Pollyanna Grows Up | Page 4

couldn't. It
would only make me think of him all the more, wondering if HE had
any one to give him water and bandage up his head. Besides, the whole
thing would be very distasteful to me--mixing with all sorts and kinds
of people like that."
"Did you ever try it?"
"Why, no, of course not!" Mrs. Carew's voice was scornfully indignant.
"Then how can you know--till you do try?" asked the young nurse,
rising to her feet a little wearily. "But I must go, dear. I'm to meet the
girls at the South Station. Our train goes at twelve-thirty. I'm sorry if
I've made you cross with me," she finished, as she kissed her sister
good-by.
"I'm not cross with you, Della," sighed Mrs. Carew; "but if you only
would understand!"
One minute later Della Wetherby made her way through the silent,
gloomy halls, and out to the street. Face, step, and manner were very
different from what they had been when she tripped up the steps less
than half an hour before. All the alertness, the springiness, the joy of
living were gone. For half a block she listlessly dragged one foot after
the other. Then, suddenly, she threw back her head and drew a long
breath.
"One week in that house would kill me," she shuddered. "I don't believe
even Pollyanna herself could so much as make a dent in the gloom!
And the only thing she could be glad for there would be that she didn't
have to stay."
That this avowed disbelief in Pollyanna's ability to bring about a
change for the better in Mrs. Carew's home was not Della Wetherby's

real opinion, however, was quickly proved; for no sooner had the nurse
reached the Sanatorium than she learned something that sent her flying
back over the fifty-mile journey to Boston the very next day.
So exactly as before did she find circumstances at her sister's home that
it seemed almost as if Mrs. Carew had not moved since she left her.
"Ruth," she burst out eagerly, after answering her sister's surprised
greeting, "I just HAD to come, and you must, this once, yield to me and
let me have my way. Listen! You can have that little Pollyanna here, I
think, if you will."
"But I won't," returned Mrs. Carew, with chilly promptness.
Della Wetherby did not seem to have heard. She plunged on excitedly.
"When I got back yesterday I found that Dr. Ames had had a letter from
Dr. Chilton, the one who married Pollyanna's aunt, you know. Well, it
seems in it he said he was going to Germany for the winter for a special
course, and was going to take his wife with him, if he could persuade
her that Pollyanna would be all right in some boarding school here
meantime. But Mrs. Chilton didn't want to leave Pollyanna in just a
school, and so he was afraid she wouldn't go. And now, Ruth, there's
our chance. I want YOU to take Pollyanna this winter, and let her go to
some school around here."
"What an absurd idea, Della! As if I wanted a child here to bother
with!"
"She won't bother a bit. She must be nearly or quite thirteen by this
time, and she's the most capable little thing you ever saw."
"I don't like 'capable' children," retorted Mrs. Carew perversely--but
she laughed; and because she did laugh, her sister took sudden courage
and redoubled her efforts.
Perhaps it was the suddenness of the appeal, or the novelty of it.
Perhaps it was because the story of Pollyanna had somehow touched

Ruth Carew's heart. Perhaps it was only her unwillingness to refuse her
sister's impassioned plea. Whatever it was that finally turned the scale,
when Della Wetherby took her hurried leave half an hour later, she
carried with her Ruth Carew's promise to receive Pollyanna into her
home.
"But just remember," Mrs. Carew warned her at parting, "just
remember that the minute that child begins to preach to me and to tell
me to count my mercies, back she goes to you, and you may do what
you please with her. I sha'n't keep her!"
"I'll remember--but I'm not worrying any," nodded the younger woman,
in farewell. To herself she whispered, as she hurried away from the
house: "Half my job is done. Now for the other half--to get Pollyanna
to come. But she's just got to come. I'll write that letter so they can't
help letting her come!"
CHAPTER II
SOME OLD FRIENDS
In Beldingsville that August day, Mrs. Chilton waited until Pollyanna
had gone to bed before she spoke to her husband about the letter that
had come in the morning mail. For that matter, she would have had to
wait, anyway, for crowded office hours, and the