POLLYANNA
Chapters 1 to 4 Chapters 5 to 8 Chapters 9 to 12
Chapters 13 to 16 Chapters 17 to 20 Chapters 21 to 24 Chapters 25 to 28 Chapters 29 to 32Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8"For the land's sake, Miss Pollyanna, what a scare you did give me," panted Nancy, hurrying up to the big rock, down which Pollyanna had just regretfully slid.
"Scare? Oh, I'm so sorry; but you mustn't, really, ever get scared about me, Nancy. Father and the Ladies' Aid used to do it, too, till they found I always came back all right."
"But I didn't even know you'd went," cried Nancy, tucking the little girl's hand under her arm and hurrying her down the hill. "I didn't see you go, and nobody didn't. I guess you flew right up through the roof; I do, I do."
Pollyanna skipped gleefully.
"I did, 'most--only I flew down instead of up. I came down the tree."
Nancy stopped short.
"You did--what?"
"Came down the tree, outside my window."
"My stars and stockings!" gasped Nancy, hurrying on again. "I'd like ter know what yer aunt would say ter that!"
"Would you? Well, I'll tell her, then, so you can find out," promised the little girl, cheerfully.
"Mercy!" gasped Nancy. "No--no!"
"Why, you don't mean she'd CARE!" cried Pollyanna, plainly disturbed.
"No--er--yes--well, never mind. I--I ain't so very particular about knowin' what she'd say, truly," stammered Nancy, determined to keep one scolding from Pollyanna, if nothing more. "But, say, we better hurry. I've got ter get them dishes done, ye know."
"I'll help," promised Pollyanna, promptly.
"Oh, Miss Pollyanna!" demurred Nancy.
For a moment there was silence. The sky was darkening fast. Pollyanna took a firmer hold of her friend's arm.
"I reckon I'm glad, after all, that you DID get scared--a little, 'cause then you came after me," she shivered.
"Poor little lamb! And you must be hungry, too. I--I'm afraid you'll have ter have bread and milk in the kitchen with me. Yer aunt didn't like it--because you didn't come down ter supper, ye know."
"But I couldn't. I was up here."
"Yes; but--she didn't know that, you see!" observed Nancy, dryly, stifling a chuckle. "I'm sorry about the bread and milk; I am, I am."
"Oh, I'm not. I'm glad."
"Glad! Why?"
"Why, I like bread and milk, and I'd like to eat with you. I don't see any trouble about being glad about that."
"You don't seem ter see any trouble bein' glad about everythin'," retorted Nancy, choking a little over her remembrance of Pollyanna's brave attempts to like the bare little attic room.
Pollyanna laughed softly.
"Well, that's the game, you know, anyway."
"The--GAME?"
"Yes; the 'just being glad' game."
"Whatever in the world are you talkin' about?"
"Why, it's a game. Father told it to me, and it's lovely," rejoined Pollyanna. "We've played it always, ever since I was a little, little girl. I told the Ladies' Aid, and they played it--some of them."
"What is it? I ain't much on games, though."
Pollyanna laughed again, but she sighed, too; and in the gathering twilight her face looked thin and wistful.
"Why, we began it on some crutches that came in a missionary barrel."
"CRUTCHES!"
"Yes. You see I'd wanted a doll, and father had written them so; but when the barrel came the lady wrote that there hadn't any dolls come in, but the little crutches had. So she sent 'em along as they might come in handy for some child, sometime. And that's when we began it."
"Well, I must say I can't see any game about that, about that," declared Nancy, almost irritably.
"Oh, yes; the game was to just find something about everything to be glad about--no matter what 'twas," rejoined Pollyanna, earnestly. "And we began right then--on the crutches."
"Well, goodness me! I can't see anythin' ter be glad about--gettin' a pair of crutches when you wanted a doll!"
Pollyanna clapped her hands.
"There is--there is," she crowed. "But _I_ couldn't see it, either, Nancy, at first," she added, with quick honesty. "Father had to tell it to me."
"Well, then, suppose YOU tell ME," almost snapped Nancy.
"Goosey! Why, just be glad because you don't--NEED--'EM!" exulted Pollyanna, triumphantly. "You see it's just as easy--when you know how!"
"Well, of all the queer doin's!" breathed Nancy, regarding Pollyanna with almost fearful eyes.
"Oh, but it isn't queer--it's lovely," maintained Pollyanna enthusiastically. "And we've played it ever since. And the harder 'tis, the more fun 'tis to get 'em out; only--only sometimes it's almost too hard--like when your father goes to Heaven, and there isn't anybody but a Ladies' Aid left."
"Yes, or when you're put in a snippy little room 'way at the top of the house with nothin' in it," growled Nancy.
Pollyanna sighed.
"That was a hard one, at first," she admitted, "specially when I was so kind of lonesome. I just didn't feel like playing the game, anyway, and I HAD been wanting pretty things, so! Then I happened to think how I hated to see my freckles in the looking-glass, and I saw that lovely picture out the window, too; so then I knew I'd found the things to be glad about. You see, when you're hunting for the glad things, you sort of forget the other kind--like the doll you wanted, you know."
"Humph!" choked Nancy, trying to swallow the lump in her throat.
"Most generally it doesn't take so long," sighed Pollyanna; "and lots of times now I just think of them WITHOUT thinking, you know. I've got so used to playing it. It's a lovely game. F-father and I used to like it so much," she faltered. "I suppose, though, it--it'll be a little harder now, as long as I haven't anybody to play it with. Maybe Aunt Polly will play it, though," she added, as an after-thought.
