"Sell it! Oh, auntie, you wouldn't—this beautiful house full of lovely things!"
"I may have to, Pollyanna. We have to eat—unfortunately."
"I know it; and I'm always SO hungry," mourned Pollyanna, with a rueful laugh. "Still, I suppose I ought to be glad my appetite is so good."
"Very likely. You'd find something to be glad about, of course. But what shall we do, child? I do wish you'd be serious for a minute."
A quick change came to Pollyanna's face.
"I am serious, Aunt Polly. I've been thinking. I—I wish I could earn some money."
"Oh, child, child, to think of my ever living to hear you say that!" moaned the woman; "—a daughter of the Harringtons having to earn her bread!"
"Oh, but that isn't the way to look at it," laughed Pollyanna. "You ought to be glad if a daughter of the Harringtons is SMART enough to earn her bread! That isn't any disgrace, Aunt Polly."
"Perhaps not; but it isn't very pleasant to one's pride, after the position we've always occupied in Beldingsville, Pollyanna."
Pollyanna did not seem to have heard. Her eyes were musingly fixed on space.
"If only I had some talent! If only I could do something better than anybody else in the world," she sighed at last. "I can sing a little, play a little, embroider a little, and darn a little; but I can't do any of them well—not well enough to be paid for it.
"I think I'd like best to cook," she resumed, after a minute's silence, "and keep house. You know I loved that in Germany winters, when Gretchen used to bother us so much by not coming when we wanted her. But I don't exactly want to go into other people's kitchens to do it."
"As if I'd let you! Pollyanna!" shuddered Mrs. Chilton again.
"And of course, to just work in our own kitchen here doesn't bring in anything," bemoaned Pollyanna, "—not any money, I mean. And it's money we need."
"It most emphatically is," sighed Aunt Polly.
There was a long silence, broken at last by Pollyanna.
"To think that after all you've done for me, auntie—to think that now, if I only could, I'd have such a splendid chance to help! And yet—I can't do it. Oh, why wasn't I born with something that's worth money?"
"There, there, child, don't, don't! Of course, if the doctor—" The words choked into silence.
Pollyanna looked up quickly, and sprang to her feet.
"Dear, dear, this will never do!" she exclaimed, with a complete change of manner. "Don't you fret, auntie. What'll you wager that I don't develop the most marvelous talent going, one of these days? Besides,Ithink it's real exciting—all this. There's so much uncertainty in it. There's a lot of fun in wanting things—and then watching for them to come. Just living along and KNOWING you're going to have everything you want is so—so humdrum, you know," she finished, with a gay little laugh.
Mrs. Chilton, however, did not laugh. She only sighed and said:
"Dear me, Pollyanna, what a child you are!"
The first few days at Beldingsville were not easy either for Mrs. Chilton or for Pollyanna. They were days of adjustment; and days of adjustment are seldom easy.
From travel and excitement it was not easy to put one's mind to the consideration of the price of butter and the delinquencies of the butcher. From having all one's time for one's own, it was not easy to find always the next task clamoring to be done. Friends and neighbors called, too, and although Pollyanna welcomed them with glad cordiality, Mrs. Chilton, when possible, excused herself; and always she said bitterly to Pollyanna:
"Curiosity, I suppose, to see how Polly Harrington likes being poor."
Of the doctor Mrs. Chilton seldom spoke, yet Pollyanna knew very well that almost never was he absent from her thoughts; and that more than half her taciturnity was but her usual cloak for a deeper emotion which she did not care to show.
Jimmy Pendleton Pollyanna saw several times during that first month. He came first with John Pendleton for a somewhat stiff and ceremonious call—not that it was either stiff or ceremonious until after Aunt Polly came into the room; then it was both. For some reason Aunt Polly had not excused herself on this occasion. After that Jimmy had come by himself, once with flowers, once with a book for Aunt Polly, twice with no excuse at all. Pollyanna welcomed him with frank pleasure always. Aunt Polly, after that first time, did not see him at all.
To the most of their friends and acquaintances Pollyanna said little about the change in their circumstances. To Jimmy, however, she talked freely, and always her constant cry was: "If only I could do something to bring in some money!"
"I'm getting to be the most mercenary little creature you ever saw," she laughed dolefully. "I've got so I measure everything with a dollar bill, and I actually think in quarters and dimes. You see, Aunt Polly does feel so poor!"
"It's a shame!" stormed Jimmy.
"I know it. But, honestly, I think she feels a little poorer than she needs to—she's brooded over it so. But I do wish I could help!"
Jimmy looked down at the wistful, eager face with its luminous eyes, and his own eyes softened.
[Illustration: See Frontispiece: "Jimmy looked down at the wistful, eager face"]
"What do you WANT to do—if you could do it?" he asked.
"Oh, I want to cook and keep house," smiled Pollyanna, with a pensive sigh. "I just love to beat eggs and sugar, and hear the soda gurgle its little tune in the cup of sour milk. I'm happy if I've got a day's baking before me. But there isn't any money in that—except in somebody else's kitchen, of course. And I—I don't exactly love it well enough for that!"
"I should say not!" ejaculated the young fellow.
Once more he glanced down at the expressive face so near him. This time a queer look came to the corners of his mouth. He pursed his lips, then spoke, a slow red mounting to his forehead.
"Well, of course you might—marry. Have you thought of that—MissPollyanna?"
Pollyanna gave a merry laugh. Voice and manner were unmistakably those of a girl quite untouched by even the most far-reaching of Cupid's darts.
"Oh, no, I shall never marry," she said blithely. "In the first place I'm not pretty, you know; and in the second place, I'm going to live with Aunt Polly and take care of her."
"Not pretty, eh?" smiled Pendleton, quizzically. "Did it ever—er—occur to you that there might be a difference of opinion on that, Pollyanna?"
Pollyanna shook her head.
"There couldn't be. I've got a mirror, you see," she objected, with a merry glance.
It sounded like coquetry. In any other girl it would have been coquetry, Pendleton decided. But, looking into the face before him now, Pendleton knew that it was not coquetry. He knew, too, suddenly, why Pollyanna had seemed so different from any girl he had ever known. Something of her old literal way of looking at things still clung to her.
"Why aren't you pretty?" he asked.
Even as he uttered the question, and sure as he was of his estimate of Pollyanna's character, Pendleton quite held his breath at his temerity. He could not help thinking of how quickly any other girl he knew would have resented that implied acceptance of her claim to no beauty. But Pollyanna's first words showed him that even this lurking fear of his was quite groundless.
"Why, I just am not," she laughed, a little ruefully. "I wasn't made that way. Maybe you don't remember, but long ago, when I was a little girl, it always seemed to me that one of the nicest things Heaven was going to give me when I got there was black curls."
"And is that your chief desire now?"
