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It rained the next time Pollyanna saw the Man. She greeted him, however, with a smile.
“How do you do?” she called.
The man stopped abruptly.
“See here, why don’t you find someone your own age to talk to?”
“I’d like to, sir, but there aren’t any around here. Still, I don’t mind so very much. I like old folks just as well, maybe better, sometimes – being used to the Ladies’ Aid, so.”
“Humph! The Ladies’ Aid, indeed! Is that what you took me for?”
Pollyanna laughed gleefully.
“Oh, no, sir. You don’t look like a Ladies’ Aider. Though I’m sure you’re much nicer than you look!”
The man turned and strode on as before.
The next time Pollyanna met the Man, he greeted her. The Man always spoke to Pollyanna after this, and frequently he spoke first, though usually he said just “good afternoon.” Even that was a great surprise to Nancy.
“Miss Pollyanna,” she gasped, “did that man SPEAK TO YOU?”
“Why, yes, he always does – now,” smiled Pollyanna.
“‘He always does’! Do you know who – he – is?” demanded Nancy.
Pollyanna frowned and shook her head.
“I reckon he forgot to tell me one day.”
“But he never speaks to anybody, I guess, except when he speaks about business. He’s John Pendleton. He lives in the big house on Pendleton Hill. He is very rich. But he doesn’t spend money he just saves it. Usually he doesn’t speak to anyone; and he lives all alone in that great big lovely house all full of grand things, they say. Some people even think he’s crazy. And EVERYBODY says he’s mysterious.” She went on: “He travels a lot and writes books.”
“Oh, Nancy!” Pollyanna exclaimed. “He is a funny man, and he’s different, too, just like Mrs. Snow, only he’s a different differently.”
“Well, I guess he is,” chuckled Nancy.
“I’m so glad that he speaks to me,” sighed Pollyanna contentedly.
The next time Pollyanna went to see Mrs. Snow, she found that lady, as at first, in a darkened room.
“It’s the little girl from Miss Polly’s, mother,” announced Milly.
“Oh, it’s you?” asked a voice from the bed. I wish you had come yesterday.”
“Did you? Well, I’m glad,” Pollyanna entered the room and set her basket carefully down on a chair. “It’s so dark here! I can’t see you,” she cried. After that Pollyanna pulled up the shade.
Mrs. Snow turned her eyes toward the basket. “Well, what is it?”
“Guess! What do you want?”
The sick woman frowned.
“Why, I don’t WANT anything,” she sighed. “After all, they all taste alike!”
Pollyanna chuckled.
“If you DID want something, what would it be?”
The woman hesitated.
“Well, of course, there’s lamb broth – ”
“I’ve got it!” crowed Pollyanna.
“But that’s what I DIDN’T want,” sighed the sick woman. “It was chicken I wanted.”
“Oh, I’ve got that, too,” chuckled Pollyanna.
The woman turned in amazement.
“Both of them?” she demanded.
“Yes – and calf’s-foot jelly,” triumphed Pollyanna. “I was just bound you should have what you wanted for once; so Nancy and I fixed it. “I’ll leave them all,” announced Pollyanna.
Suddenly Milly appeared at the door.
“Your aunt is wanting you, Miss Pollyanna.
Pollyanna rose.
“All right,” she sighed. “Goodbye, I’m awfully sorry about the hair – I wanted to do it. But maybe I can next time!”
One by one the July days passed. To Pollyanna, they were happy days, indeed. She often told her aunt, joyously, how very happy they were. Her aunt usually replied:
“Very well, Pollyanna. I am gratified, of course, that they are happy; but I trust that they are profitable, as well – otherwise I should have failed signally in my duty.”
“Is just being glad isn’t pro-fi-ta-ble?” asked Pollyanna, a little anxiously.
“Certainly not.”
“Oh dear! I’m afraid, now, you won’t ever play the game, Aunt Polly.”
“Game? What game?”