"My stars and stockings!--HER!" breathed Nancy, behind her teeth. Then, aloud, she said doggedly: "See here, Miss Pollyanna, I ain't sayin' that I'll play it very well, and I ain't sayin' that I know how, anyway; but I'll play it with ye, after a fashion--I just will, I will!"
"Oh, Nancy!" exulted Pollyanna, giving her a rapturous hug. "That'll be splendid! Won't we have fun?"
"Er--maybe," conceded Nancy, in open doubt. "But you mustn't count too much on me, ye know. I never was no case fur games. but I'm a-goin' ter make a most awful old try on this one. You're goin' ter have some one ter play it with, anyhow," she finished, as they entered the kitchen together.
Pollyanna ate her bread and milk with good appetite; then, at Nancy's suggestion, she went into the sitting room, where her aunt sat reading. Miss Polly looked up coldly.
"Have you had your supper, Pollyanna?"
"Yes, Aunt Polly."
"I'm very sorry, Pollyanna, to have been obliged so soon to send you into the kitchen to eat bread and milk."
"But I was real glad you did it, Aunt Polly. I like bread and milk, and Nancy, too. You mustn't feel bad about that one bit."
Aunt Polly sat suddenly a little more erect in her chair.
"Pollyanna, it's quite time you were in bed. You have had a hard day, and to-morrow we must plan your hours and go over your clothing to see what it is necessary to get for you. Nancy will give you a candle. Be careful how you handle it. Breakfast will be at half-past seven. See that you are down to that. Good-night."
Quite as a matter of course, Pollyanna came straight to her aunt's side and gave her an affectionate hug.
"I've had such a beautiful time, so far," she sighed happily. I know I'm going to just love living with you but then, I knew I should before I came. Good-night," she called cheerfully, as she ran from the room.
"Well, upon my soul!" ejaculated Miss Polly, half aloud. "What a most extraordinary child!" Then she frowned. "She's 'glad' I punished her, and I 'mustn't feel bad one bit,' and she's going to 'love to live' with me! Well, upon my soul!" ejaculated Miss Polly again, as she took up her book.
Fifteen minutes later, in the attic room, a lonely little girl sobbed into the tightly-clutched sheet:
"I know, father-among-the-angels, I'm not playing the game one bit now--not one bit; but I don't believe even you could find anything to be glad about sleeping all alone 'way off up here in the dark--like this. If only I was near Nancy or Aunt Polly, or even a Ladies' Aider, it would be easier!"
Down-stairs in the kitchen, Nancy, hurrying with her belated work, jabbed her dish-mop into the milk pitcher, and muttered Jerkily:
"If playin' a silly-fool game--about bein' glad you've got crutches when you want dolls--is got ter be--my way--o' bein' that rock o' refuge--why, I'm a-goin' ter play it--I am, I am!"
CHAPTER VI. A QUESTION OF DUTY
It was nearly seven o'clock when Pollyanna awoke that first day after her arrival. Her windows faced the south and the west, so she could not see the sun yet; but she could see the hazy blue of the morning sky, and she knew that the day promised to be a fair one.
The little room was cooler now, and the air blew in fresh and sweet. Outside, the birds were twittering joyously, and Pollyanna flew to the window to talk to them. She saw then that down in the garden her aunt was already out among the rosebushes. With rapid fingers, therefore, she made herself ready to join her.
Down the attic stairs sped Pollyanna, leaving both doors wide open. Through the hall, down the next flight, then bang through the front screened-door and around to the garden, she ran.
Aunt Polly, with the bent old man, was leaning over a rose-bush when Pollyanna, gurgling with delight, flung herself upon her.
"Oh, Aunt Polly, Aunt Polly, I reckon I am glad this morning just to be alive!"
"PollyANNA!" remonstrated the lady, sternly, pulling herself as erect as she could with a dragging weight of ninety pounds hanging about her neck. "Is this the usual way you say good morning?"
The little girl dropped to her toes, and danced lightly up and down.
"No, only when I love folks so I just can't help it! I saw you from my window, Aunt Polly, and I got to thinking how you WEREN'T a Ladies' Aider, and you were my really truly aunt; and you looked so good I just had to come down and hug you!"
The bent old man turned his back suddenly. Miss Polly attempted a frown--with not her usual success.
"Pollyanna, you--I Thomas, that will do for this morning. I think you understand--about those rose-bushes," she said stiffly. Then she turned and walked rapidly away.
"Do you always work in the garden, Mr.--Man?" asked Pollyanna, interestedly.
The man turned. His lips were twitching, but his eyes looked blurred as if with tears.
"Yes, Miss. I'm Old Tom, the gardener," he answered. Timidly, but as if impelled by an irresistible force, he reached out a shaking hand and let it rest for a moment on her bright hair. "You are so like your mother. little Miss! I used ter know her when she was even littler than you be. You see, I used ter work in the garden--then."
Pollyanna caught her breath audibly.
"You did? And you knew my mother, really--when she was just a little earth angel, and not a Heaven one? Oh, please tell me about her!" And down plumped Pollyanna in the middle of the dirt path by the old man's side.
A bell sounded from the house. The next moment Nancy was seen flying out the back door.
