CHAPTER XXVIII. THE GAME AND ITS PLAYERS
It was not long after John Pendleton's second visit that Milly Snowcalled one afternoon. Milly Snow had never before been to the Harringtonhomestead. She blushed and looked very embarrassed when Miss Pollyentered the room.
"I--I came to inquire for the little girl," she stammered.
"You are very kind. She is about the same. How is your mother?" rejoinedMiss Polly, wearily.
"That is what I came to tell you--that is, to ask you to tell MissPollyanna," hurried on the girl, breathlessly and incoherently. "Wethink it's--so awful--so perfectly awful that the little thing can'tever walk again; and after all she's done for us, too--for mother, youknow, teaching her to play the game, and all that. And when we heard hownow she couldn't play it herself--poor little dear! I'm sure I don't seehow she CAN, either, in her condition!--but when we remembered all thethings she'd said to us, we thought if she could only know what she HADdone for us, that it would HELP, you know, in her own case, about thegame, because she could be glad--that is, a little glad--" Milly stoppedhelplessly, and seemed to be waiting for Miss Polly to speak.
Miss Polly had sat politely listening, but with a puzzled questioning inher eyes. Only about half of what had been said, had she understood. Shewas thinking now that she always had known that Milly Snow was "queer,"but she had not supposed she was crazy. In no other way, however, couldshe account for this incoherent, illogical, unmeaning rush of words.When the pause came she filled it with a quiet:
"I don't think I quite understand, Milly. Just what is it that you wantme to tell my niece?"
"Yes, that's it; I want you to tell her," answered the girl, feverishly."Make her see what she's done for us. Of course she's SEEN some things,because she's been there, and she's known mother is different; but Iwant her to know HOW different she is--and me, too. I'm different. I'vebeen trying to play it--the game--a little."
Miss Polly frowned. She would have asked what Milly meant by this"game," but there was no opportunity. Milly was rushing on again withnervous volubility.
"You know nothing was ever right before--for mother. She was alwayswanting 'em different. And, really, I don't know as one could blame hermuch--under the circumstances. But now she lets me keep the shades up,and she takes interest in things--how she looks, and her nightdress, andall that. And she's actually begun to knit little things--reins and babyblankets for fairs and hospitals. And she's so interested, and so GLADto think she can do it!--and that was all Miss Pollyanna's doings, youknow, 'cause she told mother she could be glad she'd got her hands andarms, anyway; and that made mother wonder right away why she didn't DOsomething with her hands and arms. And so she began to do something--toknit, you know. And you can't think what a different room it is now,what with the red and blue and yellow worsteds, and the prisms in thewindow that SHE gave her--why, it actually makes you feel BETTER just togo in there now; and before I used to dread it awfully, it was so darkand gloomy, and mother was so--so unhappy, you know.
"And so we want you to please tell Miss Pollyanna that we understandit's all because of her. And please say we're so glad we know her, thatwe thought, maybe if she knew it, it would make her a little glad thatshe knew us. And--and that's all," sighed Milly, rising hurriedly to herfeet. "You'll tell her?"
"Why, of course," murmured Miss Polly, wondering just how much of thisremarkable discourse she could remember to tell.
These visits of John Pendleton and Milly Snow were only the first ofmany; and always there were the messages--the messages which were insome ways so curious that they caused Miss Polly more and more to puzzleover them.
One day there was the little Widow Benton. Miss Polly knew her well,though they had never called upon each other. By reputation she knewher as the saddest little woman in town--one who was always in black.To-day, however, Mrs. Benton wore a knot of pale blue at the throat,though there were tears in her eyes. She spoke of her grief and horrorat the accident; then she asked diffidently if she might see Pollyanna.
Miss Polly shook her head.
"I am sorry, but she sees no one yet. A little later--perhaps."
Mrs. Benton wiped her eyes, rose, and turned to go. But after she hadalmost reached the hall door she came back hurriedly.
"Miss Harrington, perhaps, you'd give her--a message," she stammered.
"Certainly, Mrs. Benton; I shall be very glad to."
Still the little woman hesitated; then she spoke.
"Will you tell her, please, that--that I've put on THIS," she said, justtouching the blue bow at her throat. Then, at Miss Polly's ill-concealedlook of surprise, she added: "The little girl has been trying for solong to make me wear--some color, that I thought she'd be--glad to knowI'd begun. She said that Freddy would be so glad to see it, if I would.You know Freddy's ALL I have now. The others have all--" Mrs. Bentonshook her head and turned away. "If you'll just tell Pollyanna--SHE'LLunderstand." And the door closed after her.
A little later, that same day, there was the other widow--at least, shewore widow's garments. Miss Polly did not know her at all. She wonderedvaguely how Pollyanna could have known her. The lady gave her name as"Mrs. Tarbell."
