“Pollyanna, long years ago I loved somebody very much. I hoped to bring her, some day, to this house. I pictured how happy we’d be together in our home all the long years to come.”
“Yes,” pitied Pollyanna, her eyes shining with sympathy.
“But—well, I didn’t bring her here. Never mind why. I just didn’t that’s all. And ever since then this great gray pile of stone has been a house—never a home. It takes a woman’s hand and heart, or a child’s presence, to make a home, Pollyanna; and I have not had either. Now will you come, my dear?”
Pollyanna sprang to her feet. Her face was fairly illumined.
“Mr. Pendleton, you—you mean that you wish you—you had had that woman’s hand and heart all this time?”
“Why, y-yes, Pollyanna.”
“Oh, I’m so glad! Then it’s all right,” sighed the little girl. “Now you can take us both, and everything will be lovely.”
“Take—you—both?” repeated the man, dazedly.
A faint doubt crossed Pollyanna’s countenance.
“Well, of course, Aunt Polly isn’t won over, yet; but I’m sure she will be if you tell it to her just as you did to me, and then we’d both come, of course.”
A look of actual terror leaped to the man’s eyes.
“Aunt Polly come—HERE!”
Pollyanna’s eyes widened a little.
“Would you rather go THERE?” she asked. “Of course the house isn’t quite so pretty, but it’s nearer—”
“Pollyanna, what ARE you talking about?” asked the man, very gently now.
“Why, about where we’re going to live, of course,” rejoined Pollyanna, in obvious surprise. “I THOUGHT you meant here, at first. You said it was here that you had wanted Aunt Polly’s hand and heart all these years to make a home, and—”
An inarticulate cry came from the man’s throat. He raised his hand and began to speak; but the next moment he dropped his hand nervelessly at his side.
“The doctor, sir,” said the maid in the doorway.
Pollyanna rose at once.
John Pendleton turned to her feverishly.
“Pollyanna, for Heaven’s sake, say nothing of what I asked you—yet,” he begged, in a low voice. Pollyanna dimpled into a sunny smile.
“Of course not! Just as if I didn’t know you’d rather tell her yourself!” she called back merrily over her shoulder.
John Pendleton fell limply back in his chair.
“Why, what’s up?” demanded the doctor, a minute later, his fingers on his patient’s galloping pulse.
A whimsical smile trembled on John Pendleton’s lips.
“Overdose of your—tonic, I guess,” he laughed, as he noted the doctor’s eyes following Pollyanna’s little figure down the driveway.
CHAPTER XX. WHICH IS MORE SURPRISING
Sunday mornings Pollyanna usually attended church and Sunday school. Sunday afternoons she frequently went for a walk with Nancy. She had planned one for the day after her Saturday afternoon visit to Mr. John Pendleton; but on the way home from Sunday school Dr. Chilton overtook her in his gig, and brought his horse to a stop.
“Suppose you let me drive you home, Pollyanna,” he suggested. “I want to speak to you a minute. I, was just driving out to your place to tell you,” he went on, as Pollyanna settled herself at his side. “Mr. Pendleton sent a special request for you to go to see him this afternoon, SURE. He says it’s very important.”
Pollyanna nodded happily.
“Yes, it is, I know. I’ll go.”
The doctor eyed her with some surprise.
“I’m not sure I shall let you, after all,” he declared, his eyes twinkling. “You seemed more upsetting than soothing yesterday, young lady.”
Pollyanna laughed.
“Oh, it wasn’t me, truly—not really, you know; not so much as it was Aunt Polly.”
The doctor turned with a quick start.
“Your—aunt!” he ejaculated.
Pollyanna gave a happy little bounce in her seat.
“Yes. And it’s so exciting and lovely, just like a story, you know. I—I’m going to tell you,” she burst out, with sudden decision. “He said not to mention it; but he wouldn’t mind your knowing, of course. He meant not to mention it to HER.”
“HER?”
“Yes; Aunt Polly. And, of course he WOULD want to tell her himself instead of having me do it—lovers, so!”
“Lovers!” As the doctor said the word, the horse started violently, as if the hand that held the reins had given them a sharp jerk.