"Miss Pollyanna, that bell means breakfast--mornin's," she panted, pulling the little girl to her feet and hurrying her back to the house; "and other times it means other meals. But it always means that you're ter run like time when ye hear it, no matter where ye be. If ye don't--well, it'll take somethin' smarter'n we be ter find ANYTHIN' ter be glad about in that!" she finished, shooing Pollyanna into the house as she would shoo an unruly chicken into a coop.
Breakfast, for the first five minutes, was a silent meal; then Miss Polly, her disapproving eyes following the airy wings of two flies darting here and there over the table, said sternly:
"Nancy, where did those flies come from?"
"I don't know, ma'am. There wasn't one in the kitchen." Nancy had been too excited to notice Pollyanna's up-flung windows the afternoon before.
"I reckon maybe they're my flies, Aunt Polly," observed Pollyanna, amiably. "There were lots of them this morning having a beautiful time upstairs."
Nancy left the room precipitately, though to do so she had to carry out the hot muffins she had just brought in.
"Yours!" gasped Miss Polly. "What do you mean? Where did they come from?"
"Why, Aunt Polly, they came from out of doors of course, through the windows. I SAW some of them come in."
"You saw them! You mean you raised those windows without any screens?"
"Why, yes. There weren't any screens there, Aunt Polly."
Nancy, at this moment, came in again with the muffins. Her face was grave, but very red.
"Nancy," directed her mistress, sharply, "you may set the muffins down and go at once to Miss Pollyanna's room and shut the windows. Shut the doors, also. Later, when your morning work is done, go through every room with the spatter. See that you make a thorough search."
To her niece she said:
"Pollyanna, I have ordered screens for those windows. I knew, of course, that it was my duty to do that. But it seems to me that you have quite forgotten YOUR duty."
"My--duty?" Pollyanna's eyes were wide with wonder.
"Certainly. I know it is warm, but I consider it your duty to keep your windows closed till those screens come. Flies, Pollyanna, are not only unclean and annoying, but very dangerous to health. After breakfast I will give you a little pamphlet on this matter to read."
"To read? Oh, thank you, Aunt Polly. I love to read!"
Miss Polly drew in her breath audibly, then she shut her lips together hard. Pollyanna, seeing her stern face, frowned a little thoughtfully.
"Of course I'm sorry about the duty I forgot, Aunt Polly," she apologized timidly. "I won't raise the windows again."
Her aunt made no reply. She did not speak, indeed, until the meal was over. Then she rose, went to the bookcase in the sitting room, took out a small paper booklet, and crossed the room to her niece's side.
"This is the article I spoke of, Pollyanna. I desire you to go to your room at once and read it. I will be up in half an hour to look over your things."
Pollyanna, her eyes on the illustration of a fly's head, many times magnified, cried joyously:
"Oh, thank you, Aunt Polly!" The next moment she skipped merrily from the room, banging the door behind her.
Miss Polly frowned, hesitated, then crossed the room majestically and opened the door; but Pollyanna was already out of sight, clattering up the attic stairs.
Half an hour later when Miss Polly, her face expressing stern duty in every line, climbed those stairs and entered Pollyanna's room, she was greeted with a burst of eager enthusiasm.
"Oh, Aunt Polly, I never saw anything so perfectly lovely and interesting in my life. I'm so glad you gave me that book to read! Why, I didn't suppose flies could carry such a lot of things on their feet, and--"
"That will do," observed Aunt Polly, with dignity. "Pollyanna, you may bring out your clothes now, and I will look them over. What are not suitable for you I shall give to the Sullivans, of course."
With visible reluctance Pollyanna laid down the pamphlet and turned toward the closet.
"I'm afraid you'll think they're worse than the Ladies' Aid did--and THEY said they were shameful," she sighed. "But there were mostly things for boys and older folks in the last two or three barrels; and--did you ever have a missionary barrel, Aunt Polly?"
At her aunt's look of shocked anger, Pollyanna corrected herself at once.
"Why, no, of course you didn't, Aunt Polly!" she hurried on, with a hot blush. "I forgot; rich folks never have to have them. But you see sometimes I kind of forget that you are rich--up here in this room, you know."
Miss Polly's lips parted indignantly, but no words came. Pollyanna, plainly unaware that she had said anything in the least unpleasant, was hurrying on.
"Well, as I was going to say, you can't tell a thing about missionary barrels--except that you won't find in 'em what you think you're going to--even when you think you won't. It was the barrels every time, too, that were hardest to play the game on, for father and--"
Just in time Pollyanna remembered that she was not to talk of her father to her aunt. She dived into her closet then, hurriedly, and brought out all the poor little dresses in both her arms.
"They aren't nice, at all," she choked, "and they'd been black if it hadn't been for the red carpet for the church; but they're all I've got."
With the tips of her fingers Miss Polly turned over the conglomerate garments, so obviously made for anybody but Pollyanna. Next she bestowed frowning attention on the patched undergarments in the bureau drawers.
"I've got the best ones on," confessed Pollyanna, anxiously. "The Ladies' Aid bought me one set straight through all whole. Mrs. Jones--she's the president--told 'em I should have that if they had to clatter down bare aisles themselves the rest of their days. But they won't. Mr. White doesn't like the noise. He's got nerves, his wife says; but he's got money, too, and they expect he'll give a lot toward the carpet--on account of the nerves, you know. I should think he'd be glad that if he did have the nerves he'd got money, too; shouldn't you?"
Miss Polly did not seem to hear. Her scrutiny of the undergarments finished, she turned to Pollyanna somewhat abruptly.
"You have been to school, of course, Pollyanna?"