"N-no, maybe not," hesitated Pollyanna. "But I still think I'd like them. Besides, my eyelashes aren't long enough, and my nose isn't Grecian, or Roman, or any of those delightfully desirable ones that belong to a 'type.' It's just NOSE. And my face is too long, or too short, I've forgotten which; but I measured it once with one of those 'correct-for-beauty' tests, and it wasn't right, anyhow. And they said the width of the face should be equal to five eyes, and the width of the eyes equal to—to something else. I've forgotten that, too—only that mine wasn't."
"What a lugubrious picture!" laughed Pendleton. Then, with his gaze admiringly regarding the girl's animated face and expressive eyes, he asked:
"Did you ever look in the mirror when you were talking, Pollyanna?"
"Why, no, of course not!"
"Well, you'd better try it sometime."
"What a funny idea! Imagine my doing it," laughed the girl. "What shall I say? Like this? 'Now, you, Pollyanna, what if your eyelashes aren't long, and your nose is just a nose, be glad you've got SOME eyelashes and SOME nose!'"
Pendleton joined in her laugh, but an odd expression came to his face.
"Then you still play—the game," he said, a little diffidently.
Pollyanna turned soft eyes of wonder full upon him.
"Why, of course! Why, Jimmy, I don't believe I could have lived—the last six months—if it hadn't been for that blessed game." Her voice shook a little.
"I haven't heard you say much about it," he commented.
She changed color.
"I know. I think I'm afraid—of saying too much—to outsiders, who don't care, you know. It wouldn't sound quite the same from me now, at twenty, as it did when I was ten. I realize that, of course. Folks don't like to be preached at, you know," she finished with a whimsical smile.
"I know," nodded the young fellow gravely. "But I wonder sometimes, Pollyanna, if you really understand yourself what that game is, and what it has done for those who are playing it."
"I know—what it has done for myself." Her voice was low, and her eyes were turned away.
"You see, it really WORKS, if you play it," he mused aloud, after a short silence. "Somebody said once that it would revolutionize the world if everybody would really play it. And I believe it would."
"Yes; but some folks don't want to be revolutionized," smiled Pollyanna. "I ran across a man in Germany last year. He had lost his money, and was in hard luck generally. Dear, dear, but he was gloomy! Somebody in my presence tried to cheer him up one day by saying, 'Come, come, things might be worse, you know!' Dear, dear, but you should have heard that man then!
"'If there is anything on earth that makes me mad clear through,' he snarled, 'it is to be told that things might be worse, and to be thankful for what I've got left. These people who go around with an everlasting grin on their faces caroling forth that they are thankful that they can breathe, or eat, or walk, or lie down, I have no use for. I don't WANT to breathe, or eat, or walk, or lie down—if things are as they are now with me. And when I'm told that I ought to be thankful for some such tommyrot as that, it makes me just want to go out and shoot somebody!'"
"Imagine what I'D have gotten if I'd have introduced the glad game to that man!" laughed Pollyanna.
"I don't care. He needed it," answered Jimmy.
"Of course he did—but he wouldn't have thanked me for giving it to him."
"I suppose not. But, listen! As he was, under his present philosophy and scheme of living, he made himself and everybody else wretched, didn't he? Well, just suppose he was playing the game. While he was trying to hunt up something to be glad about in everything that had happened to him, he COULDN'T be at the same time grumbling and growling about how bad things were; so that much would be gained. He'd be a whole lot easier to live with, both for himself and for his friends. Meanwhile, just thinking of the doughnut instead of the hole couldn't make things any worse for him, and it might make things better; for it wouldn't give him such a gone feeling in the pit of his stomach, and his digestion would be better. I tell you, troubles are poor things to hug. They've got too many prickers."
Pollyanna smiled appreciatively.
"That makes me think of what I told a poor old lady once. She was one of my Ladies' Aiders out West, and was one of the kind of people that really ENJOYS being miserable and telling over her causes for unhappiness. I was perhaps ten years old, and was trying to teach her the game. I reckon I wasn't having very good success, and evidently I at last dimly realized the reason, for I said to her triumphantly: 'Well, anyhow, you can be glad you've got such a lot of things to make you miserable, for you love to be miserable so well!'"
"Well, if that wasn't a good one on her," chuckled Jimmy.
Pollyanna raised her eyebrows.
"I'm afraid she didn't enjoy it any more than the man in Germany would have if I'd told him the same thing."
"But they ought to be told, and you ought to tell—" Pendleton stopped short with so queer an expression on his face that Pollyanna looked at him in surprise.
"Why, Jimmy, what is it?"
"Oh, nothing. I was only thinking," he answered, puckering his lips. "Here I am urging you to do the very thing I was afraid you WOULD do before I saw you, you know. That is, I was afraid before I saw you, that—that—" He floundered into a helpless pause, looking very red indeed.
"Well, Jimmy Pendleton," bridled the girl, "you needn't think you can stop there, sir. Now just what do you mean by all that, please?"
"Oh, er—n-nothing, much."
"I'm waiting," murmured Pollyanna. Voice and manner were calm and confident, though the eyes twinkled mischievously.
The young fellow hesitated, glanced at her smiling face, and capitulated.
"Oh, well, have it your own way," he shrugged. "It's only that I was worrying—a little—about that game, for fear you WOULD talk it just as you used to, you know, and—" But a merry peal of laughter interrupted him.
"There, what did I tell you? Even you were worried, it seems, lest I should be at twenty just what I was at ten!"
"N-no, I didn't mean—Pollyanna, honestly, I thought—of course I knew—" But Pollyanna only put her hands to her ears and went off into another peal of laughter.
It was toward the latter part of June that the letter came toPollyanna from Della Wetherby.
"I am writing to ask you a favor," Miss Wetherby wrote. "I am hoping you can tell me of some quiet private family in Beldingsville that will be willing to take my sister to board for the summer. There would be three of them, Mrs. Carew, her secretary, and her adopted son, Jamie. (You remember Jamie, don't you?) They do not like to go to an ordinary hotel or boarding house. My sister is very tired, and the doctor has advised her to go into the country for a complete rest and change. He suggested Vermont or New Hampshire. We immediately thought of Beldingsville and you; and we wondered if you couldn't recommend just the right place to us. I told Ruth I would write you. They would like to go right away, early in July, if possible. Would it be asking too much to request you to let us know as soon as you conveniently can if you do know of a place? Please address me here. My sister is with us here at the Sanatorium for a few weeks' treatment.
"Hoping for a favorable reply, I am,
"Most cordially yours,
For the first few minutes after the letter was finished, Pollyanna sat with frowning brow, mentally searching the homes of Beldingsville for a possible boarding house for her old friends. Then a sudden something gave her thoughts a new turn, and with a joyous exclamation she hurried to her aunt in the living-room.
