Christmas gold, p.377
Christmas Gold, page 377
"Yes, I asked you," said Mrs. Carew in a half-stifled voice, as she turned away.
Not only from Sadie Dean, however, was Mrs. Carew learning things never learned before, but from Jamie, also.
Jamie was there a great deal. Pollyanna liked to have him there, and he liked to be there. At first, to be sure, he had hesitated; but very soon he had quieted his doubts and yielded to his longings by telling himself (and Pollyanna) that, after all, visiting was not "staying for keeps."
Mrs. Carew often found the boy and Pollyanna contentedly settled on the library window-seat, with the empty wheel chair close by. Sometimes they were poring over a book. (She heard Jamie tell Pollyanna one day that he didn't think he'd mind so very much being lame if he had so many books as Mrs. Carew, and that he guessed he'd be so happy he'd fly clean away if he had both books and legs.) Sometimes the boy was telling stories, and Pollyanna was listening, wide-eyed and absorbed.
Mrs. Carew wondered at Pollyanna's interest—until one day she herself stopped and listened. After that she wondered no longer—but she listened a good deal longer. Crude and incorrect as was much of the boy's language, it was always wonderfully vivid and picturesque, so that Mrs. Carew found herself, hand in hand with Pollyanna, trailing down the Golden Ages at the beck of a glowing-eyed boy.
Dimly Mrs. Carew was beginning to realize, too, something of what it must mean, to be in spirit and ambition the center of brave deeds and wonderful adventures, while in reality one was only a crippled boy in a wheel chair. But what Mrs. Carew did not realize was the part this crippled boy was beginning to play in her own life. She did not realize how much a matter of course his presence was becoming, nor how interested she now was in finding something new "for Jamie to see." Neither did she realize how day by day he was coming to seem to her more and more the lost Jamie, her dead sister's child.
As February, March, and April passed, however, and May came, bringing with it the near approach of the date set for Pollyanna's home-going, Mrs. Carew did suddenly awake to the knowledge of what that home-going was to mean to her.
She was amazed and appalled. Up to now she had, in belief, looked forward with pleasure to the departure of Pollyanna. She had said that then once again the house would be quiet, with the glaring sun shut out. Once again she would be at peace, and able to hide herself away from the annoying, tiresome world. Once again she would be free to summon to her aching consciousness all those dear memories of the lost little lad who had so long ago stepped into that vast unknown and closed the door behind him. All this she had believed would be the case when Pollyanna should go home.
But now that Pollyanna was really going home, the picture was far different. The "quiet house with the sun shut out" had become one that promised to be "gloomy and unbearable." The longed-for "peace" would be "wretched loneliness"; and as for her being able to "hide herself away from the annoying, tiresome world," and "free to summon to her aching consciousness all those dear memories of that lost little lad"—just as if anything could blot out those other aching memories of the new Jamie (who yet might be the old Jamie) with his pitiful, pleading eyes!
Full well now Mrs. Carew knew that without Pollyanna the house would be empty; but that without the lad, Jamie, it would be worse than that. To her pride this knowledge was not pleasing. To her heart it was torture—since the boy had twice said that he would not come. For a time, during those last few days of Pollyanna's stay, the struggle was a bitter one, though pride always kept the ascendancy. Then, on what Mrs. Carew knew would be Jamie's last visit, her heart triumphed, and once more she asked Jamie to come and be to her the Jamie that was lost.
What she said she never could remember afterwards; but what the boy said, she never forgot. After all, it was compassed in six short words.
For what seemed a long, long minute his eyes had searched her face; then to his own had come a transfiguring light, as he breathed:
"Oh, yes! Why, you—CARE, now!"
Chapter XIV.
Jimmy and the Green-Eyed Monster
Table of Contents
This time Beldingsville did not literally welcome Pollyanna home with brass bands and bunting—perhaps because the hour of her expected arrival was known to but few of the townspeople. But there certainly was no lack of joyful greetings on the part of everybody from the moment she stepped from the railway train with her Aunt Polly and Dr. Chilton. Nor did Pollyanna lose any time in starting on a round of fly-away minute calls on all her old friends. Indeed, for the next few days, according to Nancy, "There wasn't no putting of your finger on her anywheres, for by the time you'd got your finger down she wa'n't there."