"Oh, yes, Aunt Polly. Besides, fath--I mean, I was taught at home some, too."
Miss Polly frowned.
"Very good. In the fall you will enter school here, of course. Mr. Hall, the principal, will doubtless settle in which grade you belong. Meanwhile, I suppose I ought to hear you read aloud half an hour each day."
"I love to read; but if you don't want to hear me I'd be just glad to read to myself--truly, Aunt Polly. And I wouldn't have to half try to be glad, either, for I like best to read to myself--on account of the big words, you know."
"I don't doubt it," rejoined Miss Polly, grimly. Have you studied music?"
"Not much. I don't like my music--I like other people's, though. I learned to play on the piano a little. Miss Gray--she plays for church--she taught me. But I'd just as soon let that go as not, Aunt Polly. I'd rather, truly."
"Very likely," observed Aunt Polly, with slightly uplifted eyebrows. "Nevertheless I think it is my duty to see that you are properly instructed in at least the rudiments of music. You sew, of course."
"Yes, ma'am." Pollyanna sighed. The Ladies' Aid taught me that. But I had an awful time. Mrs. Jones didn't believe in holding your needle like the rest of 'em did on buttonholing, and Mrs. White thought backstitching ought to be taught you before hemming (or else the other way), and Mrs. Harriman didn't believe in putting you on patchwork ever, at all."
"Well, there will be no difficulty of that kind any longer, Pollyanna. I shall teach you sewing myself, of course. You do not know how to cook, I presume."
Pollyanna laughed suddenly.
"They were just beginning to teach me that this summer, but I hadn't got far. They were more divided up on that than they were on the sewing. They were GOING to begin on bread; but there wasn't two of 'em that made it alike, so after arguing it all one sewing-meeting, they decided to take turns at me one forenoon a week--in their own kitchens, you know. I'd only learned chocolate fudge and fig cake, though, when--when I had to stop." Her voice broke.
"Chocolate fudge and fig cake, indeed!" scorned Miss Polly. "I think we can remedy that very soon. "She paused in thought for a minute, then went on slowly: "At nine o'clock every morning you will read aloud one half-hour to me. Before that you will use the time to put this room in order. Wednesday and Saturday forenoons, after half-past nine, you will spend with Nancy in the kitchen, learning to cook. Other mornings you will sew with me. That will leave the afternoons for your music. I shall, of course, procure a teacher at once for you," she finished decisively, as she arose from her chair.
Pollyanna cried out in dismay.
"Oh, but Aunt Polly, Aunt Polly, you haven't left me any time at all just to--to live."
"To live, child! What do you mean? As if you weren't living all the time!"
"Oh, of course I'd be BREATHING all the time I was doing those things, Aunt Polly, but I wouldn't be living. You breathe all the time you're asleep, but you aren't living. I mean living--doing the things you want to do: playing outdoors, reading (to myself, of course), climbing hills, talking to Mr. Tom in the garden, and Nancy, and finding out all about the houses and the people and everything everywhere all through the perfectly lovely streets I came through yesterday. That's what I call living, Aunt Polly. Just breathing isn't living!"
Miss Polly lifted her head irritably.
"Pollyanna, you ARE the most extraordinary child! You will be allowed a proper amount of playtime, of course. But, surely, it seems to me if I am willing to do my duty in seeing that you have proper care and instruction, YOU ought to be willing to do yours by seeing that that care and instruction are not ungratefully wasted."
Pollyanna looked shocked.
"Oh, Aunt Polly, as if I ever could be ungrateful--to YOU! Why, I LOVE YOU--and you aren't even a Ladies' Aider; you're an aunt!"
"Very well; then see that you don't act ungrateful," vouchsafed Miss Polly, as she turned toward the door.
She had gone halfway down the stairs when a small, unsteady voice called after her:
"Please, Aunt Polly, you didn't tell me which of my things you wanted to--to give away."
Aunt Polly emitted a tired sigh--a sigh that ascended straight to Pollyanna's ears.
"Oh, I forgot to tell you, Pollyanna. Timothy will drive us into town at half-past one this afternoon. Not one of your garments is fit for my niece to wear. Certainly I should be very far from doing my duty by you if I should let you appear out in any one of them."
Pollyanna sighed now--she believed she was going to hate that word--duty.
"Aunt Polly, please," she called wistfully, "isn't there ANY way you can be glad about all that--duty business?"
"What?" Miss Polly looked up in dazed surprise; then, suddenly, with very red cheeks, she turned and swept angrily down the stairs. "Don't be impertinent, Pollyanna!"
In the hot little attic room Pollyanna dropped herself on to one of the straight-backed chairs. To her, existence loomed ahead one endless round of duty.
"I don't see, really, what there was impertinent about that," she sighed. "I was only asking her if she couldn't tell me something to be glad about in all that duty business."
For several minutes Pollyanna sat in silence, her rueful eyes fixed on the forlorn heap of garments on the bed. Then, slowly, she rose and began to put away the dresses.
"There just isn't anything to be glad about, that I can see," she said aloud; "unless--it's to be glad when the duty's done!" Whereupon she laughed suddenly.
CHAPTER VII. POLLYANNA AND PUNISHMENTS
At half-past one o'clock Timothy drove Miss Polly and her niece to the four or five principal dry goods stores, which were about half a mile from the homestead.