"Auntie, auntie," she panted; "I've got just the loveliest idea. I told you something would happen, and that I'd develop that wonderful talent sometime. Well, I have. I have right now. Listen! I've had a letter from Miss Wetherby, Mrs. Carew's sister—where I stayed that winter in Boston, you know—and they want to come into the country to board for the summer, and Miss Wetherby's written to see if I didn't know a place for them. They don't want a hotel or an ordinary boarding house, you see. And at first I didn't know of one; but now I do. I do, Aunt Polly! Just guess where 'tis."
"Dear me, child," ejaculated Mrs. Chilton, "how you do run on! I should think you were a dozen years old instead of a woman grown. Now what are you talking about?"
"About a boarding place for Mrs. Carew and Jamie. I've found it," babbled Pollyanna.
"Indeed! Well, what of it? Of what possible interest can that be to me, child?" murmured Mrs. Chilton, drearily.
"Because it's HERE. I'm going to have them here, auntie."
"Pollyanna!" Mrs. Chilton was sitting erect in horror.
"Now, auntie, please don't say no—please don't," begged Pollyanna, eagerly. "Don't you see? This is my chance, the chance I've been waiting for; and it's just dropped right into my hands. We can do it lovely. We have plenty of room, and you know I CAN cook and keep house. And now there'd be money in it, for they'd pay well, I know; and they'd love to come, I'm sure. There'd be three of them—there's a secretary with them."
"But, Pollyanna, I can't! Turn this house into a boarding house?—theHarrington homestead a common boarding house? Oh, Pollyanna, I can't,I can't!"
"But it wouldn't be a common boarding house, dear. 'Twill be an uncommon one. Besides, they're our friends. It would be like having our friends come to see us; only they'd be PAYING guests, so meanwhile we'd be earning money—money that we NEED, auntie, money that we need," she emphasized significantly.
A spasm of hurt pride crossed Polly Chilton's face. With a low moan she fell back in her chair.
"But how could you do it?" she asked at last, faintly. "You couldn't do the work part alone, child!"
"Oh, no, of course not," chirped Pollyanna. (Pollyanna was on sure ground now. She knew her point was won.) "But I could do the cooking and the overseeing, and I'm sure I could get one of Nancy's younger sisters to help about the rest. Mrs. Durgin would do the laundry part just as she does now."
"But, Pollyanna, I'm not well at all—you know I'm not. I couldn't do much."
"Of course not. There's no reason why you should," scorned Pollyanna, loftily. "Oh, auntie, won't it be splendid? Why, it seems too good to be true—money just dropped into my hands like that!"
"Dropped into your hands, indeed! You still have some things to learn in this world, Pollyanna, and one is that summer boarders don't drop money into anybody's hands without looking very sharply to it that they get ample return. By the time you fetch and carry and bake and brew until you are ready to sink, and by the time you nearly kill yourself trying to serve everything to order from fresh-laid eggs to the weather, you will believe what I tell you."
"All right, I'll remember," laughed Pollyanna. "But I'm not doing any worrying now; and I'm going to hurry and write Miss Wetherby at once so I can give it to Jimmy Bean to mail when he comes out this afternoon."
Mrs. Chilton stirred restlessly.
"Pollyanna, I do wish you'd call that young man by his proper name. That 'Bean' gives me the shivers. His name is 'Pendleton' now, as I understand it."
"So it is," agreed Pollyanna, "but I do forget it half the time. I even call him that to his face, sometimes, and of course that's dreadful, when he really is adopted, and all. But you see I'm so excited," she finished, as she danced from the room.
She had the letter all ready for Jimmy when he called at four o'clock. She was still quivering—with excitement, and she lost no time in telling her visitor what it was all about.
"And I'm crazy to see them, besides," she cried, when she had told him of her plans. "I've never seen either of them since that winter. You know I told you—didn't I tell you?—about Jamie."
"Oh, yes, you told me." There was a touch of constraint in the young man's voice.
"Well, isn't it splendid, if they can come?"
"Why, I don't know as I should call it exactly splendid," he parried.
"Not splendid that I've got such a chance to help Aunt Polly out, for even this little while? Why, Jimmy, of course it's splendid."
"Well, it strikes me that it's going to be rather HARD—for you," bridled Jimmy, with more than a shade of irritation.
"Yes, of course, in some ways. But I shall be so glad for the money coming in that I'll think of that all the time. You see," she sighed, "how mercenary I am, Jimmy."
For a long minute there was no reply; then, a little abruptly, the young man asked:
"Let's see, how old is this Jamie now?"
Pollyanna glanced up with a merry smile.
"Oh, I remember—you never did like his name, 'Jamie,'" she twinkled. "Never mind; he's adopted now, legally, I believe, and has taken the name of Carew. So you can call him that."
"But that isn't telling me how old he is," reminded Jimmy, stiffly.
"Nobody knows, exactly, I suppose. You know he couldn't tell; but I imagine he's about your age. I wonder how he is now. I've asked all about it in this letter, anyway."
"Oh, you have!" Pendleton looked down at the letter in his hand and flipped it a little spitefully. He was thinking that he would like to drop it, to tear it up, to give it to somebody, to throw it away, to do anything with it—but mail it.
Jimmy knew perfectly well that he was jealous, that he always had been jealous of this youth with the name so like and yet so unlike his own. Not that he was in love with Pollyanna, he assured himself wrathfully. He was not that, of course. It was just that he did not care to have this strange youth with the sissy name come to Beldingsville and be always around to spoil all their good times. He almost said as much to Pollyanna, but something stayed the words on his lips; and after a time he took his leave, carrying the letter with him.
That Jimmy did not drop the letter, tear it up, give it to anybody, or throw it away was evidenced a few days later, for Pollyanna received a prompt and delighted reply from Miss Wetherby; and when Jimmy came next time he heard it read—or rather he heard part of it, for Pollyanna prefaced the reading by saying:
"Of course the first part is just where she says how glad they are to come, and all that. I won't read that. But the rest I thought you'd like to hear, because you've heard me talk so much about them. Besides, you'll know them yourself pretty soon, of course. I'm depending a whole lot on you, Jimmy, to help me make it pleasant for them."
"Oh, are you!"
"Now don't be sarcastic, just because you don't like Jamie's name," reproved Pollyanna, with mock severity. "You'll like HIM, I'm sure, when you know him; and you'll LOVE Mrs. Carew."
"Will I, indeed?" retorted Jimmy huffily. "Well, that IS a serious prospect. Let us hope, if I do, the lady will be so gracious as to reciprocate."
"Of course," dimpled Pollyanna. "Now listen, and I'll read to you about her. This letter is from her sister, Della—Miss Wetherby, you know, at the Sanatorium."
"All right. Go ahead!" directed Jimmy, with a somewhat too evident attempt at polite interest. And Pollyanna, still smiling mischievously, began to read.
"You ask me to tell you everything about everybody. That is a large commission, but I'll do the best I can. To begin with, I think you'll find my sister quite changed. The new interests that have come into her life during the last six years have done wonders for her. Just now she is a bit thin and tired from overwork, but a good rest will soon remedy that, and you'll see how young and blooming and happy she looks. Please notice I said HAPPY. That won't mean so much to you as it does to me, of course, for you were too young to realize quite how unhappy she was when you first knew her that winter in Boston. Life was such a dreary, hopeless thing to her then; and now it is so full of interest and joy.