“Yes,” nodded Pollyanna, happily. “That’s the story-part, you see. I didn’t know it till Nancy told me. She said Aunt Polly had a lover years ago, and they quarrelled. She didn’t know who it was at first. But we’ve found out now. It’s Mr. Pendleton, you know.”
The doctor relaxed suddenly, The hand holding the reins fell limply to his lap.
“Oh! No; I—didn’t know,” he said quietly.
Pollyanna hurried on—they were nearing the Harrington homestead.
“Yes; and I’m so glad now. It’s come out lovely. Mr. Pendleton asked me to come and live with him, but of course I wouldn’t leave Aunt Polly like that—after she’d been so good to me. Then he told me all about the woman’s hand and heart that he used to want, and I found out that he wanted it now; and I was so glad! For of course if he wants to make up the quarrel, everything will be all right now, and Aunt Polly and I will both go to live there, or else he’ll come to live with us. Of course Aunt Polly doesn’t know yet, and we haven’t got everything settled; so I suppose that is why he wanted to see me this afternoon, sure.”
The doctor sat suddenly erect. There was an odd smile on his lips.
“Yes; I can well imagine that Mr. John Pendleton does—want to see you, Pollyanna,” he nodded, as he pulled his horse to a stop before the door.
“There’s Aunt Polly now in the window,” cried Pollyanna; then, a second later: “Why, no, she isn’t—but I thought I saw her!”
“No; she isn’t there—now,” said the doctor, His lips had suddenly lost their smile.
Pollyanna found a very nervous John Pendleton waiting for her that afternoon.
“Pollyanna,” he began at once. “I’ve been trying all night to puzzle out what you meant by all that, yesterday—about my wanting your Aunt Polly’s hand and heart here all those years. What did you mean?”
“Why, because you were lovers, you know once; and I was so glad you still felt that way now.”
“Lovers!—your Aunt Polly and I?”
At the obvious surprise in the man’s voice, Pollyanna opened wide her eyes.
“Why, Mr. Pendleton, Nancy said you were!”
The man gave a short little laugh.
“Indeed! Well, I’m afraid I shall have to say that Nancy—didn’t know.”
“Then you—weren’t lovers?” Pollyanna’s voice was tragic with dismay.
“Never!”
“And it ISN’T all coming out like a book?”
There was no answer. The man’s eyes were moodily fixed out the window.
“O dear! And it was all going so splendidly,” almost sobbed Pollyanna. “I’d have been so glad to come—with Aunt Polly.”
“And you won’t—now?” The man asked the question without turning his head.
“Of course not! I’m Aunt Polly’s.”
The man turned now, almost fiercely.
“Before you were hers, Pollyanna, you were—your mother’s. And—it was your mother’s hand and heart that I wanted long years ago.”
“My mother’s!”
“Yes. I had not meant to tell you, but perhaps it’s better, after all, that I do—now.” John Pendleton’s face had grown very white. He was speaking with evident difficulty. Pollyanna, her eyes wide and fr
ightened, and her lips parted, was gazing at him fixedly. “I loved your mother; but she—didn’t love me. And after a time she went away with—your father. I did not know until then how much I did—care. The whole world suddenly seemed to turn black under my fingers, and—But, never mind. For long years I have been a cross, crabbed, unlovable, unloved old man—though I’m not nearly sixty, yet, Pollyanna. Then, One day, like one of the prisms that you love so well, little girl, you danced into my life, and flecked my dreary old world with dashes of the purple and gold and scarlet of your own bright cheeriness. I found out, after a time, who you were, and—and I thought then I never wanted to see you again. I didn’t want to be reminded of—your mother. But—you know how that came out. I just had to have you come. And now I want you always. Pollyanna, won’t you come NOW?”
“But, Mr. Pendleton, I—There’s Aunt Polly!” Pollyanna’s eyes were blurred with tears.
The man made an impatient gesture.
“What about me? How do you suppose I’m going to be ‘glad’ about anything—without you? Why, Pollyanna, it’s only since you came that I’ve been even half glad to live! But if I had you for my own little girl, I’d be glad for—anything; and I’d try to make you glad, too, my dear. You shouldn’t have a wish ungratified. All my money, to the last cent, should go to make you happy.”