Fitting Pollyanna with a new wardrobe proved to be more or less of an exciting experience for all concerned. Miss Polly came out of it with the feeling of limp relaxation that one might have at finding oneself at last on solid earth after a perilous walk across the very thin crust of a volcano. The various clerks who had waited upon the pair came out of it with very red faces, and enough amusing stories of Pollyanna to keep their friends in gales of laughter the rest of the week. Pollyanna herself came out of it with radiant smiles and a heart content; for, as she expressed it to one of the clerks: "When you haven't had anybody but missionary barrels and Ladies' Aiders to dress you, it IS perfectly lovely to just walk right in and buy clothes that are brand-new, and that don't have to be tucked up or let down because they don't fit!"
The shopping expedition consumed the entire afternoon; then came supper and a delightful talk with Old Tom in the garden, and another with Nancy on the back porch, after the dishes were done, and while Aunt Polly paid a visit to a neighbor.
Old Tom told Pollyanna wonderful things of her mother, that made her very happy indeed; and Nancy told her all about the little farm six miles away at "The Corners," where lived her own dear mother, and her equally dear brother and sisters. She promised, too, that sometime, if Miss Polly were willing, Pollyanna should be taken to see them.
"And THEY'VE got lovely names, too. You'll like THEIR names," sighed Nancy. "They're 'Algernon,' and 'Florabelle' and 'Estelle.' I--I just hate 'Nancy'!"
"Oh, Nancy, what a dreadful thing to say! Why?"
"Because it isn't pretty like the others. You see, I was the first baby, and mother hadn't begun ter read so many stories with the pretty names in 'em, then."
"But I love 'Nancy,' just because it's you," declared Pollyanna.
"Humph! Well, I guess you could love 'Clarissa Mabelle' just as well," retorted Nancy, and it would be a heap happier for me. I think THAT name's just grand!"
Pollyanna laughed.
"Well, anyhow," she chuckled, "you can be glad it isn't 'Hephzibah.'
"Hephzibah!"
"Yes. Mrs. White's name is that. Her husband calls her 'Hep,' and she doesn't like it. She says when he calls out 'Hep--Hep!' she feels just as if the next minute he was going to yell 'Hurrah!' And she doesn't like to be hurrahed at."
Nancy's gloomy face relaxed into a broad smile.
"Well, if you don't beat the Dutch! Say, do you know?--I sha'n't never hear 'Nancy' now that I don't think o' that 'Hep--Hep!' and giggle. My, I guess I AM glad--" She stopped short and turned amazed eyes on the little girl. "Say, Miss Pollyanna, do you mean--was you playin' that 'ere game THEN--about my bein' glad I wa'n't named Hephzibah'?"
Pollyanna frowned; then she laughed.
"Why, Nancy, that's so! I WAS playing the game--but that's one of the times I just did it without thinking, I reckon. You see, you DO, lots of times; you get so used to it--looking for something to be glad about, you know. And most generally there is something about everything that you can be glad about, if you keep hunting long enough to find it."
"Well, m-maybe," granted Nancy, with open doubt.
At half-past eight Pollyanna went up to bed. The screens had not yet come, and the close little room was like an oven. With longing eyes Pollyanna looked at the two fast-closed windows--but she did not raise them. She undressed, folded her clothes neatly, said her prayers, blew out her candle and climbed into bed.
Just how long she lay in sleepless misery, tossing from side to side of the hot little cot, she did not know; but it seemed to her that it must have been hours before she finally slipped out of bed, felt her way across the room and opened her door.
Out in the main attic all was velvet blackness save where the moon flung a path of silver half-way across the floor from the east dormer window. With a resolute ignoring of that fearsome darkness to the right and to the left, Pollyanna drew a quick breath and pattered straight into that silvery path, and on to the window.
She had hoped, vaguely, that this window might have a screen, but it did not. Outside, however, there was a wide world of fairy-like beauty, and there was, too, she knew, fresh, sweet air that would feel so good to hot cheeks and hands!
As she stepped nearer and peered longingly out, she saw something else: she saw, only a little way below the window, the wide, flat tin roof of Miss Polly's sun parlor built over the porte-cochere. The sight filled her with longing. If only, now, she were out there!
Fearfully she looked behind her. Back there, somewhere, were her hot little room and her still hotter bed; but between her and them lay a horrid desert of blackness across which one must feel one's way with outstretched, shrinking arms; while before her, out on the sun-parlor roof, were the moonlight and the cool, sweet night air.
If only her bed were out there! And folks did sleep out of doors. Joel Hartley at home, who was so sick with the consumption, HAD to sleep out of doors.
Suddenly Pollyanna remembered that she had seen near this attic window a row of long white bags hanging from nails. Nancy had said that they contained the winter clothing, put away for the summer. A little fearfully now, Pollyanna felt her way to these bags, selected a nice fat soft one (it contained Miss Polly's sealskin coat) for a bed; and a thinner one to be doubled up for a pillow, and still another (which was so thin it seemed almost empty) for a covering. Thus equipped, Pollyanna in high glee pattered to the moonlit window again, raised the sash, stuffed her burden through to the roof below, then let herself down after it, closing the window carefully behind her--Pollyanna had not forgotten those flies with the marvellous feet that carried things.
How deliciously cool it was! Pollyanna quite danced up and down with delight, drawing in long, full breaths of the refreshing air. The tin roof under her feet crackled with little resounding snaps that Pollyanna rather liked. She walked, indeed, two or three times back and forth from end to end--it gave her such a pleasant sensation of airy space after her hot little room; and the roof was so broad and flat that she had no fear of falling off. Finally, with a sigh of content, she curled herself up on the sealskin-coat mattress, arranged one bag for a pillow and the other for a covering, and settled herself to sleep.
