Pollyanna Grows Up - Eleanor H. Porter (read an ebook week .TXT) 📗

don’t believe I’d better count too much on the first prize; then I won’t be too much disappointed when I get one of the littler ones.”

Pollyanna always thought of Jimmy when she went to the Snows’, for it was at the side of the road near their cottage that she had first seen him as a forlorn little runaway lad from the Orphans’ Home years before. She thought of him again today, with a little catch of her breath. Then, with the proud lifting of her head that always came now with the second thought of Jimmy, she hurried up the Snows’ doorsteps and rang the bell.

As was usually the case, the Snows had nothing but the warmest of welcomes for Pollyanna; and also as usual it was not long before they were talking of the game: in no home in Beldingsville was the glad game more ardently played than in the Snows’.

“Well, and how are you getting along?” asked Pollyanna, when she had finished the business part of her call.

“Splendidly!” beamed Milly Snow. “This is the third job I’ve got this week. Oh, Miss Pollyanna, I’m so glad you had me take up typewriting, for you see I can do that right at home! And it’s all owing to you.”

“Nonsense!” disclaimed Pollyanna, merrily.

“But it is. In the first place, I couldn’t have done it anyway if it hadn’t been for the game⁠—making mother so much better, you know, that I had some time to myself. And then, at the very first, you suggested typewriting, and helped me to buy a machine. I should like to know if that doesn’t come pretty near owing it all to you!”

But once again Pollyanna objected. This time she was interrupted by Mrs. Snow from her wheel chair by the window. And so earnestly and gravely did Mrs. Snow speak, that Pollyanna, in spite of herself, could but hear what she had to say.

“Listen, child, I don’t think you know quite what you’ve done. But I wish you could! There’s a little look in your eyes, my dear, today, that I don’t like to see there. You are plagued and worried over something, I know. I can see it. And I don’t wonder: your uncle’s death, your aunt’s condition, everything⁠—I won’t say more about that. But there’s something I do want to say, my dear, and you must let me say it, for I can’t bear to see that shadow in your eyes without trying to drive it away by telling you what you’ve done for me, for this whole town, and for countless other people everywhere.”

“Mrs. Snow!” protested Pollyanna, in genuine distress.

“Oh, I mean it, and I know what I’m talking about,” nodded the invalid, triumphantly. “To begin with, look at me. Didn’t you find me a fretful, whining creature who never by any chance wanted what she had until she found what she didn’t have? And didn’t you open my eyes by bringing me three kinds of things so I’d have to have what I wanted, for once?”

“Oh, Mrs. Snow, was I really ever quite so⁠—impertinent as that?” murmured Pollyanna, with a painful blush.

“It wasn’t impertinent,” objected Mrs. Snow, stoutly. “You didn’t mean it as impertinence⁠—and that made all the difference in the world. You didn’t preach, either, my dear. If you had, you’d never have got me to playing the game, nor anybody else, I fancy. But you did get me to playing it⁠—and see what it’s done for me, and for Milly! Here I am so much better that I can sit in a wheel chair and go anywhere on this floor in it. That means a whole lot when it comes to waiting on yourself, and giving those around you a chance to breathe⁠—meaning Milly, in this case. And the doctor says it’s all owing to the game. Then there’s others, quantities of others, right in this town, that I’m hearing of all the time. Nellie Mahoney broke her wrist and was so glad it wasn’t her leg that she didn’t mind the wrist at all. Old Mrs. Tibbits has lost her hearing, but she’s so glad ’tisn’t her eyesight that she’s actually happy. Do you remember cross-eyed Joe that they used to call Cross Joe, be cause of his temper? Nothing went to suit him either, any more than it did me. Well, somebody’s taught him the game, they say, and made a different man of him. And listen, dear. It’s not only this town, but other places. I had a letter yesterday from my cousin in Massachusetts, and she told me all about Mrs. Tom Payson that used to live here. Do you remember them? They lived on the way up Pendleton Hill.”

“Yes, oh, yes, I remember them,” cried Pollyanna.

“Well, they left here that winter you were in the Sanatorium and went to Massachusetts where my sister lives. She knows them well. She says Mrs. Payson told her all about you, and how your glad game actually saved them from a divorce. And now not only do they play it themselves, but they’ve got quite a lot of others playing it down there, and they’re getting still others. So you see, dear, there’s no telling where that glad game of yours is going to stop. I wanted you to know. I thought it might help⁠—even you to play the game sometimes; for don’t think I don’t understand, dearie, that it is hard for you to play your own game⁠—sometimes.”

Pollyanna rose to her feet. She smiled, but her eyes glistened with tears, as she held out her hand in goodbye.

“Thank you, Mrs. Snow,” she said unsteadily. “It is hard⁠—sometimes; and maybe I did need a little help about my own game. But, anyhow, now⁠—” her eyes flashed with their old merriment⁠—“if any time I think I can’t play the game myself I can remember that I can still always be glad there are some folks playing it!”

Pollyanna walked home a little soberly that afternoon. Touched as she was by what Mrs. Snow had said, there was yet an