JIMMY WAKES UP
Outwardly the camping trip was pronounced a great success; but
inwardly--
Pollyanna wondered sometimes if it were all herself, or if there
really were a peculiar, indefinable constraint in everybody with
everybody else. Certainly she felt it, and she thought she saw
evidences that the others felt it, too. As for the cause of it
all--unhesitatingly she attributed it to that last day at camp with
its unfortunate trip to the Basin.
To be sure, she and Jimmy had easily caught up with Jamie, and had,
after considerable coaxing, persuaded him to turn about and go on to
the Basin with them. But, in spite of everybody's very evident efforts
to act as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened, nobody really
succeeded in doing so. Pollyanna, Jamie, and Jimmy overdid their
gayety a bit, perhaps; and the others, while not knowing exactly what
had happened, very evidently felt that something was not quite right,
though they plainly tried to hide the fact that they did feel so.
Naturally, in this state of affairs, restful happiness was out of the
question. Even the anticipated fish dinner was flavorless; and early
in the afternoon the start was made back to the camp.
Once home again, Pollyanna had hoped that the unhappy episode of the
angry bull would be forgotten. But she could not forget it, so in all
fairness she could not blame the others if they could not. Always she
thought of it now when she looked at Jamie. She saw again the agony on
his face, the crimson stain on the palms of his hands. Her heart ached
for him, and because it did so ache, his mere presence had come to be
a pain to her. Remorsefully she confessed to herself that she did not
like to be with Jamie now, nor to talk with him--but that did not mean
that she was not often with him. She was with him, indeed, much
oftener than before, for so remorseful was she, and so fearful was she
that he would detect her unhappy frame of mind, that she lost no
opportunity of responding to his overtures of comradeship; and
sometimes she deliberately sought him out. This last she did not often
have to do, however, for more and more frequently these days Jamie
seemed to be turning to her for companionship.
The reason for this, Pollyanna believed, was to be found in this same
incident of the bull and the rescue. Not that Jamie ever referred to
it directly. He never did that. He was, too, even gayer than usual;
but Pollyanna thought she detected sometimes a bitterness underneath
it all that was never there before. Certainly she could not help
seeing that at times he seemed almost to want to avoid the others, and
that he actually sighed, as if with relief, when he found himself
alone with her. She thought she knew why this was so, after he said to
her, as he did say one day, while they were watching the others play
tennis:
"You see, after all, Pollyanna, there isn't any one who can quite
understand as you can."
"'Understand'?" Pollyanna had not known what he meant at first. They
had been watching the players for five minutes without a word between
them.
"Yes; for you, once--couldn't walk--yourself."
"Oh-h, yes, I know," faltered Pollyanna; and she knew that her great
distress must have shown in her face, for so quickly and so blithely
did he change the subject, after a laughing:
"Come, come, Pollyanna, why don't you tell me to play the game? I
would if I were in your place. Forget it, please. I was a brute to
make you look like that!"
And Pollyanna smiled, and said: "No, no--no, indeed!" But she did not
"forget it." She could not. And it all made her only the more anxious
to be with Jamie and help him all she could.
"As if NOW I'd ever let him see that I was ever anything but glad when
he was with me!" she thought fervently, as she hurried forward a
minute later to take her turn in the game.
Pollyanna, however, was not the only one in the party who felt a new
awkwardness and constraint. Jimmy Pendleton felt it, though he, too,
tried not to show it.
Jimmy was not happy these days. From a care-free youth whose visions
were of wonderful spans across hitherto unbridgeable chasms, he has
come to be an anxious-eyed young man whose visions were of a feared
rival bearing away the girl he loved.
Jimmy knew very well now that he was in love with Pollyanna. He
suspected that he had been in love with her for some time. He stood
aghast, indeed, to find himself so shaken and powerless before this
thing that had come to him. He knew that even his beloved bridges were
as nothing when weighed against the smile in a girl's eyes and the
word on a girl's lips. He realized that the most wonderful span in the
world to him would be the thing that could help him to cross the chasm
of fear and doubt that he felt lay between him and Pollyanna--doubt
because of Pollyanna; fear because of Jamie.