Pollyanna looked shocked.
“Why, Mr. Pendleton, as if I’d let you spend it on me—all that money you’ve saved for the heathen!”
A dull red came to the man’s face. He started to speak, but Pollyanna was still talking.
“Besides, anybody with such a lot of money as you have doesn’t need me to make you glad about things. You’re making other folks so glad giving them things that you just can’t help being glad yourself! Why, look at those prisms you gave Mrs. Snow and me, and the gold piece you gave Nancy on her birthday, and—”
“Yes, yes—never mind about all that,” interrupted the man. His face was very, very red now—and no wonder, perhaps: it was not for “giving things” that John Pendleton had been best known in the past. “That’s all nonsense. ‘Twasn’t much, anyhow—but what there was, was because of you. YOU gave those things; not I! Yes, you did,” he repeated, in answer to the shocked denial in her face. “And that only goes to prove all the more how I need you, little girl,” he added, his voice softening into tender pleading once more. “If ever, ever I am to play the ‘glad game,’ Pollyanna, you’ll have to come and play it with me.”
The little girl’s forehead puckered into a wistful frown.
“Aunt Polly has been so good to me,” she began; but the man interrupted her sharply. The old irritability had come back to his face. Impatience which would brook no opposition had been a part of John Pendleton’s nature too long to yield very easily now to restraint.
“Of course she’s been good to you! But she doesn’t want you, I’ll warrant, half so much as I do,” he contested.
“Why, Mr. Pendleton, she’s glad, I know, to have—”
“Glad!” interrupted the man, thoroughly losing his patience now. “I’ll wager Miss Polly doesn’t know how to be glad—for anything! Oh, she does her duty, I know. She’s a very DUTIFUL woman. I’ve had experience with her ‘duty,’ before. I’ll acknowledge we haven’t been the best of friends for the last fifteen or twenty years. But I know her. Every one knows her—and she isn’t the ‘glad’ kind, Pollyanna. She doesn’t know how to be. As for your coming to me—you just ask her and see if she won’t let you come. And, oh, little girl, little girl, I want you so!” he finished brokenly.
Pollyanna rose to her feet with a long sigh.
“All right. I’ll ask her,” she said wistfully. “Of course I don’t mean that I wouldn’t like to live here with you, Mr. Pendleton, but—” She did not complete her sentence. There was a moment’s silence, then she added: “Well, anyhow, I’m glad I didn’t tell her yesterday;—’cause then I supposed SHE was wanted, too.”
John Pendleton smiled grimly.
“Well, yes, Pollyanna; I guess it is just as well you didn’t mention it—yesterday.”
“I didn’t—only to the doctor; and of course he doesn’t count.”
“The doctor!” cried John Pendleton, turning quickly. “Not—Dr.—Chilton?”
“Yes; when he came to tell me you wanted to see me to-day, you know.”
“Well, of all the—” muttered the man, falling back in his chair. Then he sat up with sudden interest. “And what did Dr. Chilton say?” he asked.
Pollyanna frowned thoughtfully.
“Why, I don’t remember. Not much, I reckon. Oh, he did say he could well imagine you did want to see me.”
“Oh, did he, indeed!” answered John Pendleton. And Pollyanna wondered why he gave that sudden queer little laugh.
CHAPTER XXI. A QUESTION ANSWERED
The sky was darkening fast with what appeared to be an approaching thunder shower when Pollyanna hurried down the hill from John Pendleton’s house. Half-way home she met Nancy with an umbrella. By that time, however, the clouds had shifted their position and the shower was not so imminent.
“Guess it’s goin’ ‘round ter the north,” announced Nancy, eyeing the sky critically. “I thought ‘twas, all the time, but Miss Polly wanted me ter come with this. She was WORRIED about ye!”
“Was she?” murmured Pollyanna abstractedly, eyeing the clouds in her turn.
Nancy sniffed a little.
“You don’t seem ter notice what I said,” she observed aggrievedly. “I said yer aunt was WORRIED about ye!”