"I'm so glad now that the screens didn't come," she murmured, blinking up at the stars; "else I couldn't have had this!"
Down-stairs in Miss Polly's room next the sun parlor, Miss Polly herself was hurrying into dressing gown and slippers, her face white and frightened. A minute before she had been telephoning in a shaking voice to Timothy:
"Come up quick!--you and your father. Bring lanterns. Somebody is on the roof of the sun parlor. He must have climbed up the rose-trellis or somewhere, and of course he can get right into the house through the east window in the attic. I have locked the attic door down here--but hurry, quick!"
Some time later, Pollyanna, just dropping off to sleep, was startled by a lantern flash, and a trio of amazed ejaculations. She opened her eyes to find Timothy at the top of a ladder near her, Old Tom just getting through the window, and her aunt peering out at her from behind him.
"Pollyanna, what does this mean?" cried Aunt Polly then.
Pollyanna blinked sleepy eyes and sat up.
"Why, Mr. Tom--Aunt Polly!" she stammered. "Don't look so scared! It isn't that I've got the consumption, you know, like Joel Hartley. It's only that I was so hot--in there. But I shut the window, Aunt Polly, so the flies couldn't carry those germ-things in."
Timothy disappeared suddenly down the ladder. Old Tom, with almost equal precipitation, handed his lantern to Miss Polly, and followed his son. Miss Polly bit her lip hard--until the men were gone; then she said sternly:
"Pollyanna, hand those things to me at once and come in here. Of all the extraordinary children!" she ejaculated a little later, as, with Pollyanna by her side, and the lantern in her hand, she turned back into the attic.
To Pollyanna the air was all the more stifling after that cool breath of the out of doors; but she did not complain. She only drew a long quivering sigh.
At the top of the stairs Miss Polly jerked out crisply:
"For the rest of the night, Pollyanna, you are to sleep in my bed with me. The screens will be here to-morrow, but until then I consider it my duty to keep you where I know where you are."
Pollyanna drew in her breath.
"With you?--in your bed?" she cried rapturously. "Oh, Aunt Polly, Aunt Polly, how perfectly lovely of you! And when I've so wanted to sleep with some one sometime--some one that belonged to me, you know; not a Ladies' Aider. I've HAD them. My! I reckon I am glad now those screens didn't come! Wouldn't you be?"
There was no reply. Miss Polly was stalking on ahead. Miss Polly, to tell the truth, was feeling curiously helpless. For the third time since Pollyanna's arrival, Miss Polly was punishing Pollyanna--and for the third time she was being confronted with the amazing fact that her punishment was being taken as a special reward of merit. No wonder Miss Polly was feeling curiously helpless.
CHAPTER VIII. POLLYANNA PAYS A VISIT
It was not long before life at the Harrington homestead settled into something like order--though not exactly the order that Miss Polly had at first prescribed. Pollyanna sewed, practised, read aloud, and studied cooking in the kitchen, it is true; but she did not give to any of these things quite so much time as had first been planned. She had more time, also, to "just live," as she expressed it, for almost all of every afternoon from two until six o'clock was hers to do with as she liked--provided she did not "like" to do certain things already prohibited by Aunt Polly.
It is a question, perhaps, whether all this leisure time was given to the child as a relief to Pollyanna from work--or as a relief to Aunt Polly from Pollyanna. Certainly, as those first July days passed, Miss Polly found occasion many times to ejaculate "What an extraordinary child!" and certainly the reading and sewing lessons found her at their conclusion each day somewhat dazed and wholly exhausted.
Nancy, in the kitchen, fared better. She was not dazed nor exhausted. Wednesdays and Saturdays came to be, indeed, red-letter days to her.
There were no children in the immediate neighborhood of the Harrington homestead for Pollyanna to play with. The house itself was on the outskirts of the village, and though there were other houses not far away, they did not chance to contain any boys or girls near Pollyanna's age. This, however, did not seem to disturb Pollyanna in the least.
"Oh, no, I don't mind it at all," she explained to Nancy. "I'm happy just to walk around and see the streets and the houses and watch the people. I just love people. Don't you, Nancy?"
"Well, I can't say I do--all of 'em," retorted Nancy, tersely.
Almost every pleasant afternoon found Pollyanna begging for "an errand to run," so that she might be off for a walk in one direction or another; and it was on these walks that frequently she met the Man. To herself Pollyanna always called him "the Man," no matter if she met a dozen other men the same day.
The Man often wore a long black coat and a high silk hat--two things that the "just men" never wore. His face was clean shaven and rather pale, and his hair, showing below his hat, was somewhat gray. He walked erect, and rather rapidly, and he was always alone, which made Pollyanna vaguely sorry for him. Perhaps it was because of this that she one day spoke to him.
"How do you do, sir? Isn't this a nice day?" she called cheerily, as she approached him.
The man threw a hurried glance about him, then stopped uncertainly.
"Did you speak--to me?" he asked in a sharp voice.
"Yes, sir," beamed Pollyanna. "I say, it's a nice day, isn't it?"
"Eh? Oh! Humph!" he grunted; and strode on again.
Pollyanna laughed. He was such a funny man, she thought.
The next day she saw him again.
" 'Tisn't quite so nice as yesterday, but it's pretty nice," she called out cheerfully.
"Eh? Oh! Humph!" grunted the man as before; and once again Pollyanna laughed happily.
