At half-past one o'clock Timothy drove Miss Polly and her niece to the
four or five principal dry goods stores, which were about half a mile
from the homestead.
Fitting Pollyanna with a new wardrobe proved to be more or less of an
exciting experience for all concerned. Miss Polly came out of it with
the feeling of limp relaxation that one might have at finding oneself at
last on solid earth after a perilous walk across the very thin crust of
a volcano. The various clerks who had waited upon the pair came out of
it with very red faces, and enough amusing stories of Pollyanna to
keep their friends in gales of laughter the rest of the week. Pollyanna
herself came out of it with radiant smiles and a heart content; for, as
she expressed it to one of the clerks: “When you haven't had anybody
but missionary barrels and Ladies' Aiders to dress you, it IS perfectly
lovely to just walk right in and buy clothes that are brand-new, and
that don't have to be tucked up or let down because they don't fit!”
The shopping expedition consumed the entire afternoon; then came supper
and a delightful talk with Old Tom in the garden, and another with Nancy
on the back porch, after the dishes were done, and while Aunt Polly paid
a visit to a neighbor.
Old Tom told Pollyanna wonderful things of her mother, that made her
very happy indeed; and Nancy told her all about the little farm six
miles away at “The Corners,” where lived her own dear mother, and her
equally dear brother and sisters. She promised, too, that sometime, if
Miss Polly were willing, Pollyanna should be taken to see them.
“And THEY'VE got lovely names, too. You'll like THEIR names,” sighed
Nancy. “They're 'Algernon,' and 'Florabelle' and 'Estelle.' I--I just
hate 'Nancy'!”
“Oh, Nancy, what a dreadful thing to say! Why?”
“Because it isn't pretty like the others. You see, I was the first baby,
and mother hadn't begun ter read so many stories with the pretty names
in 'em, then.”
“But I love 'Nancy,' just because it's you,” declared Pollyanna.
“Humph! Well, I guess you could love 'Clarissa Mabelle' just as well,”
retorted Nancy, “and it would be a heap happier for me. I think THAT
name's just grand!”
Pollyanna laughed.
“Well, anyhow,” she chuckled, “you can be glad it isn't 'Hephzibah.'”
“Hephzibah!”
“Yes. Mrs. White's name is that. Her husband calls her 'Hep,' and she
doesn't like it. She says when he calls out 'Hep--Hep!' she feels just
as if the next minute he was going to yell 'Hurrah!' And she doesn't
like to be hurrahed at.”
Nancy's gloomy face relaxed into a broad smile.
“Well, if you don't beat the Dutch! Say, do you know?--I sha'n't never
hear 'Nancy' now that I don't think o' that 'Hep--Hep!' and giggle. My,
I guess I AM glad--” She stopped short and turned amazed eyes on the
little girl. “Say, Miss Pollyanna, do you mean--was you playin' that
'ere game THEN--about my bein' glad I wa'n't named Hephzibah'?”
Pollyanna frowned; then she laughed.
“Why, Nancy, that's so! I WAS playing the game--but that's one of the
times I just did it without thinking, I reckon. You see, you DO, lots
of times; you get so used to it--looking for something to be glad about,
you know. And most generally there is something about everything that
you can be glad about, if you keep hunting long enough to find it.”
“Well, m-maybe,” granted Nancy, with open doubt.
At half-past eight Pollyanna went up to bed. The screens had not yet
come, and the close little room was like an oven. With longing eyes
Pollyanna looked at the two fast-closed windows--but she did not raise
them. She undressed, folded her clothes neatly, said her prayers, blew
out her candle and climbed into bed.
Just how long she lay in sleepless misery, tossing from side to side of
the hot little cot, she did not know; but it seemed to her that it must
have been hours before she finally slipped out of bed, felt her way
across the room and opened her door.
Out in the main attic all was velvet blackness save where the moon flung
a path of silver half-way across the floor from the east dormer window.
With a resolute ignoring of that fearsome darkness to the right and to
the left, Pollyanna drew a quick breath and pattered straight into that
silvery path, and on to the window.
She had hoped, vaguely, that this window might have a screen, but it did
not. Outside, however, there was a wide world of fairy-like beauty, and
there was, too, she knew, fresh, sweet air that would feel so good to
hot cheeks and hands!
As she stepped nearer and peered longingly out, she saw something else:
she saw, only a little way below the window, the wide, flat tin roof of
Miss Polly's sun parlor built over the porte-cochere. The sight filled
her with longing. If only, now, she were out there!
