Page 111 - pollyanna

you and me, all that time. We will, we will!’
Pollyanna looked shocked.
‘Glad! Oh, Nancy, when it’s a funeral?’
‘Oh, but ‘twa’n’t the funeral I was glad for, Miss Polly-
anna. It was—‘ Nancy stopped abruptly. A shrewd twinkle
came into her eyes. ‘Why, Miss Pollyanna, as if it wa’n’t yer-
self that was teachin’ me ter play the game,’ she reproached
her gravely.
Pollyanna puckered her forehead into a troubled frown.
‘I can’t help it, Nancy,’ she argued with a shake of her
head. ‘It must be that there are some things that ‘tisn’t right
to play the game on—and I’m sure funerals is one of them.
There’s nothing in a funeral to be glad about.’
Nancy chuckled.
‘We can be glad ‘tain’t our’n,’ she observed demurely. But
Pollyanna did not hear. She had begun to tell of the accident;
and in a moment Nancy, open-mouthed, was listening.
At the appointed place the next afternoon, Pollyanna met
Jimmy Bean according to agreement. As was to be expected,
of course, Jimmy showed keen disappointment that the La-
dies’ Aid preferred a little India boy to himself.
‘Well, maybe ‘tis natural,’ he sighed. ‘Of course things
you don’t know about are always nicer’n things you do,
same as the pertater on ‘tother side of the plate is always
the biggest. But I wish I looked that way ter somebody ‘way
off. Wouldn’t it be jest great, now, if only somebody over in
India wanted ME?’
Pollyanna clapped her hands.
‘Why, of course! That’s the very thing, Jimmy! I’ll write

110 Pollyanna