POLLYANNA AND PUNISHMENTS (Pollyanna)

01Chapter 7.

02Pollyanna and Punishments At half-past one o'clock, Timothy drove Miss Polly and her niece to the four or five principal dry-goods stores, which were about half a mile from the homestead.

03Fitting Pollyanna with a new wardrobe proved to be a more or less exciting experience for all concerned.

04Miss Polly came out of it with the feeling of limp relaxation that one might have at finding oneself at last on solid earth after a perilous walk across the very thin crust of a volcano.

05The various clerks who had waited upon the pair came out of it with very red faces and enough amusing stories of Pollyanna to keep their friends in gales of laughter the rest of the week.

06Pollyanna herself came out of it with radiant smiles and a heart content, for, as she expressed it to one of the clerks, when you haven't had anybody but missionary barrels and ladies' aiders to dress you, it is perfectly lovely to just walk right in and buy clothes that are brand new and that don't have to be tucked up or let down because they don't fit.

07The shopping expedition consumed the entire afternoon.

08Then came supper and a delightful talk with old Tom in the garden and another with Nancy on the back porch after the dishes were done and while Aunt Polly paid a visit to a neighbor.

09Old Tom told Pollyanna wonderful things of her mother that made her very happy indeed, and Nancy told her all about the little farm six miles away at the corners where lived her own dear mother and her equally dear brothers and sisters.

10She promised too that sometime, if Miss Polly were willing, Pollyanna should be taken to see them.

11And they've got lovely names, too.

12You like their names, sighed Nancy.

13They're Algernon and Floribel and Estelle.

14I just hate Nancy.

15Oh, Nancy, what a dreadful thing to say.

16Why?

17Because it isn't pretty like the others.

18You see, I was the first baby, and Mother hadn't begun to read so many stories with the pretty names in them then.

19But I love Nancy, just because it's you, declared Pollyanna.

20Huh.

21Well, I guess you could love Clarissa Maybell just as well, retorted Nancy.

22And it would be a heap happier for me.

23I think that name's just grand.

24Pollyanna laughed.

25Well, anyhow, she chuckled.

26You can be glad it isn't, Hepzibah.

27Hepzibah?

28Yes, Mrs.

29White's name is that.

30Her husband calls her Hep, and she doesn't like it.

31She says when he calls out Hep, Hep, she feels just as if the next minute he's going to yell Hurrah, and she doesn't like to be hurrah'd at.

32Nancy's gloomy face relaxed into a broad smile.

33Well, if you don't beat the Dutch.

34Say, do you know?

35I shan't never hear Nancy now that I don't think of that hip-hip and giggle.

36My, I guess I am glad.

37She stopped short and turned amazed eyes on the little girl.

38Say, Miss Pollyanna, do you mean—was you playing that air game then about my being glad I wasn't named Hepzibah?

39Pollyanna frowned.

40Then she laughed.

41Why, Nancy, that's so.

42I was playing the game.

43But that's one of the times I just did it without thinking, I reckon.

44You see, you do, lots of times.

45You get so used to it, looking for something to be glad about, you know.

46And most generally there is something about everything that you can be glad about, if you keep hunting long enough to find it.

47Well, maybe, granted Nancy with open doubt.

48At half-past eight Pollyanna went up to bed.

49The screens had not yet come, and the close little room was like an oven.

50With longing eyes Pollyanna looked at the two fast-closed windows, but she did not raise them.

51She undressed, folded her clothes neatly, said her prayers, blew out her candle, and climbed into bed.

52Just how long she lay in sleepless misery, tossing from side to side of the hot little cot, she did not know.

53But it seemed to her that it must have been hours before she finally slipped out of bed, felt her way across the room, and opened her door.

54Out in the main attic all was velvet blackness, save where the moon flung a path of silver halfway across the floor from the east dormer window.

55With a resolute ignoring of that fearsome darkness to the right and to the left, Pollyanna drew a quick breath and pattered straight into that silvery path and on to the window.

56She had hoped vaguely that this window might have a screen, but it did not.

57Outside, however, there was a wide world of fairy-like beauty, and there was, too, she knew, fresh, sweet air that would feel so good to hot cheeks and hands.

58As she stepped nearer and peered longingly out, she saw something else.

59She saw only a little way below the window the wide, flat, tin roof of Miss Polly's sun-parlour built over the port-cochery.

60The sight filled her with longing.

61If only now she were out there!

62Fearfully she looked behind her.