"I'm a stranger to you, of course," she began at once. "But I'm not astranger to your little niece, Pollyanna. I've been at the hotel allsummer, and every day I've had to take long walks for my health. It wason these walks that I've met your niece--she's such a dear little girl!I wish I could make you understand what she's been to me. I was verysad when I came up here; and her bright face and cheery ways reminded meof--my own little girl that I lost years ago. I was so shocked to hearof the accident; and then when I learned that the poor child would neverwalk again, and that she was so unhappy because she couldn't be glad anylonger--the dear child!--I just had to come to you."
"You are very kind," murmured Miss Polly.
"But it is you who are to be kind," demurred the other. "I--I want youto give her a message from me. Will you?"
"Certainly."
"Will you just tell her, then, that Mrs. Tarbell is glad now. Yes, Iknow it sounds odd, and you don't understand. But--if you'll pardon meI'd rather not explain." Sad lines came to the lady's mouth, and thesmile left her eyes. "Your niece will know just what I mean; and I feltthat I must tell--her. Thank you; and pardon me, please, for any seemingrudeness in my call," she begged, as she took her leave.
Thoroughly mystified now, Miss Polly hurried up-stairs to Pollyanna'sroom.
"Pollyanna, do you know a Mrs. Tarbell?"
"Oh, yes. I love Mrs. Tarbell. She's sick, and awfully sad; and she'sat the hotel, and takes long walks. We go together. I mean--we used to."Pollyanna's voice broke, and two big tears rolled down her cheeks.
Miss Polly cleared her throat hurriedly.
"We'll, she's just been here, dear. She left a message for you--but shewouldn't tell me what it meant. She said to tell you that Mrs. Tarbellis glad now."
Pollyanna clapped her hands softly.
"Did she say that--really? Oh, I'm so glad!"
"But, Pollyanna, what did she mean?"
"Why, it's the game, and--" Pollyanna stopped short, her fingers to herlips.
"What game?"
"N-nothing much, Aunt Polly; that is--I can't tell it unless I tellother things that--that I'm not to speak of."
It was on Miss Polly's tongue to question her niece further; but theobvious distress on the little girl's face stayed the words before theywere uttered.
Not long after Mrs. Tarbell's visit, the climax came. It came in theshape of a call from a certain young woman with unnaturally pink cheeksand abnormally yellow hair; a young woman who wore high heels and cheapjewelry; a young woman whom Miss Polly knew very well by reputation--butwhom she was angrily amazed to meet beneath the roof of the Harringtonhomestead.
Miss Polly did not offer her hand. She drew back, indeed, as she enteredthe room.
The woman rose at once. Her eyes were very red, as if she had beencrying. Half defiantly she asked if she migh
t, for a moment, see thelittle girl, Pollyanna.
Miss Polly said no. She began to say it very sternly; but something inthe woman's pleading eyes made her add the civil explanation that no onewas allowed yet to see Pollyanna.
The woman hesitated; then a little brusquely she spoke. Her chin wasstill at a slightly defiant tilt.
"My name is Mrs. Payson--Mrs. Tom Payson. I presume you've heard ofme--most of the good people in the town have--and maybe some of thethings you've heard ain't true. But never mind that. It's about thelittle girl I came. I heard about the accident, and--and it broke meall up. Last week I heard how she couldn't ever walk again, and--andI wished I could give up my two uselessly well legs for hers. She'ddo more good trotting around on 'em one hour than I could in a hundredyears. But never mind that. Legs ain't always given to the one who canmake the best use of 'em, I notice."
She paused, and cleared her throat; but when she resumed her voice wasstill husky.
"Maybe you don't know it, but I've seen a good deal of that little girlof yours. We live on the Pendleton Hill road, and she used to go byoften--only she didn't always GO BY. She came in and played with thekids and talked to me--and my man, when he was home. She seemed to likeit, and to like us. She didn't know, I suspect, that her kind of folksdon't generally call on my kind. Maybe if they DID call more, MissHarrington, there wouldn't be so many--of my kind," she added, withsudden bitterness.
"Be that as it may, she came; and she didn't do herself no harm, and shedid 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 wanther to know.
"But it's just this. It's been hard times with us this year, in moreways than one. We've been blue and discouraged--my man and me, and readyfor--'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 thekids. Then came the accident, and what we heard about the little girl'snever walking again. And we got to thinking how she used to come andsit on our doorstep and train with the kids, and laugh, and--and just beglad. She was always being glad about something; and then, one day, shetold us why, and about the game, you know; and tried to coax us to playit.