When for the third time Pollyanna accosted him in much the same manner, the man stopped abruptly.
"See here, child, who are you, and why are you speaking to me every day?"
"I'm Pollyanna Whittier, and I thought you looked lonesome. I'm so glad you stopped. Now we're introduced--only I don't know your name yet."
"Well, of all the--" The man did not finish his sentence, but strode on faster than ever.
Pollyanna looked after him with a disappointed droop to her usually smiling lips.
"Maybe he didn't understand--but that was only half an introduction. I don't know HIS name, yet," she murmured, as she proceeded on her way.
Pollyanna was carrying calf's-foot jelly to Mrs. Snow to-day. Miss Polly Harrington always sent something to Mrs. Snow once a week. She said she thought that it was her duty, inasmuch as Mrs. Snow was poor, sick, and a member of her church--it was the duty of all the church members to look out for her, of course. Miss Polly did her duty by Mrs. Snow usually on Thursday afternoons--not personally, but through Nancy. To-day Pollyanna had begged the privilege, and Nancy had promptly given it to her in accordance with Miss Polly's orders.
"And it's glad that I am ter get rid of it," Nancy had declared in private afterwards to Pollyanna; "though it's a shame ter be tuckin' the job off on ter you, poor lamb, so it is, it is!"
"But I'd love to do it, Nancy."
"Well, you won't--after you've done it once," predicted Nancy, sourly.
"Why not?"
"Because nobody does. If folks wa'n't sorry for her there wouldn't a soul go near her from mornin' till night, she's that cantankerous. All is, I pity her daughter what HAS ter take care of her."
"But, why, Nancy?"
Nancy shrugged her shoulders.
"Well, in plain words, it's just that nothin' what ever has happened, has happened right in Mis' Snow's eyes. Even the days of the week ain't run ter her mind. If it's Monday she's bound ter say she wished 'twas Sunday; and if you take her jelly you're pretty sure ter hear she wanted chicken--but if you DID bring her chicken, she'd be jest hankerin' for lamb broth!"
"Why, what a funny woman," laughed Pollyanna. "I think I shall like to go to see her. She must be so surprising and--and different. I love DIFFERENT folks."
"Humph! Well, Mis' Snow's 'different,' all right--I hope, for the sake of the rest of us!" Nancy had finished grimly.
Pollyanna was thinking of these remarks to-day as she turned in at the gate of the shabby little cottage. Her eyes were quite sparkling, indeed, at the prospect of meeting this "different" Mrs. Snow.
A pale-faced, tired-looking young girl answered her knock at the door.
"How do you do?" began Pollyanna politely. "I'm from Miss Polly Harrington, and I'd like to see Mrs. Snow, please."
"Well, if you would, you're the first one that ever 'liked' to see her," muttered the girl under her breath; but Pollyanna did not hear this. The girl had turned and was leading the way through the hall to a door at the end of it.
In the sick-room, after the girl had ushered her in and closed the door, Pollyanna blinked a little before she could accustom her eyes to the gloom. Then she saw, dimly outlined, a woman half-sitting up in the bed across the room. Pollyanna advanced at once.
"How do you do, Mrs. Snow? Aunt Polly says she hopes you are comfortable to-day, and she's sent you some calf's-foot jelly."
"Dear me! jelly?" murmured a fretful voice,
"Of course I'm very much obliged, but I was hoping 'twould be lamb broth to-day."
Pollyanna frowned a little.
"Why, I thought it was CHICKEN you wanted when folks brought you jelly," she said.
"What?" The sick woman turned sharply.
"Why, nothing, much," apologized Pollyanna, hurriedly; "and of course it doesn't really make any difference. It's only that Nancy said it was chicken you wanted when we brought jelly, and lamb broth when we brought chicken--but maybe 'twas the other way, and Nancy forgot."
The sick woman pulled herself up till she sat erect in the bed--a most unusual thing for her to do, though Pollyanna did not know this.
"Well, Miss Impertinence, who are you?" she demanded.
Pollyanna laughed gleefully.
"Oh, THAT isn't my name, Mrs. Snow--and I'm so glad 'tisn't, too! That would be worse than 'Hephzibah,' wouldn't it? I'm Pollyanna Whittier, Miss Polly Harrington's niece, and I've come to live with her. That's why I'm here with the jelly this morning."
All through the first part of this sentence, the sick woman had sat interestedly erect; but at the reference to the jelly she fell back on her pillow listlessly.
"Very well; thank you. Your aunt is very kind, of course, but my appetite isn't very good this morning, and I was wanting lamb--" She stopped suddenly, then went on with an abrupt change of subject. "I never slept a wink last night--not a wink!"
"O dear, I wish _I_ didn't," sighed Pollyanna, placing the jelly on the little stand and seating herself comfortably in the nearest chair. "You lose such a lot of time just sleeping! Don't you think so?"
"Lose time--sleeping!" exclaimed the sick woman.
"Yes, when you might be just living, you know. It seems such a pity we can't live nights, too."
Once again the woman pulled herself erect in her bed.
"Well, if you ain't the amazing young one!" she cried. "Here! do you go to that window and pull up the curtain," she directed. "I should like to know what you look like!"
Pollyanna rose to her feet, but she laughed a little ruefully.
"O dear! then you'll see my freckles, won't you?" she sighed, as she went to the window; "--and just when I was being so glad it was dark and you couldn't see 'em. There! Now you can--oh!" she broke off excitedly, as she turned back to the bed; "I'm so glad you wanted to see me, because now I can see you! They didn't tell me you were so pretty!"