Not until he had seen Pollyanna in jeopardy that day in the pasture
had he realized how empty would be the world--his world--without her.
Not until his wild dash for safety with Pollyanna in his arms had he
realized how precious she was to him. For a moment, indeed, with his
arms about her, and hers clinging about his neck, he had felt that she
was indeed his; and even in that supreme moment of danger he knew the
thrill of supreme bliss. Then, a little later, he had seen Jamie's
face, and Jamie's hands. To him they could mean but one thing: Jamie,
too, loved Pollyanna, and Jamie had to stand by, helpless--"tied to
two sticks." That was what he had said. Jimmy believed that, had he
himself been obliged to stand by helpless, "tied to two sticks," while
another rescued the girl that he loved, he would have looked like
that.
Jimmy had gone back to camp that day with his thoughts in a turmoil of
fear and rebellion. He wondered if Pollyanna cared for Jamie; that was
where the fear came in. But even if she did care, a little, must he
stand aside, weakly, and let Jamie, without a struggle, make her learn
to care more? That was where the rebellion came in. Indeed, no, he
would not do it, decided Jimmy. It should be a fair fight between
them.
Then, all by himself as he was, Jimmy flushed hot to the roots of his
hair. Would it be a "fair" fight? Could any fight between him and
Jamie be a "fair" fight? Jimmy felt suddenly as he had felt years
before when, as a lad, he had challenged a new boy to a fight for an
apple they both claimed, then, at the first blow, had discovered that
the new boy had a crippled arm. He had purposely lost then, of course,
and had let the crippled boy win. But he told himself fiercely now
that this case was different. It was no apple that was at stake. It
was his life's happiness. It might even be Pollyanna's life's
happiness, too. Perhaps she did not care for Jamie at all, but would
care for her old friend, Jimmy, if he but once showed her he wanted
her to care. And he would show her. He would--
Once again Jimmy blushed hotly. But he frowned, too, angrily: if only
he COULD forget how Jamie had looked when he had uttered that moaning
"tied to two sticks!" If only--But what was the use? It was NOT a fair
fight, and he knew it. He knew, too, right there and then, that his
decision would be just what it afterwards proved to be: he would watch
and wait. He would give Jamie his chance; and if Pollyanna showed that
she cared, he would take himself off and away quite out of their
lives; and they should never know, either of them, how bitterly he was
suffering. He would go back to his bridges--as if any bridge, though
it led to the moon itself, could compare for a moment with Pollyanna!
But he would do it. He must do it.
It was all very fine and heroic, and Jimmy felt so exalted he was
atingle with something that was almost happiness when he finally
dropped off to sleep that night. But martyrdom in theory and practice
differs woefully, as would-be martyrs have found out from time
immemorial. It was all very well to decide alone and in the dark that
he would give Jamie his chance; but it was quite another matter really
to do it when it involved nothing less than the leaving of Pollyanna
and Jamie together almost every time he saw them. Then, too, he was
very much worried at Pollyanna's apparent attitude toward the lame
youth. It looked very much to Jimmy as if she did indeed care for him,
so watchful was she of his comfort, so apparently eager to be with
him. Then, as if to settle any possible doubt in Jimmy's mind, there
came the day when Sadie Dean had something to say on the subject.
They were all out in the tennis court. Sadie was sitting alone when
Jimmy strolled up to her.
"You next with Pollyanna, isn't it?" he queried.
She shook her head.
"Pollyanna isn't playing any more this morning."
"Isn't playing!" frowned Jimmy, who had been counting on his own game
with Pollyanna. "Why not?"
For a brief minute Sadie Dean did not answer; then with very evident
difficulty she said:
"Pollyanna told me last night that she thought we were playing tennis
too much; that it wasn't kind to--Mr. Carew, as long as he can't
play."
"I know; but--" Jimmy stopped helplessly, the frown plowing a deeper
furrow into his forehead. The next instant he fairly started with
surprise at the tense something in Sadie Dean's voice, as she said:
"But he doesn't want her to stop. He doesn't want any one of us to
make any difference--for him. It's that that hurts him so. She doesn't
understand. She doesn't understand! But I do. She thinks she does,
though!"
