Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter (books to read fiction .TXT) 📕

I shouldn’t have got to planning all through the hall that first day how pretty mine would be here, and⁠—and⁠—but, truly, Aunt Polly, it wasn’t but just a minute⁠—I mean, a few minutes⁠—before I was being glad that the bureau didn’t have a looking-glass, because it didn’t show my freckles; and there couldn’t be a nicer picture than the one out my window there; and you’ve been so good to me, that⁠—”

Miss Polly rose suddenly to her feet. Her face was very red.

“That will do, Pollyanna,” she said stiffly.

“You have said quite enough, I’m sure.” The next minute she had swept down the stairs⁠—and not until she reached the first floor did it suddenly occur to her that she had gone up into the attic to find a white wool shawl in the cedar chest near the east window.

Less than twenty-four hours later, Miss Polly said to Nancy, crisply:

“Nancy, you may move Miss Pollyanna’s things downstairs this morning to the room directly beneath. I have decided to have my niece sleep there for the present.”

“Yes, ma’am,” said Nancy aloud.

“O glory!” said Nancy to herself.

To Pollyanna, a minute later, she cried joyously:

“And won’t ye jest be listenin’ ter this, Miss Pollyanna. You’re ter sleep downstairs in the room straight under this. You are⁠—you are!”

Pollyanna actually grew white.

“You mean⁠—why, Nancy, not really⁠—really and truly?”

“I guess you’ll think it’s really and truly,” prophesied Nancy, exultingly, nodding her head to Pollyanna over the armful of dresses she had taken from the closet. “I’m told ter take down yer things, and I’m goin’ ter take ’em, too, ’fore she gets a chance ter change her mind.”

Pollyanna did not stop to hear the end of this sentence. At the imminent risk of being dashed headlong, she was flying downstairs, two steps at a time.

Bang went two doors and a chair before Pollyanna at last reached her goal⁠—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, besides the one outdoors, too, ’cause the windows look the same way. 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; that’s all. Pollyanna, please pick up that chair; and you have banged two doors in the last half-minute.” Miss Polly spoke sternly, all the more sternly because, for some inexplicable reason, she felt inclined to cry⁠—and Miss Polly was not used to feeling inclined to cry.

Pollyanna picked up the chair.

“Yes’m; I know I banged ’em⁠—those doors,” she admitted cheerfully. “You see I’d just found out about the room, and I reckon you’d have banged doors if⁠—” Pollyanna stopped short and eyed her aunt with new interest. “Aunt Polly, did you ever bang doors?”

“I hope⁠—not, Pollyanna!” Miss Polly’s voice was properly shocked.

“Why, Aunt Polly, what a shame!” Pollyanna’s face expressed only concerned sympathy.

“A shame!” repeated Aunt Polly, too dazed to say more.

“Why, yes. You see, if you’d felt like banging doors you’d have banged ’em, of course; and if you didn’t, that must have meant that you weren’t ever glad over anything⁠—or you would have banged ’em. You couldn’t have helped it. And I’m so sorry you weren’t ever glad over anything!”

“Pollyanna!” gasped the lady; but Pollyanna was gone, and only the distant bang of the attic-stairway door answered for her. Pollyanna had gone to help Nancy bring down “her things.”

Miss Polly, in the sitting room, felt vaguely disturbed;⁠—but then, of course she had been glad⁠—over some things!

XI Introducing Jimmy

August came. August brought several surprises and some changes⁠—none of which, however, were really a surprise to Nancy. Nancy, since Pollyanna’s arrival, had come to look for surprises and changes.

First there was the kitten.

Pollyanna found the kitten mewing pitifully some distance down the road. When systematic questioning of the neighbors failed to find any one who claimed it, Pollyanna brought it home at once, as a matter of course.

“And I was glad I didn’t find any one who owned it, too,” she told her aunt in happy confidence; “ ’cause I wanted to bring it home all the time. I love kitties. I knew you’d be glad to let it live here.”

Miss Polly looked at the forlorn little gray bunch of neglected misery in Pollyanna’s arms, and shivered: Miss Polly did not care for cats⁠—not even pretty, healthy, clean ones.

“Ugh! Pollyanna! What a dirty little beast! And it’s sick, I’m sure, and all mangy and fleay.”

“I know it, poor little thing,” crooned Pollyanna, tenderly, looking into the little creature’s frightened eyes. “And it’s all trembly, too, it’s so scared. You see it doesn’t know, yet, that we’re going to keep it, of course.”

“No⁠—nor anybody else,” retorted Miss Polly, with meaning emphasis.

“Oh, yes, they do,” nodded Pollyanna, entirely misunderstanding her aunt’s words. “I told everybody we should keep it, if I didn’t find where it belonged. I knew you’d be glad to have it⁠—poor little lonesome thing!”

Miss Polly opened her lips and tried to speak; but in vain. The curious helpless feeling that had been hers so often since Pollyanna’s arrival, had her now fast in its grip.

“Of course I knew,” hurried on Pollyanna, gratefully, “that you wouldn’t let a dear little lonesome kitty go hunting for a home when you’d just taken me in; and I said so to Mrs. Ford when she asked if you’d let me keep it. Why, I had the Ladies’ Aid, you know, and kitty didn’t have anybody. I knew you’d feel that way,” she nodded happily, as she ran from the room.

“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!” And Aunt Polly, in the sitting room⁠—who abhorred cats⁠—fell back in her chair with a gasp of dismay, powerless to remonstrate.

The next day it was a dog, even