“Oh,” sighed Pollyanna, remembering suddenly the question she was so soon to ask her aunt. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare her.”
“Well, I’m glad,” retorted Nancy, unexpectedly. “I am, I am.”
Pollyanna stared.
“GLAD that Aunt Polly was scared about me! Why, Nancy, THAT isn’t the way to play the game—to be glad for things like that!” she objected.
“There wa’n’t no game in it,” retorted Nancy. “Never thought of it. YOU don’t seem ter sense what it means ter have Miss Polly WORRIED about ye, child!”
“Why, it means worried—and worried is horrid—to feel,” maintained Pollyanna. “What else can it mean?”
Nancy tossed her head.
“Well, I’ll tell ye what it means. It means she’s at last gettin’ down somewheres near human—like folks; an’ that she ain’t jest doin’ her duty by ye all the time.”
“Why, Nancy,” demurred the scandalized Pollyanna, “Aunt Polly always does her duty. She—she’s a very dutiful woman!” Unconsciously Pollyanna repeated John Pendleton’s words of half an hour before.
Nancy chuckled.
“You’re right she is—and she always was, I guess! But she’s somethin’ more, now, since you came.”
Pollyanna’s face changed. Her brows drew into a troubled frown.
“There, that’s what I was going to ask you, Nancy,” she sighed. “Do you think Aunt Polly likes to have me here? Would she mind—if if I wasn’t here any more?”
Nancy threw a quick look into the little girl’s absorbed face. She had expected to be asked this question long before, and she had dreaded it. She had wondered how she should answer it—how she could answer it honestly without cruelly hurting the questioner. But now, NOW, in the face of the new suspicions that had become convictions by the afternoon’s umbrella-sending—Nancy only welcomed the question with open arms. She was sure that, with a clean conscience to-day, she could set the love-hungry little girl’s heart at rest.
“Likes ter have ye here? Would she miss ye if ye wa’n’t here?” cried Nancy, indignantly. “As if that wa’n’t jest what I was tellin’ of ye! Didn’t she send me posthaste with an umbrella ‘cause she see a little cloud in the sky? Didn’t she make me tote yer things all down-stairs, so you could have the pretty room you wa
nted? Why, Miss Pollyanna, when ye remember how at first she hated ter have—”
With a choking cough Nancy pulled herself up just in time.
“And it ain’t jest things I can put my fingers on, neither,” rushed on Nancy, breathlessly. “It’s little ways she has, that shows how you’ve been softenin’ her up an’ mellerin’ her down—the cat, and the dog, and the way she speaks ter me, and oh, lots o’ things. Why, Miss Pollyanna, there ain’t no tellin’ how she’d miss ye—if ye wa’n’t here,” finished Nancy, speaking with an enthusiastic certainty that was meant to hide the perilous admission she had almost made before. Even then she was not quite prepared for the sudden joy that illumined Pollyanna’s face.
“Oh, Nancy, I’m so glad—glad—glad! You don’t know how glad I am that Aunt Polly—wants me!”
“As if I’d leave her now!” thought Pollyanna, as she climbed the stairs to her room a little later. “I always knew I wanted to live with Aunt Polly—but I reckon maybe I didn’t know quite how much I wanted Aunt Polly—to want to live with ME!”
The task of telling John Pendleton of her decision would not be an easy one, Pollyanna knew, and she dreaded it. She was very fond of John Pendleton, and she was very sorry for him—because he seemed to be so sorry for himself. She was sorry, too, for the long, lonely life that had made him so unhappy; and she was grieved that it had been because of her mother that he had spent those dreary years. She pictured the great gray house as it would be after its master was well again, with its silent rooms, its littered floors, its disordered desk; and her heart ached for his loneliness. She wished that somewhere, some one might be found who—And it was at this point that she sprang to her feet with a little cry of joy at the thought that had come to her.
As soon as she could, after that, she hurried up the hill to John Pendleton’s house; and in due time she found herself in the great dim library, with John Pendleton himself sitting near her, his long, thin hands lying idle on the arms of his chair, and his faithful little dog at his feet.
The Classic Children's Literature Collection: 39 Classic Novels Page 47
