to say: I shall not speak of this again, and I wish you all to follow
my example. I cannot expect you to feel as kindly toward any one
whom you suspect as before this happened, but I do expect and
desire that you will not torment the suspected person in any way,
he will have a hard enough time without that. Now go to your
lessons.”
“Father Bhaer let Nat off too easy,” muttered Ned to Emil, as they
got out their books.
“Hold your tongue,” growled Emil, who felt that this event was a
blot upon the family honor.
Many of the boys agreed with Ned, but Mr. Bhaer was right,
nevertheless; and Nat would have been wiser to confess on the
spot and have the trouble over, for even the hardest whipping he
ever received from his father was far easier to bear than the cold
looks, the avoidance, and general suspicion that met him on all
sides. If ever a boy was sent to Coventry and kept there, it was
poor Nat; and he suffered a week of slow torture, though not a
hand was raised against him, and hardly a word said.
That was the worst of it; if they would only have talked it out, or
even have thrashed him all round, he could have stood it better
than the silent distrust that made very face so terrible to meet.
Even Mrs. Bhaer’s showed traces of it, though her manner was
nearly as kind as ever; but the sorrowful anxious look in Father
Bhaer’s eyes cut Nat to the heart, for he loved his teacher dearly,
and knew that he had disappointed all his hopes by this double sin.
Only one person in the house entirely believed in him, and stood
up for him stoutly against all the rest. This was Daisy. She could
not explain why she trusted him against all appearances, she only
felt that she could not doubt him, and her warm sympathy made
her strong to take his part. She would not hear a word against him
from any one, and actually slapped her beloved Demi when he
tried to convince her that it must have been Nat, because no one
else knew where the money was.
“Maybe the hens ate it; they are greedy old things,” she said; and
when Demi laughed, she lost her temper, slapped the amazed boy,
and then burst out crying and ran away, still declaring, “He didn’t!
he didn’t! he didn’t!”
Neither aunt nor uncle tried to shake the child’s faith in her friend,
but only hoped her innocent instinct might prove sure, and loved
her all the better for it. Nat often said, after it was over, that he
couldn’t have stood it, if it had not been for Daisy. When the others
shunned him, she clung to him closer than ever, and turned her
back on the rest. She did not sit on the stairs now when he solaced
himself with the old fiddle, but went in and sat beside him,
listening with a face so full of confidence and affection, that Nat
forgot disgrace for a time, and was happy. She asked him to help
her with her lessons, she cooked him marvelous messes in her
kitchen, which he ate manfully, no matter what they were, for
gratitude gave a sweet flavor to the most distasteful. She proposed
impossible games of cricket and ball, when she found that he
shrank from joining the other boys. She put little nosegays from
her garden on his desk, and tried in every way to show that she was
not a fair-weather friend, but faithful through evil as well as good
repute. Nan soon followed her example, in kindness at least;
curbed her sharp tongue, and kept her scornful little nose from any
demonstration of doubt or dislike, which was good of Madame
Giddy-gaddy, for she firmly believed that Nat took the money.
Most of the boys let him severely alone, but Dan, though he said
he despised him for being a coward, watched over him with a grim
sort of protection, and promptly cuffed any lad who dared to
molest his mate or make him afraid. His idea of friendship was as