Something in words or manner sent a sudden pang to Jimmy's heart. He
threw a sharp look into her face. A question flew to his lips. For a
moment he held it back; then, trying to hide his earnestness with a
bantering smile, he let it come.
"Why, Miss Dean, you don't mean to convey the idea that--that there's
any SPECIAL interest in each other--between those two, do you?"
She gave him a scornful glance.
"Where have your eyes been? She worships him! I mean--they worship
each other," she corrected hastily.
Jimmy, with an inarticulate ejaculation, turned and walked away
abruptly. He could not trust himself to remain longer. He did not wish
to talk any more, just then, to Sadie Dean. So abruptly, indeed, did
he turn, that he did not notice that Sadie Dean, too, turned
hurriedly, and busied herself looking in the grass at her feet, as if
she had lost something. Very evidently, Sadie Dean, also, did not wish
to talk any more just then.
Jimmy Pendleton told himself that it was not true at all; that it was
all falderal, what Sadie Dean had said. Yet nevertheless, true or not
true, he could not forget it. It colored all his thoughts thereafter,
and loomed before his eyes like a shadow whenever he saw Pollyanna and
Jamie together. He watched their faces covertly. He listened to the
tones of their voices. He came then, in time, to think it was, after
all, true: that they did worship each other; and his heart, in
consequence, grew like lead within him. True to his promise to
himself, however, he turned resolutely away. The die was cast, he told
himself. Pollyanna was not to be for him.
Restless days for Jimmy followed. To stay away from the Harrington
homestead entirely he did not dare, lest his secret be suspected. To
be with Pollyanna at all now was torture. Even to be with Sadie Dean
was unpleasant, for he could not forget that it was Sadie Dean who had
finally opened his eyes. Jamie, certainly, was no haven of refuge,
under the circumstances; and that left only Mrs. Carew. Mrs. Carew,
however, was a host in herself, and Jimmy found his only comfort these
days in her society. Gay or grave, she always seemed to know how to
fit his mood exactly; and it was wonderful how much she knew about
bridges--the kind of bridges he was going to build. She was so wise,
too, and so sympathetic, knowing always just the right word to say. He
even one day almost told her about The Packet; but John Pendleton
interrupted them at just the wrong moment, so the story was not told.
John Pendleton was always interrupting them at just the wrong moment,
Jimmy thought vexedly, sometimes. Then, when he remembered what John
Pendleton had done for him, he was ashamed.
"The Packet" was a thing that dated back to Jimmy's boyhood, and had
never been mentioned to any one save to John Pendleton, and that only
once, at the time of his adoption. The Packet was nothing but rather a
large white envelope, worn with time, and plump with mystery behind a
huge red seal. It had been given him by his father, and it bore the
following instructions in his father's hand:
"To my boy, Jimmy. Not to be opened until his thirtieth birthday
except in case of his death, when it shall be opened at once."
There were times when Jimmy speculated a good deal as to the contents
of that envelope. There were other times when he forgot its existence.
In the old days, at the Orphans' Home, his chief terror had been that
it should be discovered and taken away from him. In those days he wore
it always hidden in the lining of his coat. Of late years, at John
Pendleton's suggestion, it had been tucked away in the Pendleton safe.
"For there's no knowing how valuable it may be," John Pendleton had
said, with a smile. "And, anyway, your father evidently wanted you to
have it, and we wouldn't want to run the risk of losing it."
"No, I wouldn't want to lose it, of course," Jimmy had smiled back, a
little soberly. "But I'm not counting on its being real valuable, sir.
Poor dad didn't have anything that was very valuable about him, as I
remember."
It was this Packet that Jimmy came so near mentioning to Mrs. Carew
one day,--if only John Pendleton had not interrupted them.
"Still, maybe it's just as well I didn't tell her about it," Jimmy
reflected afterwards, on his way home. "She might have thought dad had
something in his life that wasn't quite--right. And I wouldn't have
wanted her to think that--of dad."