"Well, we've heard now that she's fretting her poor little life out ofher, because she can't play it no more--that there's nothing to be gladabout. And that's what I came to tell her to-day--that maybe she can bea little glad for us, 'cause we've decided to stick to each other, andplay the game ourselves. I knew she would be glad, because she used tofeel kind of bad--at things we said, sometimes. Just how the game isgoing 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. "Andthank you for coming, Mrs. Payson," she said simply.
The defiant chin fell. The lips above it trembled visibly. With anincoherently mumbled something, Mrs. Payson blindly clutched at theoutstretched hand, turned, and fled.
The door had scarcely closed behind her before Miss Polly wasconfronting Nancy in the kitchen.
"Nancy!"
Miss Polly spoke sharply. The series of puzzling, disconcerting visitsof the last few days, culminating as they had in the extraordinaryexperience of the afternoon, had strained her nerves to the snappingpoint. Not since Miss Pollyanna's accident had Nancy heard her mistressspeak so sternly.
"Nancy, WILL you tell me what this absurd 'game' is that the whole townseems to be babbling about? And what, please, has my niece to do withit? WHY does everybody, from Milly Snow to Mrs. Tom Payson, send word toher that they're 'playing it'? As near as I can judge, half the townare putting on blue ribbons, or stopping family quarrels, or learning tolike something they never liked before, and all because of Pollyanna. Itried to ask the child herself about it, but I can't seem to makemuch headway, and of course I don't like to worry her--now. But fromsomething I heard her say to you last night, I should judge you were oneof them, too. Now WILL you tell me what it all means?"
To Miss Polly's surprise and dismay, Nancy burst into tears.
"It means that ever since last June that blessed child has jest beenmakin' the whole town glad, an' now they're turnin' 'round an' tryin'ter make her a little glad, too."
"Glad of what?"
"Just glad! That's the game."
Miss Polly actually stamped her foot.
"There you go like all the rest, Nancy. What game?"
Nancy lifted her chin. She faced her mistress and looked her squarely inthe eye.
"I'll tell ye, ma'am. It's a game Miss Pollyanna's father learned herter play. She got a pair of crutches once in a missionary barrel whenshe was wantin' a doll; an' she cried, of course, like any child would.It seems 'twas then her father told her that there wasn't ever anythin'but what there was somethin' about it that you could be glad about; an'that she could be glad about them crutches."
"Glad for--CRUTCHES!" Miss Polly choked back a sob--she was thinking ofthe helpless little legs on the bed up-stairs.
"Yes'm. That's what I said, an' Miss Pollyanna said that's what shesaid, too. But he told her she COULD be glad--'cause she DIDN'T NEED'EM."
"Oh-h!" cried Miss Polly.
"And after that she said he made a regular game of it--findin' somethin'in everythin' ter be glad about. An' she said ye could do it, too, andthat ye didn't seem ter mind not havin' the doll so much, 'cause ye wasso glad ye DIDN'T need the crutches. An' they called it the 'jest bein'glad' game. That's the game, ma'am. She's played it ever since."
"But, how--how--" Miss Polly came to a helpless pause.
"An' you'd be surprised ter find how cute it works, ma'am, too,"maintained Nancy, with almost the eagerness of Pollyanna herself. "Iwish I could tell ye what a lot she's done for mother an' the folks outhome. She's been ter see 'em, ye know, twice, with me. She's made meglad, too, on such a lot o' things--little things, an' big things; an'it's made 'em so much easier. For instance, I don't mind 'Nancy' fora name half as much since she told me I could be glad 'twa'n't'Hephzibah.' An' there's Monday mornin's, too, that I used ter hate so.She's actually made me glad for Monday mornin's."
"Glad--for Monday mornings!"
Nancy laughed.
"I know it does sound nutty, ma'am. But let me tell ye. That blessedlamb found out I hated Monday mornin's somethin' awful; an' what doesshe up an' tell me one day but this: 'Well, anyhow, Nancy, I shouldthink you could be gladder on Monday mornin' than on any other day inthe week, because 'twould be a whole WEEK before you'd have anotherone!' An' I'm blest if I hain't thought of it ev'ry Monday mornin'since--an' it HAS helped, ma'am. It made me laugh, anyhow, ev'ry time Ithought of it; an' laughin' helps, ye know--it does, it does!"
"But why hasn't--she told me--the game?" faltered Miss Polly. "Why hasshe made such a mystery of it, when I asked her?"
Nancy hesitated.
"Beggin' yer pardon, ma'am, you told her not ter speak of--her father;so she couldn't tell ye. 'Twas her father's game, ye see."
Miss Polly bit her lip.
"She wanted ter tell ye, first off," continued Nancy, a littleunsteadily. "She wanted somebody ter play it with, ye know. That's why Ibegun it, so she could have some one."