63Back there, somewhere, were her hot little room and her still hotter bed.

64But between her and them lay a hard desert of blackness across which one must feel one's way with outstretched, shrinking arms.

65While before her, out on the sun-parlour roof, were the moonlight and the cool, sweet night air.

66If only her bed were out there!

67And folks did sleep out of doors.

68Joel Hartley at home, who was so sick with the consumption, had to sleep out of doors.

69Suddenly Pollyanna remembered that she had seen, near this attic window, a row of long white bags hanging from nails.

70Nancy had said that they contained the winter clothing put away for the summer.

71A little fearfully now Pollyanna felt her way to these bags, selected a nice, fat, soft one.

72It contained Miss Polly's seal-skin coat for a bed, and a thinner one to be doubled up for a pillow, and still another, which was so thin it seemed almost empty, for a covering.

73Thus equipped Pollyanna, in high glee, pattered to the moonlit window again, raised the sash, stuffed her burden through to the roof below, then let herself down after it, closing the window carefully behind her.

74Pollyanna had not forgotten those flies with the marvelous feet that carried things.

75How deliciously cool it was!

76Pollyanna quite danced up and down with delight, drawing in long, full breaths of the refreshing air.

77The tin roof under her feet crackled with little resounding snaps that Pollyanna rather liked.

78She walked, indeed, two or three times, back and forth, from end to end.

79It gave her such a pleasant sensation of airy space after her hot little room, and the roof was so broad and flat that she had no fear of falling off.

80Finally, with a sigh of content, she curled herself up on the seal-skin coat mattress, arranged one bag for a pillow and the other for a covering, and settled herself to sleep.

81I'm so glad now that the screens didn't come, she murmured, blinking up at the stars.

82Else I couldn't have had this!

83Downstairs, in Miss Polly's room, next to the sun-parlour, Miss Polly herself was hurrying into dressing-gown and slippers, her face white and frightened.

84A minute before, she had been telephoning in a shaky voice to Timothy.

85Come up quick!

86You and your father bring lanterns.

87Somebody is on the roof of the sun-parlour.

88He must have climbed up the rose trellis or something, and of course he can get right into the house through the east window in the attic.

89I have locked the attic door down here, but hurry, please!

90Some time later Pollyanna, just dropping off to sleep, was startled by a lantern flash and a trio of amazed ejaculations.

91She opened her eyes to find Timothy at the top of a ladder near her, old Tom just getting through the window, and her aunt peering out at her from behind him.

92Pollyanna, what does this mean?

93cried Aunt Polly then.

94Pollyanna blinked sleepy eyes and sat up.

95Why, Mr.

96Tom, Aunt Polly!

97she stammered.

98Don't look so scared.

99It isn't that I've got the consumption, you know, like Joel Hartley.

100It's only that I was so hot in there.

101But I shut the window, Aunt Polly, so the flies couldn't carry those germ-things in.

102Timothy disappeared suddenly down the ladder.

103Old Tom, with almost equal precipitation, handed his lantern to Miss Polly and followed his son.

104Miss Polly bit her lip hard until the men were gone.

105Then she said sternly, Pollyanna, hand those things to me at once and come in here.

106Of all the extraordinary children, she ejaculated a little later, as, with Pollyanna by her side and the lantern in her hand, she turned back into the attic.

107To Pollyanna the air was all the more stifling after that cool breath of the out-of-doors.

108But she did not complain.

109She only drew a long, quivering sigh.

110At the top of the stairs Miss Polly jerked out crisply.

111For the rest of the night, Pollyanna, you are to sleep in my bed with me.

112The screens will be here tomorrow, but until then I consider it my duty to keep you where I know where you are.

113Pollyanna drew in her breath.

114With you?

115In your bed?

116She cried rapturously.

117Oh, Aunt Polly, Aunt Polly, how perfectly lovely of you!

118And when I've so wanted to sleep with someone sometime, someone that belonged to me, you know, not a ladies' aider, I've had them.

119My, I reckon I am glad now that those screens didn't come.

120Wouldn't you be?

121There was no reply.

122Miss Polly was stalking on ahead.

123Miss Polly, to tell the truth, was feeling curiously helpless.

124For the third time since Pollyanna's arrival, Miss Polly was punishing Pollyanna.

125And for the third time, she was being confronted with the amazing fact that her punishment was being taken as a special reward of merit.

126No wonder Miss Polly was feeling curiously helpless.

127End of chapter 7 End of chapter 7 End of chapter 7 End of chapter 7