but then, you see, she has so many children, she has no love to spare for me."
"That's certain and sure," Pierre muttered in his heavy beard, but we had reached the farm-house, and he lifted Nathalie out tenderly.
"Farewell, madame, and thank you," she said, as he bore her into the house.
I thought often of Nathalie during the next few weeks. I heard her ankle was sprained, but that she was doing well. I did not venture to call, for it was evident that Madame Poisson had taken an inveterate dislike to me.
But I was glad to see the little girl walking out one morning with the baby in her arms. I hurried forward and intercepted them. Nathalie was thinner than ever, but her eyes—lovely eyes they were—brightened at sight of me.
"Are you quite well, Nathalie," I asked.
"My foot hurts me a little, madam, but I can walk. It is the first time I could carry Bebe—sweet Bebe!" kissing enthusiastically the pasty-faced infant.
"We are going to have a fête in the woods, Bebe and I," showing me a little package she held in one hand.
"There is a slice of pie and a piece of cake, and oh, madame, will you not come to our fête?"
I said I would, but I must run home for something. That something was an addition to the tea-party in the shape of some fruit I had just received. It was good to see the delight in Nathalie's eyes when I laid my contribution before her.
"Oh, Bebe! Bebe?" she screamed, clapping her hands.
"Bananas, Bebe!
Oranges! and lovely white grapes!
Oh, they are too beautiful to eat!"
When the repast was over, Nathalie wrapped what remained in her apron for Bebe and the twins.
"You look quite happy, Nathalie," I said.
"Happy? ah, yes, madame, there is no one happier than I am to-day. Only think, I can walk again and nurse Bebe.
I love all children, but Bebe is a real angel of heaven!"
I sat there wondering over that starved young life whose only modicum of sunlight was putty-faced Bebe. What was happiness after all? A poor, ill-treated waif, whose daily bread was flavored by harsh words, sat there under God's blessed sunlight and called herself happy. I gave up the problem.
Several weeks passed, and although I was often on the watch, I saw nothing of Nathalie. The house where my friend and I boarded, commanded a full view of the Poisson farm; for some days none of the men had been working in the field, and the loud voice of Madame Poisson was silent.
"What is the matter over at Poisson's?" I asked our landlady, Mrs. Blake.
Mrs. Blake turned very red, and looked confused.
"Well, the truth is, I didn't like to tell you, ladies, for I thought you might get scared, and there ain't a bit of danger, for there's no communication between the farm and any house in town.
They've got small-pox there bad. Nearly all the family are down with it. Old Poisson caught it from a tramp. Two of the children will die to-night, and they say the old madame can't live. There is no one to attend them but one of the boys and little Nathalie."
"She is not sick, then?" I said, relieved.
"Nathalie? no.
Old Dargan, who has been there—he's had small-pox himself—told Mr. Blake, the child goes from one to the other, with Bebe in her arms.
Bebe has small-pox, too, and she never puts it down."
I cannot express all I felt when the next day I saw the funerals leave the cottage—one of the sons and one of the smaller children, Mrs. Blake did not know which. Then a few days afterward the hearse stopped again, and two small white coffins were brought out.
They held the poor little Dutch dolls.
After that I heard of the gradual recovery of the other patients and that Nathalie did not take the disease.
Nearly a month elapsed, and I was preparing to leave Mapleton when, in one of my walks, I came suddenly upon Nathalie leading her aunt by the hand.
"Oh, I'm so glad to see you, madame!" she cried. "We are taking a little walk," Tante Poisson and I. She is getting quite strong again."
"I am glad to see you out," I said.
"I heard how ill you were."
"Is it the American lady, Thalie?" she asked. "I am blind, madame. I live, yes; but never to see again! Helpless, useless! ah!" With a groan she threw up her gaunt arms, and her face, torn and ploughed by the dread disease, was full of despair.
"Oh, hush, Tante!" Nathalie cried.
"Am I not here to help you and do all you want?"
"Yes, it is so," the woman cried, quietly. "The one to whom I was cruel and unkind. God has given me as my sole stay. I tell her to go and be happy.
She shall have money to live where she chooses, but she says: 'No! No!' "
"Leave you and Bebe!" Nathalie cried; "Never! With you is my home as long as you want me."
The woman, still weak and nervous, burst into tears, and her little niece led her away.
My problem was solved. If Nathalie was happy in loving and serving a little child, what will be her degree of felicity to find herself necessary to a whole family—her duties manifold, but sweetened by the love and trust for which her faithful little heart hungered.—Marie B. Williams, in Youth's Companion.