Page 129 - pollyanna

‘No, no—please, Aunt Polly!’ Pollyanna’s jubilant voice
turned to one of distressed appeal. ‘Don’t smooth ‘em out!
It’s those that I’m talking about—those darling little black
curls. Oh, Aunt Polly, they’re so pretty!’
‘Nonsense! What do you mean, Pollyanna, by going to
the Ladies’ Aid the other day in that absurd fashion about
that beggar boy?’
‘But it isn’t nonsense,’ urged Pollyanna, answering only
the first of her aunt’s remarks. ‘You don’t know how pretty
you look with your hair like that! Oh, Aunt Polly, please,
mayn’t I do your hair like I did Mrs. Snow’s, and put in a
flower? I’d so love to see you that way! Why, you’d be ever
so much prettier than she was!’
‘Pollyanna!’ (Miss Polly spoke very sharply—all the more
sharply because Pollyanna’s words had given her an odd
throb of joy: when before had anybody cared how she, or
her hair looked? When before had anybody ‘loved’ to see
her ‘pretty’?) ‘Pollyanna, you did not answer my question.
Why did you go to the Ladies’ Aid in that absurd fashion?’
‘Yes’m, I know; but, please, I didn’t know it was absurd
until I went and found out they’d rather see their report
grow than Jimmy. So then I wrote to MY Ladies’ Aid-
ers—‘cause Jimmy is far away from them, you know; and I
thought maybe he could be their little India boy same as—
Aunt Polly, WAS I your little India girl? And, Aunt Polly,
you WILL let me do your hair, won’t you?’
Aunt Polly put her hand to her throat—the old, helpless
feeling was upon her, she knew.
‘But, Pollyanna, when the ladies Old me this afternoon

1 Pollyanna