“Does she still – play the game?”
John Pendleton smiled fondly.
“I imagine she plays it, but she doesn’t say much about it now, I fancy. Anyhow, she didn’t to me, the two or three times I saw her.”
There was a short silence; then, a little slowly, young Pendleton said:
“I think that was one of the things that was worrying me. That game has been so much to so many people. It has meant so much everywhere, all through the town! I couldn’t bear to think of her giving it up and not playing it. At the same time I couldn’t fancy a grown-up Pollyanna perpetually admonishing people to be glad for something. Someway, I – well, as I said, I – I just didn’t want Pollyanna to grow up, anyhow.”
“Well, I wouldn’t worry,” shrugged the elder man, with a peculiar smile. “Always, with Pollyanna, you know, it was the ‘clearing-up shower,’ both literally and figuratively; and I think you’ll find she lives up to the same principle now – though perhaps not quite in the same way. Poor child, I fear she’ll need some kind of game to make existence endurable, for a while, at least.”
“Do you mean because Mrs Chilton has lost her money? Are they so very poor, then?”
“I suspect they are. In fact, they are in rather bad shape, so far as money matters go, as I happen to know. Mrs Chilton’s own fortune has shrunk unbelievably, and poor Tom’s estate is very small, and hopelessly full of bad debts – professional services never paid for, and that never will be paid for. Tom could never say no when his help was needed, and all the dead beats in town knew it and imposed on him accordingly. Expenses have been heavy with him lately. Besides, he expected great things when he should have completed this special work in Germany. Naturally he supposed his wife and Pollyanna were more than amply provided for through the Harrington estate; so he had no worry in that direction.”
“Hm-m; I see, I see. Too bad, too bad!”
“But that isn’t all. It was about two months after Tom’s death that I saw Mrs Chilton and Pollyanna in Rome, and Mrs Chilton then was in a terrible state. In addition to her sorrow, she had just begun to get an inkling of the trouble with her finances, and she was nearly frantic. She refused to come home. She declared she never wanted to see Beldingsville, or anybody in it, again. You see, she has always been a peculiarly proud woman, and it was all affecting her in a rather curious way. Pollyanna said that her aunt seemed possessed with the idea that Beldingsville had not approved of her marrying Dr Chilton in the first place, at her age; and now that he was dead, she felt that they were utterly out of sympathy in any grief that she might show. She resented keenly, too, the fact that they must now know that she was poor as well as widowed. In short, she had worked herself Into an utterly morbid, wretched state, as unreasonable as it was terrible. Poor little Pollyanna! It was a marvel to me how she stood it. All is, if Mrs Chilton kept it up, and continues to keep it up, that child will be a wreck. That’s why I said Pollyanna would need some kind of a game if ever anybody did.”
“The pity of it! – to think of that happening to Pollyanna!” exclaimed the young man, in a voice that was not quite steady.
“Yes; and you can see all is not right by the way they are coming today – so quietly, with not a word to anybody. That was Polly Chilton’s doings, I’ll warrant. She didn’t want to be met by anybody. I understand she wrote to no one but her Old Tom’s wife, Mrs Durgin, who had the keys.”
“Yes, so Nancy told me – good old soul! She’d got the whole house open, and had contrived somehow to make it look as if it wasn’t a tomb of dead hopes and lost pleasures. Of course the grounds looked fairly well, for Old Tom has kept them up, after a fashion. But it made my heart ache – the whole thing.”
There was a long silence, then, curtly, John Pendleton suggested:
“They ought to be met.”
“They will be met.”
“Are you going to the station?”
“I am.”
“Then you know what train they’re coming on.”
“Oh, no. Neither does Nancy.”
“Then how will you manage?”
“I’m going to begin in the morning and go to every train till they come,” laughed the young man, a bit grimly. “Timothy’s going too, with the family carriage. After all, there aren’t many trains, anyway, that they can come on, you know.”
“Hm-m, I know,” said John Pendleton. “Jim, I admire your nerve, but not your judgment. I’m glad you’re going to follow your nerve and not your judgment, however – and I wish you good luck.”
“Thank you, sir,” smiled the young man dolefully. “I need ’em – your good wishes – all right, all right, as Nancy says.”