"First she has Jamie, and when you see them together you won't need to be told what he is to her. To be sure, we are no nearer knowing whether he is the REAL Jamie, or not, but my sister loves him like an own son now, and has legally adopted him, as I presume you know.
"Then she has her girls. Do you remember Sadie Dean, the salesgirl? Well, from getting interested in her, and trying to help her to a happier living, my sister has broadened her efforts little by little, until she has scores of girls now who regard her as their own best and particular good angel. She has started a Home for Working Girls along new lines. Half a dozen wealthy and influential men and women are associated with her, of course, but she is head and shoulders of the whole thing, and never hesitates to give HERSELF to each and every one of the girls. You can imagine what that means in nerve strain. Her chief support and right-hand man is her secretary, this same Sadie Dean. You'll find HER changed, too, yet she is the same old Sadie.
"As for Jamie—poor Jamie! The great sorrow of his life is that he knows now he can never walk. For a time we all had hopes. He was here at the Sanatorium under Dr. Ames for a year, and he improved to such an extent that he can go now with crutches. But the poor boy will always be a cripple—so far as his feet are concerned, but never as regards anything else. Someway, after you know Jamie, you seldom think of him as a cripple, his SOUL is so free. I can't explain it, but you'll know what I mean when you see him; and he has retained, to a marvelous degree, his old boyish enthusiasm and joy of living. There is just one thing—and only one, I believe—that would utterly quench that bright spirit and cast him into utter despair; and that is to find that he is not Jamie Kent, our nephew. So long has he brooded over this, and so ardently has he wished it, that he has come actually to believe that he IS the real Jamie; but if he isn't, I hope he will never find it out."
"There, that's all she says about them," announced Pollyanna, folding up the closely-written sheets in her hands. "But isn't that interesting?"
"Indeed it is!" There was a ring of genuineness in Jimmy's voice now. Jimmy was thinking suddenly of what his own good legs meant to him. He even, for the moment, was willing that this poor crippled youth should have a PART of Pollyanna's thoughts and attentions, if he were not so presuming as to claim too much of them, of course! "By George! it is tough for the poor chap, and no mistake."
"Tough! You don't know anything about it, Jimmy Bean," chokedPollyanna; "butIdo.Icouldn't walk once.IKNOW!"
"Yes, of course, of course," frowned the youth, moving restively in his seat. Jimmy, looking into Pollyanna's sympathetic face and brimming eyes was suddenly not so sure, after all, that he WAS willing to have this Jamie come to town—if just to THINK of him made Pollyanna look like that!
The few intervening days before the expected arrival of "those dreadful people," as Aunt Polly termed her niece's paying guests, were busy ones indeed for Pollyanna—but they were happy ones, too, as Pollyanna refused to be weary, or discouraged, or dismayed, no matter how puzzling were the daily problems she had to meet.
Summoning Nancy, and Nancy's younger sister, Betty, to her aid, Pollyanna systematically went through the house, room by room, and arranged for the comfort and convenience of her expected boarders. Mrs. Chilton could do but little to assist. In the first place she was not well. In the second place her mental attitude toward the whole idea was not conducive to aid or comfort, for at her side stalked always the Harrington pride of name and race, and on her lips was the constant moan:
"Oh, Pollyanna, Pollyanna, to think of the Harrington homestead ever coming to this!"
"It isn't, dearie," Pollyanna at last soothed laughingly. "It's theCarews that are COMING TO THE HARRINGTON HOMESTEAD!"
But Mrs. Chilton was not to be so lightly diverted, and responded only with a scornful glance and a deeper sigh, so Pollyanna was forced to leave her to travel alone her road of determined gloom.
Upon the appointed day, Pollyanna with Timothy (who owned the Harrington horses now) went to the station to meet the afternoon train. Up to this hour there had been nothing but confidence and joyous anticipation in Pollyanna's heart. But with the whistle of the engine there came to her a veritable panic of doubt, shyness, and dismay. She realized suddenly what she, Pollyanna, almost alone and unaided, was about to do. She remembered Mrs. Carew's wealth, position, and fastidious tastes. She recollected, too, that this would be a new, tall, young-man Jamie, quite unlike the boy she had known.
For one awful moment she thought only of getting away—somewhere, anywhere.
"Timothy, I—I feel sick. I'm not well. I—tell 'em—er—not to come," she faltered, poising as if for flight.
"Ma'am!" exclaimed the startled Timothy.
One glance into Timothy's amazed face was enough. Pollyanna laughed and threw back her shoulders alertly.
"Nothing. Never mind! I didn't mean it, of course, Timothy. Quick—see! They're almost here," she panted. And Pollyanna hurried forward, quite herself once more.
She knew them at once. Even had there been any doubt in her mind, the crutches in the hands of the tall, brown-eyed young man would have piloted her straight to her goal.
There were a brief few minutes of eager handclasps and incoherent exclamations, then, somehow, she found herself in the carriage with Mrs. Carew at her side, and Jamie and Sadie Dean in front. She had a chance, then, for the first time, really to see her friends, and to note the changes the six years had wrought.
In regard to Mrs. Carew, her first feeling was one of surprise. She had forgotten that Mrs. Carew was so lovely. She had forgotten that the eyelashes were so long, that the eyes they shaded were so beautiful. She even caught herself thinking enviously of how exactly that perfect face must tally, figure by figure, with that dread beauty-test-table. But more than anything else she rejoiced in the absence of the old fretful lines of gloom and bitterness.
Then she turned to Jamie. Here again she was surprised, and for much the same reason. Jamie, too, had grown handsome. To herself Pollyanna declared that he was really distinguished looking. His dark eyes, rather pale face, and dark, waving hair she thought most attractive. Then she caught a glimpse of the crutches at his side, and a spasm of aching sympathy contracted her throat.
From Jamie Pollyanna turned to Sadie Dean.
Sadie, so far as features went, looked much as she had when Pollyanna first saw her in the Public Garden; but Pollyanna did not need a second glance to know that Sadie, so far as hair, dress, temper, speech, and disposition were concerned, was a very different Sadie indeed.
Then Jamie spoke.
"How good you were to let us come," he said to Pollyanna. "Do you know what I thought of when you wrote that we could come?"
"Why, n-no, of course not," stammered Pollyanna. Pollyanna was still seeing the crutches at Jamie's side, and her throat was still tightened from that aching sympathy.
"Well, I thought of the little maid in the Public Garden with her bag of peanuts for Sir Lancelot and Lady Guinevere, and I knew that you were just putting us in their places, for if you had a bag of peanuts, and we had none, you wouldn't be happy till you'd shared it with us."
"A bag of peanuts, indeed!" laughed Pollyanna.