“Why, that father – ” Pollyanna clapped her hand to her lips. “N-nothing,” she stammered. Miss Polly frowned.
It was that afternoon that Pollyanna, coming down from her attic room, met her aunt on the stairway.
“Why, Aunt Polly,” she cried. “You were coming up to see me! Come right in. I love company,” said Pollyanna, “especially since I’ve had this room, all mine, you know. And of course NOW I just love this room, even if it hasn’t got the carpets and curtains and pictures – ” With a painful blush Pollyanna stopped.
“What’s that, Pollyanna?”
Pollyanna blushed still more painfully.
“I ought not to have, of course, Aunt Polly,” she apologized. “It was only because I’d always wanted them and hadn’t had them, I suppose.”
Miss Polly rose suddenly to her feet. Her face was very red.
“That will do, Pollyanna,” she said.
Less than twenty-four hours later, Miss Polly said to Nancy:
“Nancy, move Miss Pollyanna’s things downstairs this morning to the room directly beneath.
“Yes, ma’am,” said Nancy aloud.
“O glory!” said Nancy to herself.
To Pollyanna, a minute later, she cried joyously:
“You’re to sleep downstairs in the room straight under this!”
“You mean – why, Nancy, not really – really and truly?”
“Your aunt told me to take your things down. And I’m going to take them there now.”
Pollyanna did not stop to hear the end of this sentence. She flied downstairs to Aunt Polly.
“Oh, Aunt Polly, Aunt Polly, did you mean it, really? Why, that room’s got EVERYTHING – the carpet and curtains and three pictures. Oh, Aunt Polly!”
“Very well, Pollyanna. I am gratified that you like the change, of course; but if you think so much of all those things, I trust you will take proper care of them.
But Pollyanna had gone to help Nancy bring down “her things”.
Miss Polly, in the sitting room, felt vaguely disturbed but she was glad!
August came. August brought several surprises and some changes.
First there was the kitten.
Pollyanna found the kitten mewing distance down the road. Nobody wanted to take it and Pollyanna brought it home.
“I was glad I didn’t find any one who owned it,” she told her aunt in happy confidence; “because I wanted to bring it home all the time. I love kitties. I knew you’d be glad to let it live here.”
“Of course I knew,” added Pollyanna, gratefully, “that you wouldn’t let a dear little lonesome kitty go hunting for a home when you’d just taken ME in.”
“But, Pollyanna, Pollyanna,” remonstrated Miss Polly. “I don’t – ”
But Pollyanna was already halfway to the kitchen, calling:
“Nancy, Nancy, just see this dear little kitty that Aunt Polly is going to bring up along with me!”
The next day it was a dog; and again Miss Polly found herself as before powerless to remonstrate.
Mrs. Snow and Pollyanna were the best friends now. And Mrs. Snow herself was playing the game now, with Pollyanna. To be sure, she was not playing it very well – but under Pollyanna’s cheery instructions and merry laughter at her mistakes, she was learning fast. That day she was carrying calf’s-foot jelly to Mrs. Snow when suddenly she saw a boy. The boy was sitting by the roadside.
“Hullo,” smiled Pollyanna.
The boy glanced up, but he looked away again, at once.
“Hullo yourself,” he mumbled.
Pollyanna laughed. She hesitated, but then sat comfortably down on the grass near him.
“My name’s Pollyanna Whittier,” she began pleasantly. “What’s yours?”
“Jimmy Bean,” he grunted with ungracious indifference.
“Good! Now we’re introduced. Where do you live?”
“Nowhere.”
“Nowhere! Why, you can’t do that – everybody lives somewhere,” asserted Pollyanna.
“Well, I don’t – just now. I’m hunting up a new place.”
“Oh! Where is it?”
The boy looked at her with scornful eyes.
“Silly! As if I’d be hunting for it – if I knew!”
“Where did you live – before?” she asked.
