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Page 91
Miss Polly said no. She began to say it very sternly; but
something in the woman's pleading eyes made her add the civil
explanation that no one was allowed yet to see Pollyanna.
The woman hesitated; then a little brusquely she spoke. Her chin
was still at a slightly defiant tilt.
"My name is Mrs. Payson--Mrs. Tom Payson. I presume you've heard
of me--most of the good people in the town have--and maybe some
of the things you've heard ain't true. But never mind that. It's
about the little girl I came. I heard about the accident,
and--and it broke me all up. Last week I heard how she couldn't
ever walk again, and--and I wished I could give up my two
uselessly well legs for hers. She'd do more good trotting around
on 'em one hour than I could in a hundred years. But never mind
that. Legs ain't always given to the one who can make the best
use of 'em, I notice."
She paused, and cleared her throat; but when she resumed her
voice was still husky.
"Maybe you don't know it, but I've seen a good deal of that
little girl of yours. We live on the Pendleton Hill road, and she
used to go by often--only she didn't always GO BY. She came in
and played with the kids and talked to me--and my man, when he
was home. She seemed to like it, and to like us. She didn't know,
I suspect, that her kind of folks don't generally call on my
kind. Maybe if they DID call more, Miss Harrington, there
wouldn't be so many--of my kind," she added, with sudden
bitterness.
"Be that as it may, she came; and she didn't do herself no harm,
and she did do us good--a lot o' good. How much she won't
know--nor can't know, I hope; 'cause if she did, she'd know other
things--that I don't want her to know.
"But it's just this. It's been hard times with us this year, in
more ways than one. We've been blue and discouraged--my man and
me, and ready for--'most anything. We was reckoning on getting a
divorce about now, and letting the kids well, we didn't know what
we would do with the kids, Then came the accident, and what we
heard about the little girl's never walking again. And we got to
thinking how she used to come and sit on our doorstep and train
with the kids, and laugh, and--and just be glad. She was always
being glad about something; and then, one day, she told us why,
and about the game, you know; and tried to coax us to play it.
"Well, we've heard now that she's fretting her poor little life
out of her, because she can't play it no more--that there's
nothing to be glad about. And that's what I came to tell her
to-day--that maybe she can be a little glad for us, 'cause we've
decided to stick to each other, and play the game ourselves. I
knew she would be glad, because she used to feel kind of bad--at
things we said, sometimes. Just how the game is going to help us,
I can't say that I exactly see, yet; but maybe 'twill. Anyhow,
we're going to try--'cause she wanted us to. Will you tell her?"
"Yes, I will tell her," promised Miss Polly, a little faintly.
Then, with sudden impulse, she stepped forward and held out her
hand. "And thank you for coming, Mrs. Payson," she said simply.
The defiant chin fell. The lips above it trembled visibly. With
an incoherently mumbled something, Mrs. Payson blindly clutched
at the outstretched hand, turned, and fled.
The door had scarcely closed behind her before Miss Polly was
confronting Nancy in the kitchen.
"Nancy!"
Miss Polly spoke sharply. The series of puzzling, disconcerting
visits of the last few days, culminating as they had in the
extraordinary experience of the afternoon, had strained her
nerves to the snapping point. Not since Miss Pollyanna's accident
had Nancy heard her mistress speak so sternly.
"Nancy, WILL you tell me what this absurd 'game' is that the
whole town seems to be babbling about? And what, please, has my
niece to do with it? WHY does everybody, from Milly Snow to Mrs.
Tom Payson, send word to her that they're 'playing it'? As near
as I can judge, half the town are putting on blue ribbons, or
stopping family quarrels, or learning to like something they
never liked before, and all because of Pollyanna. I tried to ask
the child herself about it, but I can't seem to make much
headway, and of course I don't like to worry her--now. But from
something I heard her say to you last night, I should judge you
were one of them, too. Now WILL you tell me what it all means?"
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