"Oh, of course in this case, your bag of peanuts happened to be airy country rooms, and cow's milk, and real eggs from a real hen's nest," returned Jamie whimsically; "but it amounts to the same thing. And maybe I'd better warn you—you remember how greedy Sir Lancelot was;—well—" He paused meaningly.
"All right, I'll take the risk," dimpled Pollyanna, thinking how glad she was that Aunt Polly was not present to hear her worst predictions so nearly fulfilled thus early. "Poor Sir Lancelot! I wonder if anybody feeds him now, or if he's there at all."
"Well, if he's there, he's fed," interposed Mrs. Carew, merrily. "This ridiculous boy still goes down there at least once a week with his pockets bulging with peanuts and I don't know what all. He can be traced any time by the trail of small grains he leaves behind him; and half the time, when I order my cereal for breakfast it isn't forthcoming, because, forsooth, 'Master Jamie has fed it to the pigeons, ma'am!'"
"Yes, but let me tell you," plunged in Jamie, enthusiastically. And the next minute Pollyanna found herself listening with all the old fascination to a story of a couple of squirrels in a sunlit garden. Later she saw what Della Wetherby had meant in her letter, for when the house was reached, it came as a distinct shock to her to see Jamie pick up his crutches and swing himself out of the carriage with their aid. She knew then that already in ten short minutes he had made her forget that he was lame.
To Pollyanna's great relief that first dreaded meeting between Aunt Polly and the Carew party passed off much better than she had feared. The newcomers were so frankly delighted with the old house and everything in it, that it was an utter impossibility for the mistress and owner of it all to continue her stiff attitude of disapproving resignation to their presence. Besides, as was plainly evident before an hour had passed, the personal charm and magnetism of Jamie had pierced even Aunt Polly's armor of distrust; and Pollyanna knew that at least one of her own most dreaded problems was a problem no longer, for already Aunt Polly was beginning to play the stately, yet gracious hostess to these, her guests.
Notwithstanding her relief at Aunt Polly's change of attitude, however, Pollyanna did not find that all was smooth sailing, by any means. There was work, and plenty of it, that must be done. Nancy's sister, Betty, was pleasant and willing, but she was not Nancy, as Pollyanna soon found. She needed training, and training took time. Pollyanna worried, too, for fear everything should not be quite right. To Pollyanna, those days, a dusty chair was a crime and a fallen cake a tragedy.
Gradually, however, after incessant arguments and pleadings on the part of Mrs. Carew and Jamie, Pollyanna came to take her tasks more easily, and to realize that the real crime and tragedy in her friends' eyes was, not the dusty chair nor the fallen cake, but the frown of worry and anxiety on her own face.
"Just as if it wasn't enough for you to LET us come," Jamie declared, "without just killing yourself with work to get us something to eat."
"Besides, we ought not to eat so much, anyway," Mrs. Carew laughed, "or else we shall get 'digestion,' as one of my girls calls it when her food disagrees with her."
It was wonderful, after all, how easily the three new members of the family fitted into the daily life. Before twenty-four hours had passed, Mrs. Carew had gotten Mrs. Chilton to asking really interested questions about the new Home for Working Girls, and Sadie Dean and Jamie were quarreling over the chance to help with the pea-shelling or the flower-picking.
The Carews had been at the Harrington homestead nearly a week when one evening John Pendleton and Jimmy called. Pollyanna had been hoping they would come soon. She had, indeed, urged it very strongly before the Carews came. She made the introductions now with visible pride.
"You are such good friends of mine, I want you to know each other, and be good friends together," she explained.
That Jimmy and Mr. Pendleton should be clearly impressed with the charm and beauty of Mrs. Carew did not surprise Pollyanna in the least; but the look that came into Mrs. Carew's face at sight of Jimmy did surprise her very much. It was almost a look of recognition.
"Why, Mr. Pendleton, haven't I met you before?" Mrs. Carew cried.
Jimmy's frank eyes met Mrs. Carew's gaze squarely, admiringly.
"I think not," he smiled back at her. "I'm sure I never have met you.I should have remembered it—ifIhad met YOU," he bowed.
So unmistakable was his significant emphasis that everybody laughed, and John Pendleton chuckled:
"Well done, son—for a youth of your tender years. I couldn't have done half so well myself."
Mrs. Carew flushed slightly and joined in the laugh.
"No, but really," she urged; "joking aside, there certainly is a strangely familiar something in your face. I think I must have SEEN you somewhere, if I haven't actually met you."
"And maybe you have," cried Pollyanna, "in Boston. Jimmy goes to Tech there winters, you know. Jimmy's going to build bridges and dams, you see—when he grows up, I mean," she finished with a merry glance at the big six-foot fellow still standing before Mrs. Carew.
Everybody laughed again—that is, everybody but Jamie; and only Sadie Dean noticed that Jamie, instead of laughing, closed his eyes as if at the sight of something that hurt. And only Sadie Dean knew how—and why—the subject was so quickly changed, for it was Sadie herself who changed it. It was Sadie, too, who, when the opportunity came, saw to it that books and flowers and beasts and birds—things that Jamie knew and understood—were talked about as well as dams and bridges which (as Sadie knew), Jamie could never build. That Sadie did all this, however, was not realized by anybody, least of all by Jamie, the one who most of all was concerned.
When the call was over and the Pendletons had gone, Mrs. Carew referred again to the curiously haunting feeling that somewhere she had seen young Pendleton before.
"I have, I know I have—somewhere," she declared musingly. "Of course it may have been in Boston; but—" She let the sentence remain unfinished; then, after a minute she added: "He's a fine young fellow, anyway. I like him."
"I'm so glad! I do, too," nodded Pollyanna. "I've always liked Jimmy."
"You've known him some time, then?" queried Jamie, a little wistfully.
"Oh, yes. I knew him years ago when I was a little girl, you know. He was Jimmy Bean then."
"Jimmy BEAN! Why, isn't he Mr. Pendleton's son?" asked Mrs. Carew, in surprise.
"No, only by adoption."
"Adoption!" exclaimed Jamie. "Then HE isn't a real son any more than I am." There was a curious note of almost joy in the lad's voice.
"No. Mr. Pendleton hasn't any children. He never married. He—he was going to, once, but he—he didn't." Pollyanna blushed and spoke with sudden diffidence. Pollyanna had never forgotten that it was her mother who, in the long ago, had said no to this same John Pendleton, and who had thus been responsible for the man's long, lonely years of bachelorhood.
Mrs. Carew and Jamie, however, being unaware of this, and seeing now only the blush on Pollyanna's cheek and the diffidence in her manner, drew suddenly the same conclusion.
"Is it possible," they asked themselves, "that this man, JohnPendleton, ever had a love affair with Pollyanna, child that she is?"
Naturally they did not say this aloud; so, naturally, there was no answer possible. Naturally, too, perhaps, the thought, though unspoken, was still not forgotten, but was tucked away in a corner of their minds for future reference—if need arose.