"Me!--pretty!" scoffed the woman, bitterly.
"Why, yes. Didn't you know it?" cried Pollyanna.
"Well, no, I didn't," retorted Mrs. Snow, dryly. Mrs. Snow had lived forty years, and for fifteen of those years she had been too busy wishing things were different to find much time to enjoy things as they were.
"Oh, but your eyes are so big and dark, and your hair's all dark, too, and curly," cooed Pollyanna. "I love black curls. (That's one of the things I'm going to have when I get to Heaven.) And you've got two little red spots in your cheeks. Why, Mrs. Snow, you ARE pretty! I should think you'd know it when you looked at yourself in the glass."
"The glass!" snapped the sick woman, falling back on her pillow. "Yes, well, I hain't done much prinkin' before the mirror these days--and you wouldn't, if you was flat on your back as I am!"
"Why, no, of course not," agreed Pollyanna, sympathetically. "But wait--just let me show you," she exclaimed, skipping over to the bureau and picking up a small hand-glass.
On the way back to the bed she stopped, eyeing the sick woman with a critical gaze.
"I reckon maybe, if you don't mind, I'd like to fix your hair just a little before I let you see it," she proposed. "May I fix your hair, please?"
"Why, I--suppose so, if you want to," permitted Mrs. Snow, grudgingly; "but 'twon't stay, you know."
"Oh, thank you. I love to fix people's hair," exulted Pollyanna, carefully laying down the hand-glass and reaching for a comb. "I sha'n't do much to-day, of course--I'm in such a hurry for you to see how pretty you are; but some day I'm going to take it all down and have a perfectly lovely time with it, she cried, touching with soft fingers the waving hair above the sick woman's forehead.
For five minutes Pollyanna worked swiftly, deftly, combing a refractory curl into fluffiness, perking up a drooping ruffle at the neck, or shaking a pillow into plumpness so that the head might have a better pose. Meanwhile the sick woman, frowning prodigiously, and openly scoffing at the whole procedure, was, in spite of herself, beginning to tingle with a feeling perilously near to excitement.
"There!" panted Pollyanna, hastily plucking a pink from a vase near by and tucking it into the dark hair where it would give the best effect. "Now I reckon we're ready to be looked at!" And she held out the mirror in triumph.
"Humph!" grunted the sick woman, eyeing her reflection severely. "I like red pinks better than pink ones; but then, it'll fade, anyhow, before night, so what's the difference!"
"But I should think you'd be glad they did fade," laughed Pollyanna, " 'cause then you can have the fun of getting some more. I just love your hair fluffed out like that," she finished with a satisfied gaze. "Don't you?"
"Hm-m; maybe. Still--'twon't last, with me tossing back and forth on the pillow as I do."
"Of course not--and I'm glad, too," nodded Pollyanna, cheerfully, "because then I can fix it again. Anyhow, I should think you'd be glad it's black--black shows up so much nicer on a pillow than yellow hair like mine does."
"Maybe; but I never did set much store by black hair--shows gray too soon," retorted Mrs. Snow. She spoke fretfully, but she still held the mirror before her face.
"Oh, I love black hair! I should be so glad if I only had it," sighed Pollyanna.
Mrs. Snow dropped the mirror and turned irritably.
"Well, you wouldn't!--not if you were me. You wouldn't be glad for black hair nor anything else--if you had to lie here all day as I do!"
Pollyanna bent her brows in a thoughtful frown.
"Why, 'twould be kind of hard--to do it then, wouldn't it?" she mused aloud.
"Do what?"
"Be glad about things."
"Be glad about things--when you're sick in bed all your days? Well, I should say it would," retorted Mrs. Snow. "If you don't think so, just tell me something to be glad about; that's all!"
To Mrs. Snow's unbounded amazement, Pollyanna sprang to her feet and clapped her hands.
"Oh, goody! That'll be a hard one--won't it? I've got to go, now, but I'll think and think all the way home; and maybe the next time I come I can tell it to you. Good-by. I've had a lovely time! Good-by," she called again, as she tripped through the doorway.
"Well, I never! Now, what does she mean by that?" ejaculated Mrs. Snow, staring after her visitor. By and by she turned her head and picked up the mirror, eyeing her reflection critically.
"That little thing HAS got a knack with hair and no mistake," she muttered under her breath. "I declare, I didn't know it could look so pretty. But then, what's the use?" she sighed, dropping the little glass into the bedclothes, and rolling her head on the pillow fretfully.
A little later, when Milly, Mrs. Snow's daughter, came in, the mirror still lay among the bedclothes it had been carefully hidden from sight.
"Why, mother--the curtain is up!" cried Milly, dividing her amazed stare between the window and the pink in her mother's hair.
"Well, what if it is?" snapped the sick woman. "I needn't stay in the dark all my life, if I am sick, need I?"
"Why, n-no, of course not," rejoined Milly, in hasty conciliation, as she reached for the medicine bottle. "It's only--well, you know very well that I've tried to get you to have a lighter room for ages and you wouldn't."
There was no reply to this. Mrs. Snow was picking at the lace on her nightgown. At last she spoke fretfully.
"I should think SOMEBODY might give me a new nightdress--instead of lamb broth, for a change!
"Why--mother!"
No wonder Milly quite gasped aloud with bewilderment. In the drawer behind her at that moment lay two new nightdresses that Milly for months had been vainly urging her mother to wear.