Элинор Портер - Pollyanna Crows up / Поллианна вырастает. Книга для чтения на английском языке

But now that Pollyanna was really going home, the picture was far different. The “quiet house with the sun shut out” had become one that promised to be “gloomy and unbearable.” The longed-for “peace” would be “wretched loneliness”; and as for her being able to “hide herself away from the annoying, tiresome world,” and “free to summon to her aching consciousness all those dear memories of that lost little lad” – just as if anything could blot out those other aching memories of the new Jamie (who yet might be the old Jamie) with his pitiful, pleading eyes!

Full well now Mrs. Carew knew that without Pollyanna the house would be empty; but that without the lad, Jamie, it would be worse than that. To her pride this knowledge was not pleasing. To her heart it was torture – since the boy had twice said that he would not come. For a time, during those last few days of Pollyanna’s stay, the struggle was a bitter one, though pride always kept the ascendancy [81] pride always kept the ascendancy – ( уст. ) всегда гордыня одерживала верх . Then, on what Mrs. Carew knew would be Jamie’s last visit, her heart triumphed, and once more she asked Jamie to come and be to her the Jamie that was lost.

What she said she never could remember afterwards; but what the boy said, she never forgot. After all, it was compassed in six short words.

For what seemed a long, long minute his eyes had searched her face; then to his own had come a transfiguring light, as he breathed:

“Oh, yes! Why, you – CARE, now!”

This time Beldingsville did not literally welcome Pollyanna home with brass bands and bunting – perhaps because the hour of her expected arrival was known to but few of the townspeople. But there certainly was no lack of joyful greetings on the part of everybody from the moment she stepped from the railway train with her Aunt Polly and Dr. Chilton. Nor did Pollyanna lose any time in starting on a round of fly-away minute calls on all her old friends. Indeed, for the next few days, according to Nancy, “There wasn’t no putting of your finger on her anywheres, for by the time you’d got your finger down she wa’n’t there.”

And always, everywhere she went, Pollyanna met the question: “Well, how did you like Boston?” Perhaps to no one did she answer this more fully than she did to Mr. Pendleton. As was usually the case when this question was put to her, she began her reply with a troubled frown.

“Oh, I liked it – I just loved it – some of it.”

“But not all of it?” smiled Mr. Pendleton.

“No. There’s parts of it – Oh, I was glad to be there,” she explained hastily. “I had a perfectly lovely time, and lots of things were so queer and different, you know – like eating dinner at night instead of noons, when you ought to eat it. But everybody was so good to me, and I saw such a lot of wonderful things – Bunker Hill [83] Bunker Hill – мемориал в память о битве 1775 г.; хотя победили англичане, американские колонисты доказали, что они лучшие воины, чем думали британцы , and the Public Garden, and the Seeing Boston autos, and miles of pictures and statues and store-windows and streets that didn’t have any end. And folks. I never saw such a lot of folks.”

“Well, I’m sure – I thought you liked folks,” commented the man.

“I do.” Pollyanna frowned again and pondered. “But what’s the use of such a lot of them if you don’t know ’em? And Mrs. Carew wouldn’t let me. She didn’t know ’em herself. She said folks didn’t, down there.”

There was a slight pause, then, with a sigh, Pollyanna resumed.

“I reckon maybe that’s the part I don’t like the most – that folks don’t know each other. It would be such a lot nicer if they did! Why, just think, Mr. Pendleton, there are lots of folks that live on dirty, narrow streets, and don’t even have beans and fish balls to eat, nor things even as good as missionary barrels to wear. Then there are other folks – Mrs. Carew, and a whole lot like her – that live in perfectly beautiful houses, and have more things to eat and wear than they know what to do with. Now if THOSE folks only knew the other folks —”

But Mr. Pendleton interrupted with a laugh.

“My dear child, did it ever occur to you that these people don’t CARE to know each other?” he asked quizzically.

“Oh, but some of them do,” maintained Pollyanna, in eager defense. “Now there’s Sadie Dean – she sells bows, lovely bows in a big store – she WANTS to know people; and I introduced her to Mrs. Carew, and we had her up to the house, and we had Jamie and lots of others there, too; and she was SO glad to know them! And that’s what made me think that if only a lot of Mrs. Carew’s kind could know the other kind – but of course I couldn’t do the introducing. I didn’t know many of them myself, anyway. But if they COULD know each other, so that the rich people could give the poor people part of their money —”

But again Mr. Pendleton interrupted with a laugh.

“Oh, Pollyanna, Pollyanna,” he chuckled; “I’m afraid you’re getting into pretty deep water [84] you’re getting into pretty deep water – ( разг. ) лезешь в воду, не зная броду (попадешь в беду) . You’ll be a rabid little socialist before you know it.”

“A – what?” questioned the little girl, dubiously. “I – I don’t think I know what a socialist is. But I know what being SOCIABLE is – and I like folks that are that. If it’s anything like that, I don’t mind being one, a mite. I’d like to be one.”

“I don’t doubt it, Pollyanna,” smiled the man. “But when it comes to this scheme of yours for the wholesale distribution of wealth – you’ve got a problem on your hands that you might have difficulty with.”

Pollyanna drew a long sigh.

“I know,” she nodded. “That’s the way Mrs. Carew talked. She says I don’t understand; that ’twould – er – pauperize her and be indiscriminate and pernicious, and – Well, it was SOMETHING like that, anyway,” bridled the little girl, aggrievedly, as the man began to laugh. “And, anyway, I DON’t understand why some folks should have such a lot, and other folks shouldn’t have anything; and I DON’t like it. And if I ever have a lot I shall just give some of it to folks who don’t have any, even if it does make me pauperized and pernicious, and —” But Mr. Pendleton was laughing so hard now that Pollyanna, after a moment’s struggle, surrendered and laughed with him.

“Well, anyway,” she reiterated, when she had caught her breath, “I don’t understand it, all the same.”

“No, dear, I’m afraid you don’t,” agreed the man, growing suddenly very grave and tender-eyed; “nor any of the rest of us, for that matter. But, tell me,” he added, after a minute, “who is this Jamie you’ve been talking so much about since you came?”

And Pollyanna told him.

In talking of Jamie, Pollyanna lost her worried, baffled look. Pollyanna loved to talk of Jamie. Here was something she understood. Here was no problem that had to deal with big, fearsome-sounding words. Besides, in this particular instance – would not Mr. Pendleton be especially interested in Mrs. Carew’s taking the boy into her home, for who better than himself could understand the need of a child’s presence?