And always, everywhere she went, Pollyanna met the question: "Well, how did you like Boston?" Perhaps to no one did she answer this more fully than she did to Mr. Pendleton. As was usually the case when this question was put to her, she began her reply with a troubled frown.
"Oh, I liked it—I just loved it—some of it."
"But not all of it?" smiled Mr. Pendleton.
"No. There's parts of it—Oh, I was glad to be there," she explained hastily. "I had a perfectly lovely time, and lots of things were so queer and different, you know—like eating dinner at night instead of noons, when you ought to eat it. But everybody was so good to me, and I saw such a lot of wonderful things—Bunker Hill, and the Public Garden, and the Seeing Boston autos, and miles of pictures and statues and store-windows and streets that didn't have any end. And folks. I never saw such a lot of folks."
"Well, I'm sure—I thought you liked folks," commented the man.
"I do." Pollyanna frowned again and pondered. "But what's the use of such a lot of them if you don't know 'em? And Mrs. Carew wouldn't let me. She didn't know 'em herself. She said folks didn't, down there."
There was a slight pause, then, with a sigh, Pollyanna resumed.
"I reckon maybe that's the part I don't like the most—that folks don't know each other. It would be such a lot nicer if they did! Why, just think, Mr. Pendleton, there are lots of folks that live on dirty, narrow streets, and don't even have beans and fish balls to eat, nor things even as good as missionary barrels to wear. Then there are other folks—Mrs. Carew, and a whole lot like her—that live in perfectly beautiful houses, and have more things to eat and wear than they know what to do with. Now if THOSE folks only knew the other folks—" But Mr. Pendleton interrupted with a laugh.
"My dear child, did it ever occur to you that these people don't CARE to know each other?" he asked quizzically.
"Oh, but some of them do," maintained Pollyanna, in eager defense. "Now there's Sadie Dean—she sells bows, lovely bows in a big store—she WANTS to know people; and I introduced her to Mrs. Carew, and we had her up to the house, and we had Jamie and lots of others there, too; and she was SO glad to know them! And that's what made me think that if only a lot of Mrs. Carew's kind could know the other kind—but of course I couldn't do the introducing. I didn't know many of them myself, anyway. But if they COULD know each other, so that the rich people could give the poor people part of their money—"
But again Mr. Pendleton interrupted with a laugh.
"Oh, Pollyanna, Pollyanna," he chuckled; "I'm afraid you're getting into pretty deep water. You'll be a rabid little socialist before you know it."
"A—what?" questioned the little girl, dubiously. "I—I don't think I know what a socialist is. But I know what being SOCIABLE is—and I like folks that are that. If it's anything like that, I don't mind being one, a mite. I'd like to be one."
"I don't doubt it, Pollyanna," smiled the man. "But when it comes to this scheme of yours for the wholesale distribution of wealth—you've got a problem on your hands that you might have difficulty with."
Pollyanna drew a long sigh.
"I know," she nodded. "That's the way Mrs. Carew talked. She says I don't understand; that 'twould—er—pauperize her and be indiscriminate and pernicious, and—Well, it was SOMETHING like that, anyway," bridled the little girl, aggrievedly, as the man began to laugh. "And, anyway, I DON'T understand why some folks should have such a lot, and other folks shouldn't have anything; and I DON'T like it. And if I ever have a lot I shall just give some of it to folks who don't have any, even if it does make me pauperized and pernicious, and—" But Mr. Pendleton was laughing so hard now that Pollyanna, after a moment's struggle, surrendered and laughed with him.
"Well, anyway," she reiterated, when she had caught her breath, "I don't understand it, all the same."
"No, dear, I'm afraid you don't," agreed the man, growing suddenly very grave and tender-eyed; "nor any of the rest of us, for that matter. But, tell me," he added, after a minute, "who is this Jamie you've been talking so much about since you came?"
And Pollyanna told him.