Before the Carews came, Pollyanna had told Jimmy that she was depending on him to help her entertain them. Jimmy had not expressed himself then as being overwhelmingly desirous to serve her in this way; but before the Carews had been in town a fortnight, he had shown himself as not only willing but anxious,—judging by the frequency and length of his calls, and the lavishness of his offers of the Pendleton horses and motor cars.
Between him and Mrs. Carew there sprang up at once a warm friendship based on what seemed to be a peculiarly strong attraction for each other. They walked and talked together, and even made sundry plans for the Home for Working Girls, to be carried out the following winter when Jimmy should be in Boston. Jamie, too, came in for a good measure of attention, nor was Sadie Dean forgotten. Sadie, as Mrs. Carew plainly showed, was to be regarded as if she were quite one of the family; and Mrs. Carew was careful to see that she had full share in any plans for merrymaking.
Nor did Jimmy always come alone with his offers for entertainment. More and more frequently John Pendleton appeared with him. Rides and drives and picnics were planned and carried out, and long delightful afternoons were spent over books and fancy-work on the Harrington veranda.
Pollyanna was delighted. Not only were her paying guests being kept from any possibilities of ennui and homesickness, but her good friends, the Carews, were becoming delightfully acquainted with her other good friends, the Pendletons. So, like a mother hen with a brood of chickens, she hovered over the veranda meetings, and did everything in her power to keep the group together and happy.
Neither the Carews nor the Pendletons, however, were at all satisfied to have Pollyanna merely an onlooker in their pastimes, and very strenuously they urged her to join them. They would not take no for an answer, indeed, and Pollyanna very frequently found the way opened for her.
"Just as if we were going to have you poked up in this hot kitchen frosting cake!" Jamie scolded one day, after he had penetrated the fastnesses of her domain. "It is a perfectly glorious morning, and we're all going over to the Gorge and take our luncheon. And YOU are going with us."
"But, Jamie, I can't—indeed I can't," refused Pollyanna.
"Why not? You won't have dinner to get for us, for we sha'n't be here to eat it."
"But there's the—the luncheon."
"Wrong again. We'll have the luncheon with us, so you CAN'T stay home to get that. Now what's to hinder your going along WITH the luncheon, eh?"
"Why, Jamie, I—I can't. There's the cake to frost—"
"Don't want it frosted."
"And the dusting—"
"Don't want it dusted."
"And the ordering to do for to-morrow."
"Give us crackers and milk. We'd lots rather have you and crackers and milk than a turkey dinner and not you."
"But I can't begin to tell you the things I've got to do to-day."
"Don't want you to begin to tell me," retorted Jamie, cheerfully. "I want you to stop telling me. Come, put on your bonnet. I saw Betty in the dining room, and she says she'll put our luncheon up. Now hurry."
"Why, Jamie, you ridiculous boy, I can't go," laughed Pollyanna, holding feebly back, as he tugged at her dress-sleeve. "I can't go to that picnic with you!"
But she went. She went not only then, but again and again. She couldnot help going, indeed, for she found arrayed against her not onlyJamie, but Jimmy and Mr. Pendleton, to say nothing of Mrs. Carew andSadie Dean, and even Aunt Polly herself.
"And of course I AM glad to go," she would sigh happily, when some dreary bit of work was taken out of her hands in spite of all protesting. "But, surely, never before were there any boarders like mine—teasing for crackers-and-milk and cold things; and never before was there a boarding mistress like me—running around the country after this fashion!"
The climax came when one day John Pendleton (and Aunt Polly never ceased to exclaim because it WAS John Pendleton)—suggested that they all go on a two weeks' camping trip to a little lake up among the mountains forty miles from Beldingsville.
The idea was received with enthusiastic approbation by everybody except Aunt Polly. Aunt Polly said, privately, to Pollyanna, that it was all very good and well and desirable that John Pendleton should have gotten out of the sour, morose aloofness that had been his state for so many years, but that it did not necessarily follow that it was equally desirable that he should be trying to turn himself into a twenty-year-old boy again; and that was what, in her opinion, he seemed to be doing now! Publicly she contented herself with saying coldly that SHE certainly should not go on any insane camping trip to sleep on damp ground and eat bugs and spiders, under the guise of "fun," nor did she think it a sensible thing for anybody over forty to do.
If John Pendleton felt any wound from this shaft, he made no sign. Certainly there was no diminution of apparent interest and enthusiasm on his part, and the plans for the camping expedition came on apace, for it was unanimously decided that, even if Aunt Polly would not go, that was no reason why the rest should not.
"And Mrs. Carew will be all the chaperon we need, anyhow," Jimmy had declared airily.
For a week, therefore, little was talked of but tents, food supplies, cameras, and fishing tackle, and little was done that was not a preparation in some way for the trip.
"And let's make it the real thing," proposed Jimmy, eagerly, "—yes, even to Mrs. Chilton's bugs and spiders," he added, with a merry smile straight into that lady's severely disapproving eyes. "None of your log-cabin-central-dining-room idea for us! We want real camp-fires with potatoes baked in the ashes, and we want to sit around and tell stories and roast corn on a stick."
"And we want to swim and row and fish," chimed in Pollyanna. "And—" She stopped suddenly, her eyes on Jamie's face. "That is, of course," she corrected quickly, "we wouldn't want to—to do those things all the time. There'd be a lot of QUIET things we'd want to do, too—read and talk, you know."
Jamie's eyes darkened. His face grew a little white. His lips parted, but before any words came, Sadie Dean was speaking.
"Oh, but on camping trips and picnics, you know, we EXPECT to dooutdoor stunts," she interposed feverishly; "and I'm sure we WANT to.Last summer we were down in Maine, and you should have seen the fishMr. Carew caught. It was—You tell it," she begged, turning to Jamie.
Jamie laughed and shook his head.
"They'd never believe it," he objected; "—a fish story like that!"
"Try us," challenged Pollyanna.
Jamie still shook his head—but the color had come back to his face, and his eyes were no longer somber as if with pain. Pollyanna, glancing at Sadie Dean, vaguely wondered why she suddenly settled back in her seat with so very evident an air of relief.
At last the appointed day came, and the start was made in John Pendleton's big new touring car with Jimmy at the wheel. A whir, a throbbing rumble, a chorus of good-bys, and they were off, with one long shriek of the siren under Jimmy's mischievous fingers.
In after days Pollyanna often went back in her thoughts to that first night in camp. The experience was so new and so wonderful in so many ways.
It was four o'clock when their forty-mile automobile journey came to an end. Since half-past three their big car had been ponderously picking its way over an old logging-road not designed for six-cylinder automobiles. For the car itself, and for the hand at the wheel, this part of the trip was a most wearing one; but for the merry passengers, who had no responsibility concerning hidden holes and muddy curves, it was nothing but a delight growing more poignant with every new vista through the green arches, and with every echoing laugh that dodged the low-hanging branches.