Fearfully she looked behind her. Back there, somewhere, were her hot
little room and her still hotter bed; but between her and them lay a
horrid desert of blackness across which one must feel one's way with
outstretched, shrinking arms; while before her, out on the sun-parlor
roof, were the moonlight and the cool, sweet night air.
If only her bed were out there! And folks did sleep out of doors. Joel
Hartley at home, who was so sick with the consumption, HAD to sleep out
of doors.
Suddenly Pollyanna remembered that she had seen near this attic window
a row of long white bags hanging from nails. Nancy had said that
they contained the winter clothing, put away for the summer. A little
fearfully now, Pollyanna felt her way to these bags, selected a nice
fat soft one (it contained Miss Polly's sealskin coat) for a bed; and a
thinner one to be doubled up for a pillow, and still another (which was
so thin it seemed almost empty) for a covering. Thus equipped, Pollyanna
in high glee pattered to the moonlit window again, raised the sash,
stuffed her burden through to the roof below, then let herself down
after it, closing the window carefully behind her--Pollyanna had not
forgotten those flies with the marvellous feet that carried things.
How deliciously cool it was! Pollyanna quite danced up and down with
delight, drawing in long, full breaths of the refreshing air. The tin
roof under her feet crackled with little resounding snaps that Pollyanna
rather liked. She walked, indeed, two or three times back and forth from
end to end--it gave her such a pleasant sensation of airy space after
her hot little room; and the roof was so broad and flat that she had no
fear of falling off. Finally, with a sigh of content, she curled herself
up on the sealskin-coat mattress, arranged one bag for a pillow and the
other for a covering, and settled herself to sleep.
“I'm so glad now that the screens didn't come,” she murmured, blinking
up at the stars; “else I couldn't have had this!”
Down-stairs in Miss Polly's room next the sun parlor, Miss Polly
herself was hurrying into dressing gown and slippers, her face white and
frightened. A minute before she had been telephoning in a shaking voice
to Timothy:
“Come up quick!--you and your father. Bring lanterns. Somebody is on
the roof of the sun parlor. He must have climbed up the rose-trellis
or somewhere, and of course he can get right into the house through the
east window in the attic. I have locked the attic door down here--but
hurry, quick!”
Some time later, Pollyanna, just dropping off to sleep, was startled by
a lantern flash, and a trio of amazed ejaculations. She opened her eyes
to find Timothy at the top of a ladder near her, Old Tom just getting
through the window, and her aunt peering out at her from behind him.
“Pollyanna, what does this mean?” cried Aunt Polly then.
Pollyanna blinked sleepy eyes and sat up.
“Why, Mr. Tom--Aunt Polly!” she stammered. “Don't look so scared! It
isn't that I've got the consumption, you know, like Joel Hartley. It's
only that I was so hot--in there. But I shut the window, Aunt Polly, so
the flies couldn't carry those germ-things in.”
Timothy disappeared suddenly down the ladder. Old Tom, with almost equal
precipitation, handed his lantern to Miss Polly, and followed his son.
Miss Polly bit her lip hard--until the men were gone; then she said
sternly:
“Pollyanna, hand those things to me at once and come in here. Of all
the extraordinary children!” she ejaculated a little later, as, with
Pollyanna by her side, and the lantern in her hand, she turned back into
the attic.
To Pollyanna the air was all the more stifling after that cool breath
of the out of doors; but she did not complain. She only drew a long
quivering sigh.
At the top of the stairs Miss Polly jerked out crisply:
“For the rest of the night, Pollyanna, you are to sleep in my bed with
me. The screens will be here to-morrow, but until then I consider it my
duty to keep you where I know where you are.”
Pollyanna drew in her breath.
“With you?--in your bed?” she cried rapturously. “Oh, Aunt Polly, Aunt
Polly, how perfectly lovely of you! And when I've so wanted to sleep
with some one sometime--some one that belonged to me, you know; not a
Ladies' Aider. I've HAD them. My! I reckon I am glad now those screens
didn't come! Wouldn't you be?”
There was no reply. Miss Polly was stalking on ahead. Miss Polly, to
tell the truth, was feeling curiously helpless. For the third time since
Pollyanna's arrival, Miss Polly was punishing Pollyanna--and for the
third time she was being confronted with the amazing fact that her
punishment was being taken as a special reward of merit. No wonder Miss
Polly was feeling curiously helpless.