In talking of Jamie, Pollyanna lost her worried, baffled look. Pollyanna loved to talk of Jamie. Here was something she understood. Here was no problem that had to deal with big, fearsome-sounding words. Besides, in this particular instance—would not Mr. Pendleton be especially interested in Mrs. Carew's taking the boy into her home, for who better than himself could understand the need of a child's presence?
For that matter, Pollyanna talked to everybody about Jamie. She assumed that everybody would be as interested as she herself was. On most occasions she was not disappointed in the interest shown; but one day she met with a surprise. It came through Jimmy Pendleton.
"Say, look a-here," he demanded one afternoon, irritably. "Wasn't there ANYBODY else down to Boston but just that everlasting 'Jamie'?"
"Why, Jimmy Bean, what do you mean?" cried Pollyanna.
The boy lifted his chin a little.
"I'm not Jimmy Bean. I'm Jimmy Pendleton. And I mean that I should think, from your talk, that there wasn't ANYBODY down to Boston but just that loony boy who calls them birds and squirrels 'Lady Lancelot,' and all that tommyrot."
"Why, Jimmy Be—Pendleton!" gasped Pollyanna. Then, with some spirit: "Jamie isn't loony! He is a very nice boy. And he knows a lot—books and stories! Why, he can MAKE stories right out of his own head! Besides, it isn't 'Lady Lancelot,'—it's 'Sir Lancelot.' If you knew half as much as he does you'd know that, too!" she finished, with flashing eyes.
Jimmy Pendleton flushed miserably and looked utterly wretched. Growing more and more jealous moment by moment, still doggedly he held his ground.
"Well, anyhow," he scoffed, "I don't think much of his name. 'Jamie'!
Humph!—sounds sissy! And I know somebody else that said so, too."
"Who was it?"
There was no answer.
"WHO WAS IT?" demanded Pollyanna, more peremptorily.
"Dad." The boy's voice was sullen.
"Your—dad?" repeated Pollyanna, in amazement. "Why, how could he know
Jamie?"
"He didn't. 'Twasn't about that Jamie. 'Twas about me." The boy still spoke sullenly, with his eyes turned away. Yet there was a curious softness in his voice that was always noticeable whenever he spoke of his father.
"YOU!"
"Yes. 'Twas just a little while before he died. We stopped 'most a week with a farmer. Dad helped about the hayin'—and I did, too, some. The farmer's wife was awful good to me, and pretty quick she was callin' me 'Jamie.' I don't know why, but she just did. And one day father heard her. He got awful mad—so mad that I remembered it always—what he said. He said 'Jamie' wasn't no sort of a name for a boy, and that no son of his should ever be called it. He said 'twas a sissy name, and he hated it. 'Seems so I never saw him so mad as he was that night. He wouldn't even stay to finish the work, but him and me took to the road again that night. I was kind of sorry, 'cause I liked her—the farmer's wife, I mean. She was good to me."
Pollyanna nodded, all sympathy and interest. It was not often that Jimmy said much of that mysterious past life of his, before she had known him.
"And what happened next?" she prompted. Pollyanna had, for the moment, forgotten all about the original subject of the controversy—the name "Jamie" that was dubbed "sissy."
The boy sighed.
"We just went on till we found another place. And 'twas there dad—died. Then they put me in the 'sylum."
"And then you ran away and I found you that day, down by Mrs. Snow's," exulted Pollyanna, softly. "And I've known you ever since."
"Oh, yes—and you've known me ever since," repeated Jimmy—but in a far different voice: Jimmy had suddenly come back to the present, and to his grievance. "But, then, I ain't 'JAMIE,' you know," he finished with scornful emphasis, as he turned loftily away, leaving a distressed, bewildered Pollyanna behind him.
"Well, anyway, I can be glad he doesn't always act like this," sighed the little girl, as she mournfully watched the sturdy, boyish figure with its disagreeable, amazing swagger.
Chapter XV.
Aunt Polly Takes Alarm
Table of Contents
Pollyanna had been at home about a week when the letter from Della
Wetherby came to Mrs. Chilton.
"I wish I could make you see what your little niece has done for my sister," wrote Miss Wetherby; "but I'm afraid I can't. You would have to know what she was before. You did see her, to be sure, and perhaps you saw something of the hush and gloom in which she has shrouded herself for so many years. But you can have no conception of her bitterness of heart, her lack of aim and interest, her insistence upon eternal mourning.