The site for the camp was one known to John Pendleton years before, and he greeted it now with a satisfied delight that was not unmingled with relief.
"Oh, how perfectly lovely!" chorused the others.
"Glad you like it! I thought it would be about right," nodded John Pendleton. "Still, I was a little anxious, after all, for these places do change, you know, most remarkably sometimes. And of course this has grown up to bushes a little—but not so but what we can easily clear it."
Everybody fell to work then, clearing the ground, putting up the two little tents, unloading the automobile, building the camp fire, and arranging the "kitchen and pantry."
It was then that Pollyanna began especially to notice Jamie, and to fear for him. She realized suddenly that the hummocks and hollows and pine-littered knolls were not like a carpeted floor for a pair of crutches, and she saw that Jamie was realizing it, too. She saw, also, that in spite of his infirmity, he was trying to take his share in the work; and the sight troubled her. Twice she hurried forward and intercepted him, taking from his arms the box he was trying to carry.
"Here, let me take that," she begged. "You've done enough." And the second time she added: "Do go and sit down somewhere to rest, Jamie. You look so tired!"
If she had been watching closely she would have seen the quick color sweep to his forehead. But she was not watching, so she did not see it. She did see, however, to her intense surprise, Sadie Dean hurry forward a moment later, her arms full of boxes, and heard her cry:
"Oh, Mr. Carew, please, if you WOULD give me a lift with these!"
The next moment, Jamie, once more struggling with the problem of managing a bundle of boxes and two crutches, was hastening toward the tents.
With a quick word of protest on her tongue, Pollyanna turned to Sadie Dean. But the protest died unspoken, for Sadie, her finger to her lips, was hurrying straight toward her.
"I know you didn't think," she stammered in a low voice, as she reached Pollyanna's side. "But, don't you see?—it HURTS him—to have you think he can't do things like other folks. There, look! See how happy he is now."
Pollyanna looked, and she saw. She saw Jamie, his whole self alert, deftly balance his weight on one crutch and swing his burden to the ground. She saw the happy light on his face, and she heard him say nonchalantly:
"Here's another contribution from Miss Dean. She asked me to bring this over."
"Why, yes, I see," breathed Pollyanna, turning to Sadie Dean. ButSadie Dean had gone.
Pollyanna watched Jamie a good deal after that, though she was careful not to let him, or any one else, see that she was watching him. And as she watched, her heart ached. Twice she saw him essay a task and fail: once with a box too heavy for him to lift; once with a folding-table too unwieldy for him to carry with his crutches. And each time she saw his quick glance about him to see if others noticed. She saw, too, that unmistakably he was getting very tired, and that his face, in spite of its gay smile, was looking white and drawn, as if he were in pain.
"I should think we might have known more," stormed Pollyanna hotly to herself, her eyes blinded with tears. "I should think we might have known more than to have let him come to a place like this. Camping, indeed!—and with a pair of crutches! Why couldn't we have remembered before we started?"
An hour later, around the camp fire after supper, Pollyanna had her answer to this question; for, with the glowing fire before her, and the soft, fragrant dark all about her, she once more fell under the spell of the witchery that fell from Jamie's lips; and she once more forgot—Jamie's crutches.
They were a merry party—the six of them—and a congenial one. There seemed to be no end to the new delights that came with every new day, not the least of which was the new charm of companionship that seemed to be a part of this new life they were living.
As Jamie said one night, when they were all sitting about the fire:
"You see, we seem to know each other so much better up here in the woods—better in a week than we would in a year in town."
"I know it. I wonder why," murmured Mrs. Carew, her eyes dreamily following the leaping blaze.
"I think it's something in the air," sighed Pollyanna, happily. "There's something about the sky and the woods and the lake so—so—well, there just is; that's all."
"I think you mean, because the world is shut out," cried Sadie Dean, with a curious little break in her voice. (Sadie had not joined in the laugh that followed Pollyanna's limping conclusion.) "Up here everything is so real and true that we, too, can be our real true selves—not what the world SAYS we are because we are rich, or poor, or great, or humble; but what we really are, OURSELVES."
"Ho!" scoffed Jimmy, airily. "All that sounds very fine; but the real common-sense reason is because we don't have any Mrs. Tom and Dick and Harry sitting on their side porches and commenting on every time we stir, and wondering among themselves where we are going, why we are going there, and how long we're intending to stay!"
"Oh, Jimmy, how you do take the poetry out of things," reproachedPollyanna, laughingly.
"But that's my business," flashed Jimmy. "How do you suppose I'm going to build dams and bridges if I don't see something besides poetry in the waterfall?"
"You can't, Pendleton! And it's the bridge—that counts—every time," declared Jamie in a voice that brought a sudden hush to the group about the fire. It was for only a moment, however, for almost at once Sadie Dean broke the silence with a gay:
"Pooh! I'd rather have the waterfall every time, without ANY bridge around—to spoil the view!"
Everybody laughed—and it was as if a tension somewhere snapped. ThenMrs. Carew rose to her feet.
"Come, come, children, your stern chaperon says it's bedtime!" And with a merry chorus of good-nights the party broke up.
And so the days passed. To Pollyanna they were wonderful days, and still the most wonderful part was the charm of close companionship—a companionship that, while differing as to details with each one, was yet delightful with all.
With Sadie Dean she talked of the new Home, and of what a marvelous work Mrs. Carew was doing. They talked, too, of the old days when Sadie was selling bows behind the counter, and of what Mrs. Carew had done for her. Pollyanna heard, also, something of the old father and mother "back home," and of the joy that Sadie, in her new position, had been able to bring into their lives.
"And after all it's really YOU that began it, you know," she said one day to Pollyanna. But Pollyanna only shook her head at this with an emphatic:
"Nonsense! It was all Mrs. Carew."
With Mrs. Carew herself Pollyanna talked also of the Home, and of her plans for the girls. And once, in the hush of a twilight walk, Mrs. Carew spoke of herself and of her changed outlook on life. And she, like Sadie Dean, said brokenly: "After all, it's really you that began it, Pollyanna." But Pollyanna, as in Sadie Dean's case, would have none of this; and she began to talk of Jamie, and of what HE had done.
"Jamie's a dear," Mrs. Carew answered affectionately. "And I love him like an own son. He couldn't be dearer to me if he were really my sister's boy."
"Then you don't think he is?"
"I don't know. We've never learned anything conclusive. Sometimes I'm sure he is. Then again I doubt it. I think HE really believes he is—bless his heart! At all events, one thing is sure: he has good blood in him from somewhere. Jamie's no ordinary waif of the streets, you know, with his talents; and the wonderful way he has responded to teaching and training proves it."
"Of course," nodded Pollyanna. "And as long as you love him so well, it doesn't really matter, anyway, does it, whether he's the real Jamie or not?"
