Pollyanna Grows Up, Eleanor H. Porter [best short novels of all time txt] 📗

have something in the bank, and a little coming in, of course. And we have this house. But of what earthly use is the house? We can’t eat it, or wear it. It’s too big for us, the way we shall have to live; and we couldn’t sell it for half what it’s really worth, unless we happened to find just the person that wanted it.”

“Sell it! Oh, auntie, you wouldn’t⁠—this beautiful house full of lovely things!”

“I may have to, Pollyanna. We have to eat⁠—unfortunately.”

“I know it; and I’m always so hungry,” mourned Pollyanna, with a rueful laugh. “Still, I suppose I ought to be glad my appetite is so good.”

“Very likely. You’d find something to be glad about, of course. But what shall we do, child? I do wish you’d be serious for a minute.”

A quick change came to Pollyanna’s face.

“I am serious, Aunt Polly. I’ve been thinking. I⁠—I wish I could earn some money.”

“Oh, child, child, to think of my ever living to hear you say that!” moaned the woman; “⁠—a daughter of the Harringtons having to earn her bread!”

“Oh, but that isn’t the way to look at it,” laughed Pollyanna. “You ought to be glad if a daughter of the Harringtons is smart enough to earn her bread! That isn’t any disgrace, Aunt Polly.”

“Perhaps not; but it isn’t very pleasant to one’s pride, after the position we’ve always occupied in Beldingsville, Pollyanna.”

Pollyanna did not seem to have heard. Her eyes were musingly fixed on space.

“If only I had some talent! If only I could do something better than anybody else in the world,” she sighed at last. “I can sing a little, play a little, embroider a little, and darn a little; but I can’t do any of them well⁠—not well enough to be paid for it.

“I think I’d like best to cook,” she resumed, after a minute’s silence, “and keep house. You know I loved that in Germany winters, when Gretchen used to bother us so much by not coming when we wanted her. But I don’t exactly want to go into other people’s kitchens to do it.”

“As if I’d let you! Pollyanna!” shuddered Mrs. Chilton again.

“And of course, to just work in our own kitchen here doesn’t bring in anything,” bemoaned Pollyanna, “⁠—not any money, I mean. And it’s money we need.”

“It most emphatically is,” sighed Aunt Polly.

There was a long silence, broken at last by Pollyanna.

“To think that after all you’ve done for me, auntie⁠—to think that now, if I only could, I’d have such a splendid chance to help! And yet⁠—I can’t do it. Oh, why wasn’t I born with something that’s worth money?”

“There, there, child, don’t, don’t! Of course, if the doctor⁠—” The words choked into silence.

Pollyanna looked up quickly, and sprang to her feet.

“Dear, dear, this will never do!” she exclaimed, with a complete change of manner. “Don’t you fret, auntie. What’ll you wager that I don’t develop the most marvelous talent going, one of these days? Besides, I think it’s real exciting⁠—all this. There’s so much uncertainty in it. There’s a lot of fun in wanting things⁠—and then watching for them to come. Just living along and knowing you’re going to have everything you want is so⁠—so humdrum, you know,” she finished, with a gay little laugh.

Mrs. Chilton, however, did not laugh. She only sighed and said:

“Dear me, Pollyanna, what a child you are!”

XVIII A Matter of Adjustment

The first few days at Beldingsville were not easy either for Mrs. Chilton or for Pollyanna. They were days of adjustment; and days of adjustment are seldom easy.

From travel and excitement it was not easy to put one’s mind to the consideration of the price of butter and the delinquencies of the butcher. From having all one’s time for one’s own, it was not easy to find always the next task clamoring to be done. Friends and neighbors called, too, and although Pollyanna welcomed them with glad cordiality, Mrs. Chilton, when possible, excused herself; and always she said bitterly to Pollyanna:

“Curiosity, I suppose, to see how Polly Harrington likes being poor.”

Of the doctor Mrs. Chilton seldom spoke, yet Pollyanna knew very well that almost never was he absent from her thoughts; and that more than half her taciturnity was but her usual cloak for a deeper emotion which she did not care to show.

Jimmy Pendleton Pollyanna saw several times during that first month. He came first with John Pendleton for a somewhat stiff and ceremonious call⁠—not that it was either stiff or ceremonious until after Aunt Polly came into the room; then it was both. For some reason Aunt Polly had not excused herself on this occasion. After that Jimmy had come by himself, once with flowers, once with a book for Aunt Polly, twice with no excuse at all. Pollyanna welcomed him with frank pleasure always. Aunt Polly, after that first time, did not see him at all.

To the most of their friends and acquaintances Pollyanna said little about the change in their circumstances. To Jimmy, however, she talked freely, and always her constant cry was: “If only I could do something to bring in some money!”

“I’m getting to be the most mercenary little creature you ever saw,” she laughed dolefully. “I’ve got so I measure everything with a dollar bill, and I actually think in quarters and dimes. You see, Aunt Polly does feel so poor!”

“It’s a shame!” stormed Jimmy.

“I know it. But, honestly, I think she feels a little poorer than she needs to⁠—she’s brooded over it so. But I do wish I could help!”

Jimmy looked down at the wistful, eager face with its luminous eyes, and his own eyes softened.

“What do you want to do⁠—if you could do it?” he asked.

“Oh, I want to cook and keep house,” smiled Pollyanna, with a pensive sigh. “I just love to beat eggs and sugar, and hear the soda gurgle its little tune in the cup of sour milk. I’m happy if I’ve got a day’s baking before me. But there