"Then came Pollyanna. Probably I didn't tell you, but my sister regretted her promise to take the child, almost the minute it was given; and she made the stern stipulation that the moment Pollyanna began to preach, back she should come to me. Well, she hasn't preached—at least, my sister says she hasn't; and my sister ought to know. And yet—well, just let me tell you what I found when I went to see her yesterday. Perhaps nothing else could give you a better idea of what that wonderful little Pollyanna of yours has accomplished.
"To begin with, as I approached the house, I saw that nearly all the shades were up: they used to be down—'way down to the sill. The minute I stepped into the hall I heard music—Parsifal. The drawing-rooms were open, and the air was sweet with roses.
"'Mrs. Carew and Master Jamie are in the music-room,' said the maid. And there I found them—my sister, and the youth she has taken into her home, listening to one of those modern contrivances that can hold an entire opera company, including the orchestra.
"The boy was in a wheel chair. He was pale, but plainly beatifically happy. My sister looked ten years younger. Her usually colorless cheeks showed a faint pink, and her eyes glowed and sparkled. A little later, after I had talked a few minutes with the boy, my sister and I went up-stairs to her own rooms; and there she talked to me—of Jamie. Not of the old Jamie, as she used to, with tear-wet eyes and hopeless sighs, but of the new Jamie—and there were no sighs nor tears now. There was, instead, the eagerness of enthusiastic interest.
"'Della, he's wonderful,' she began. 'Everything that is best in music, art, and literature seems to appeal to him in a perfectly marvelous fashion, only, of course, he needs development and training. That's what I'm going to see that he gets. A tutor is coming to-morrow. Of course his language is something awful; at the same time, he has read so many good books that his vocabulary is quite amazing—and you should hear the stories he can reel off! Of course in general education he is very deficient; but he's eager to learn, so that will soon be remedied. He loves music, and I shall give him what training in that he wishes. I have already put in a stock of carefully selected records. I wish you could have seen his face when he first heard that Holy Grail music. He knows all about King Arthur and his Round Table, and he prattles of knights and lords and ladies as you and I do of the members of our own family—only sometimes I don't know whether his Sir Lancelot means the ancient knight or a squirrel in the Public Garden. And, Della, I believe he can be made to walk. I'm going to have Dr. Ames see him, anyway, and—'
"And so on and on she talked, while I sat amazed and tongue-tied, but, oh, so happy! I tell you all this, dear Mrs. Chilton, so you can see for yourself how interested she is, how eagerly she is going to watch this boy's growth and development, and how, in spite of herself, it is all going to change her attitude toward life. She CAN'T do what she is doing for this boy, Jamie, and not do for herself at the same time. Never again, I believe, will she be the soured, morose woman she was before. And it's all because of Pollyanna.
"Pollyanna! Dear child—and the best part of it is, she is so unconscious of the whole thing. I don't believe even my sister yet quite realizes what is taking place within her own heart and life, and certainly Pollyanna doesn't—least of all does she realize the part she played in the change.
"And now, dear Mrs. Chilton, how can I thank you? I know I can't; so I'm not even going to try. Yet in your heart I believe you know how grateful I am to both you and Pollyanna.
"DELLA WETHERBY."
"Well, it seems to have worked a cure, all right," smiled Dr. Chilton, when his wife had finished reading the letter to him.
To his surprise she lifted a quick, remonstrative hand.
"Thomas, don't, please!" she begged.
"Why, Polly, what's the matter? Aren't you glad that—that the medicine worked?"
Mrs. Chilton dropped despairingly back in her chair.
"There you go again, Thomas," she sighed. "Of COURSE I'm glad that this misguided woman has forsaken the error of her ways and found that she can be of use to some one. And of course I'm glad that Pollyanna did it. But I am not glad to have that child continually spoken of as if she were a—a bottle of medicine, or a 'cure.' Don't you see?"
"Nonsense! After all, where's the harm? I've called Pollyanna a tonic ever since I knew her."
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