Mrs. Carew hesitated. Into her eyes crept the old somberness of heartache.
"Not so far as he is concerned," she sighed, at last. "It's only that sometimes I get to thinking: if he isn't our Jamie, where is—Jamie Kent? Is he well? Is he happy? Has he any one to love him? When I get to thinking like that, Pollyanna, I'm nearly wild. I'd give—everything I have in the world, it seems to me, to really KNOW that this boy is Jamie Kent."
Pollyanna used to think of this conversation sometimes, in her after talks with Jamie. Jamie was so sure of himself.
"It's just somehow that I FEEL it's so," he said once to Pollyanna. "I believe I am Jamie Kent. I've believed it quite a while. I'm afraid I've believed it so long now, that—that I just couldn't bear it, to find out I wasn't he. Mrs. Carew has done so much for me; just think if, after all, I were only a stranger!"
"But she—loves you, Jamie."
"I know she does—and that would only hurt all the more—don't you see?—because it would be hurting her. SHE wants me to be the real Jamie. I know she does. Now if I could only DO something for her—make her proud of me in some way! If I could only do something to support myself, even, like a man! But what can I do, with—these?" He spoke bitterly, and laid his hand on the crutches at his side.
Pollyanna was shocked and distressed. It was the first time she had heard Jamie speak of his infirmity since the old boyhood days. Frantically she cast about in her mind for just the right thing to say; but before she had even thought of anything, Jamie's face had undergone a complete change.
"But, there, forget it! I didn't mean to say it," he cried gaily. "And 'twas rank heresy to the game, wasn't it? I'm sure I'm GLAD I've got the crutches. They're a whole lot nicer than the wheel chair!"
"And the Jolly Book—do you keep it now?" asked Pollyanna, in a voice that trembled a little.
"Sure! I've got a whole library of jolly books now," he retorted. "They're all in leather, dark red, except the first one. That is the same little old notebook that Jerry gave me."
"Jerry! And I've been meaning all the time to ask for him," criedPollyanna. "Where is he?"
"In Boston; and his vocabulary is just as picturesque as ever, only he has to tone it down at times. Jerry's still in the newspaper business—but he's GETTING the news, not selling it. Reporting, you know. I HAVE been able to help him and mumsey. And don't you suppose I was glad? Mumsey's in a sanatorium for her rheumatism."
"And is she better?"
"Very much. She's coming out pretty soon, and going to housekeeping with Jerry. Jerry's been making up some of his lost schooling during these past few years. He's let me help him—but only as a loan. He's been very particular to stipulate that."
"Of course," nodded Pollyanna, in approval. "He'd want it that way,I'm sure. I should. It isn't nice to be under obligations that youcan't pay. I know how it is. That's why I so wish I could help AuntPolly out—after all she's done for me!"
"But you are helping her this summer."
Pollyanna lifted her eyebrows.
"Yes, I'm keeping summer boarders. I look it, don't I?" she challenged, with a flourish of her hands toward her surroundings. "Surely, never was a boarding-house mistress's task quite like mine! And you should have heard Aunt Polly's dire predictions of what summer boarders would be," she chuckled irrepressibly.
"What was that?"
Pollyanna shook her head decidedly.
"Couldn't possibly tell you. That's a dead secret. But—" She stopped and sighed, her face growing wistful again. "This isn't going to last, you know. It can't. Summer boarders don't. I've got to do something winters. I've been thinking. I believe—I'll write stories."
Jamie turned with a start.
"You'll—what?" he demanded.
"Write stories—to sell, you know. You needn't look so surprised! Lots of folks do that. I knew two girls in Germany who did."
"Did you ever try it?" Jamie still spoke a little queerly.
"N-no; not yet," admitted Pollyanna. Then, defensively, in answer to the expression on his face, she bridled: "I TOLD you I was keeping summer boarders now. I can't do both at once."
"Of course not!"
She threw him a reproachful glance.
"You don't think I can ever do it?"
"I didn't say so."
"No; but you look it. I don't see why I can't. It isn't like singing. You don't have to have a voice for it. And it isn't like an instrument that you have to learn how to play."
"I think it is—a little—like that." Jamie's voice was low. His eyes were turned away.
"How? What do you mean? Why, Jamie, just a pencil and paper, so—that isn't like learning to play the piano or violin!"
There was a moment's silence. Then came the answer, still in that low, diffident voice; still with the eyes turned away.
"The instrument that you play on, Pollyanna, will be the great heart of the world; and to me that seems the most wonderful instrument of all—to learn. Under your touch, if you are skilful, it will respond with smiles or tears, as you will."
[Illustration: "'The instrument that you play on, Pollyanna, will be the great heart of the world'"]
Pollyanna drew a tremulous sigh. Her eyes grew wet.
"Oh, Jamie, how beautifully you do put things—always! I never thought of it that way. But it's so, isn't it? How I would love to do it! Maybe I couldn't do—all that. But I've read stories in the magazines, lots of them. Seems as if I could write some like those, anyway. I LOVE to tell stories. I'm always repeating those you tell, and I always laugh and cry, too, just as I do when YOU tell them."
Jamie turned quickly.
"DO they make you laugh and cry, Pollyanna—really?" There was a curious eagerness in his voice.
"Of course they do, and you know it, Jamie. And they used to long ago, too, in the Public Garden. Nobody can tell stories like you, Jamie. YOU ought to be the one writing stories; not I. And, say, Jamie, why don't you? You could do it lovely, I know!"
There was no answer. Jamie, apparently, did not hear; perhaps because he called, at that instant, to a chipmunk that was scurrying through the bushes near by.
It was not always with Jamie, nor yet with Mrs. Carew and Sadie Dean that Pollyanna had delightful walks and talks, however; very often it was with Jimmy, or John Pendleton.
Pollyanna was sure now that she had never before known John Pendleton. The old taciturn moroseness seemed entirely gone since they came to camp. He rowed and swam and fished and tramped with fully as much enthusiasm as did Jimmy himself, and with almost as much vigor. Around the camp fire at night he quite rivaled Jamie with his story-telling of adventures, both laughable and thrilling, that had befallen him in his foreign travels.
"In the 'Desert of Sarah,' Nancy used to call it," laughed Pollyanna one night, as she joined the rest in begging for a story.
Better than all this, however, in Pollyanna's opinion, were the times when John Pendleton, with her alone, talked of her mother as he used to know her and love her, in the days long gone. That he did so talk with her was a joy to Pollyanna, but a great surprise, too; for, never in the past, had John Pendleton talked so freely of the girl whom he had so loved—hopelessly. Perhaps John Pendleton himself felt some of the surprise, for once he said to Pollyanna, musingly:
"I wonder why I'm talking to you like this."
"Oh, but I love to have you," breathed Pollyanna.
"Yes, I know—but I wouldn't think I would do it. It must be, though, that it's because you are so like her, as I knew her. You are very like your mother, my dear."