“All right then —! I’m Jimmy Bean, and I’m ten years old. I came last year to live at the Orphans’ Home; but I’ve left it. I’m going to live somewhere else. I’d LIKE to have a home. Since my parents died I’ve tried four houses, but – they didn’t want me – though I said I wanted to work, of course. There! Is that all you want to know?”
“O dear! I know just how you feel, because after – after my father died, too, there wasn’t anybody but the Ladies’ Aid for me, until Aunt Polly said – ”
Pollyanna stopped abruptly.
“Oh, I know just the place for you,” she cried. “Aunt Polly will take you – I know she will! Didn’t she take me? And didn’t she take Fluffy and Buffy, when they didn’t have any one to love them, or any place to go? – and they’re only cats and dogs. Oh, come, I know Aunt Polly’ll take you! You don’t know how good and kind she is!”
Jimmy Bean’s thin little face brightened.
“I will work, and I’m really strong!” He bared a small, bony arm.
When they reached the house, Pollyanna piloted her companion straight to her amazed aunt.
“Oh, Aunt Polly, just look here! I’ve got something nicer, even, than Fluffy and Buffy for you to bring up. It’s a real live boy. And he says he’ll work.”
“Pollyanna, what does this mean? Who is this dirty little boy? Where did you find him?” she demanded sharply.
“This is Jimmy Bean, Aunt Polly.”
“Well, what is he doing here?”
“Why, Aunt Polly, I just told you!” Pollyanna’s eyes were wide with surprise. “He’s for you. I brought him home – so he could live here, you know. He wants a home and folks. I told him how good you were to me, and to Fluffy and Buffy, and that I knew you would be to him, because of course he’s even nicer than cats and dogs.”
Miss Polly dropped back in her chair.
“That will do, Pollyanna. This is absurd. He is just a ragged little beggar from the street, who – ”
Jimmy’s eyes flashed. There was a sudden stir from the boy. His eyes flashed and he confronted Miss Polly fearlessly.
“I’m not a beggar, ma’am, and I don’t want anything from you. I just wanted some work and the place to live. I wouldn’t have come to your old house, but this girl told me you’re so good and kind that you’d be just dying to take me in. So, there!” And he went away with dignity.
“Oh, Aunt Polly,” choked Pollyanna. “Why, I thought you’d be GLAD to have him here!”
“Pollyanna,” she cried sharply, “WILL you stop using that everlasting word ‘glad’!”
Pollyanna’s jaw dropped.
Before the boy had reached the end of the driveway, she overtook him.
“Boy! Boy! Jimmy Bean, I want you to know how – how sorry I am,” she panted.
“I’m not blaming you,” retorted the boy, sullenly. “But I’m not beggar!” he added.
“Of course, you aren’t! But you mustn’t blame auntie,” appealed Pollyanna. “Probably I didn’t do the introducing right, anyhow; and I reckon I didn’t tell her much who you were. She is good and kind, really —; but I probably didn’t explain it right.”
The boy shrugged his shoulders and half turned away.
“Never mind. But I’m no beggar, you know.”
“I know what I will do! The Ladies’ Aid meets this afternoon.”
“Well, what is a Ladies’ Aid?”
“It’s just a lot of ladies that meet and sew and give suppers and raise money and – and talk; that’s what a Ladies’ Aid is. They’re awfully kind. I’m going to tell them about you this afternoon.”
The boy turned fiercely.
“Maybe you think I’m going to stand in front of them and hear how all these women call me a beggar, instead of just ONE? No!”
“Oh, but you wouldn’t be there,” argued Pollyanna. “I will go alone, of course, and tell them. And I’m sure someone would be glad to give you a home.”
“Don’t forget to tell them I can work,” the boy said.
“Then I’ll let you know tomorrow.”
“Where?”
“By the road – where I found you today; near Mrs. Snow’s house.”
“All right. I’ll be there.”
“Goodbye!” she called brightly.
Miss Polly stood at the sitting-room window and watched them. In her ears still was the boy’s scornful “you’re so good and kind.” In her heart was a curious sense of desolation – as of something lost.
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