"And--and--these others?" Miss Polly's voice shook now.
"Oh, ev'rybody, 'most, knows it now, I guess. Anyhow, I should thinkthey did from the way I'm hearin' of it ev'rywhere I go. Of course shetold a lot, and they told the rest. Them things go, ye know, when theygets started. An' she was always so smilin' an' pleasant ter ev'ryone, an' so--so jest glad herself all the time, that they couldn'thelp knowin' it, anyhow. Now, since she's hurt, ev'rybody feels sobad--specially when they heard how bad SHE feels 'cause she can't findanythin' ter be glad about. An' so they've been comin' ev'ry day tertell her how glad she's made THEM, hopin' that'll help some. Ye see,she's always wanted ev'rybody ter play the game with her."
"Well, I
know somebody who'll play it--now," choked Miss Polly, as sheturned and sped through the kitchen doorway.
Behind her, Nancy stood staring amazedly.
"Well, I'll believe anythin'--anythin' now," she muttered to herself."Ye can't stump me with anythin' I wouldn't believe, now--o' MissPolly!"
A little later, in Pollyanna's room, the nurse left Miss Polly andPollyanna alone together.
"And you've had still another caller to-day, my dear," announced MissPolly, in a voice she vainly tried to steady. "Do you remember Mrs.Payson?"
"Mrs. Payson? Why, I reckon I do! She lives on the way to Mr.Pendleton's, and she's got the prettiest little girl baby threeyears old, and a boy 'most five. She's awfully nice, and so's herhusband--only they don't seem to know how nice each other is. Sometimesthey fight--I mean, they don't quite agree. They're poor, too, they say,and of course they don't ever have barrels, 'cause he isn't a missionaryminister, you know, like--well, he isn't."
A faint color stole into Pollyanna's cheeks which was duplicatedsuddenly in those of her aunt.
"But she wears real pretty clothes, sometimes, in spite of their beingso poor," resumed Pollyanna, in some haste. "And she's got perfectlybeautiful rings with diamonds and rubies and emeralds in them; but shesays she's got one ring too many, and that she's going to throw it awayand get a divorce instead. What is a divorce, Aunt Polly? I'm afraid itisn't very nice, because she didn't look happy when she talked about it.And she said if she did get it, they wouldn't live there any more, andthat Mr. Payson would go 'way off, and maybe the children, too. But Ishould think they'd rather keep the ring, even if they did have so manymore. Shouldn't you? Aunt Polly, what is a divorce?"
"But they aren't going 'way off, dear," evaded Aunt Polly, hurriedly."They're going to stay right there together."
"Oh, I'm so glad! Then they'll be there when I go up to see--O dear!"broke off the little girl, miserably. "Aunt Polly, why CAN'T I rememberthat my legs don't go any more, and that I won't ever, ever go up to seeMr. Pendleton again?"
"There, there, don't," choked her aunt. "Perhaps you'll drive upsometime. But listen! I haven't told you, yet, all that Mrs. Paysonsaid. She wanted me to tell you that they--they were going to staytogether and to play the game, just as you wanted them to."
Pollyanna smiled through tear-wet eyes.
"Did they? Did they, really? Oh, I am glad of that!"
"Yes, she said she hoped you'd be. That's why she told you, to makeyou--GLAD, Pollyanna."
Pollyanna looked up quickly.
"Why, Aunt Polly, you--you spoke just as if you knew--DO you know aboutthe game, Aunt Polly?"
"Yes, dear." Miss Polly sternly forced her voice to be cheerfullymatter-of-fact. "Nancy told me. I think it's a beautiful game. I'm goingto play it now--with you."
"Oh, Aunt Polly--YOU? I'm so glad! You see, I've really wanted you mostof anybody, all the time."
Aunt Polly caught her breath a little sharply. It was even harder thistime to keep her voice steady; but she did it.
"Yes, dear; and there are all those others, too. Why, Pollyanna, I thinkall the town is playing that game now with you--even to the minister! Ihaven't had a chance to tell you, yet, but this morning I met Mr. Fordwhen I was down to the village, and he told me to say to you that justas soon as you could see him, he was coming to tell you that he hadn'tstopped being glad over those eight hundred rejoicing texts that youtold him about. So you see, dear, it's just you that have done it.The whole town is playing the game, and the whole town is wonderfullyhappier--and all because of one little girl who taught the people a newgame, and how to play it."
Pollyanna clapped her hands.
"Oh, I'm so glad," she cried. Then, suddenly, a wonderful lightillumined her face. "Why, Aunt Polly, there IS something I can beglad about, after all. I can be glad I've HAD my legs, anyway--else Icouldn't have done--that!"