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Into the eyes of those she met Pollyanna smiled joyously. She was disappointed but not surprised that she received no answering smile in return. She was used to that now in Boston. She still smiled, however, hopefully: there might be some one, sometime, who would smile back.
Mrs. Carews home was very near the beginning of Commonwealth Avenue, so it was not long before Pollyanna found herself at the edge of a street crossing her way at right angles. Across the street, in all its autumn glory, lay what to Pollyanna was the most beautiful yard she had ever seen the Boston Public Garden.
For a moment Pollyanna hesitated, her eyes longingly fixed on the wealth of beauty before her. That it was the private grounds of some rich man or woman, she did not for a moment doubt. Once, with Dr. Ames at the Sanatorium, she had been taken to call on a lady who lived in a beautiful house surrounded by just such walks and trees and flowerbeds as these.
Pollyanna wanted now very much to cross the street and walk in those grounds, but she doubted if she had the right. To be sure, others were there, moving about, she could see; but they might be invited guests, of course. After she had seen two women, one man, and a little girl unhesitatingly enter the gate and walk briskly down the path, however, Pollyanna concluded that she, too, might go. Watching her chance she skipped nimbly across the street and entered the Garden.
It was even more beautiful close at hand[26] than it had been at a distance. Birds twittered over her head, and a squirrel leaped across the path ahead of her. On benches here and there sat men, women, and children. Through the trees flashed the sparkle of the sun on water; and from somewhere came the shouts of children and the sound of music.
Once again Pollyanna hesitated; then, a little timidly, she accosted a handsomely-dressed young woman coming toward her.
Please, is this a party? she asked.
The young woman stared.
A party! she repeated dazedly.
Yesm. I mean, is it all right for me to be here?
For you to be here? Why, of course. Its for for everybody! exclaimed the young woman.
Oh, thats all right, then. Im glad I came, beamed Pollyanna.
The young woman said nothing; but she turned back and looked at Pollyanna still dazedly as she hurried away.
Pollyanna, not at all surprised that the owner of this beautiful place should be so generous as to give a party to everybody, continued on her way. At the turn of the path she came upon a small girl and a doll carriage. She stopped with a glad little cry, but she had not said a dozen words before from somewhere came a young woman with hurrying steps and a disapproving voice; a young woman who held out her hand to the small girl, and said sharply:
Here, Gladys, Gladys, come away with me. Hasnt mama told you not to talk to strange children?
But Im not strange children, explained Pollyanna in eager defense. I live right here in Boston, now, and But the young woman and the little girl dragging the doll carriage were already far down the path; and with a half-stifled sigh Pollyanna fell back. For a moment she stood silent, plainly disappointed; then resolutely she lifted her chin and went forward.
Well, anyhow, I can be glad for that, she nodded to herself, for now maybe Ill find somebody even nicer Susie Smith, perhaps, or even Mrs. Carews Jamie. Anyhow, I can IMAGINE Im going to find them; and if I dont find THEM, I can find SOMEBODY! she finished, her wistful eyes on the self-absorbed people all about her.
Undeniably Pollyanna was lonesome. Brought up by her father and the Ladies Aid Society in a small Western town, she had counted every house in the village her home, and every man, woman, and child her friend. Coming to her aunt in Vermont at eleven years of age, she had promptly assumed that conditions would differ only in that the homes and the friends would be new, and therefore even more delightful, possibly, for they would be different and Pollyanna did so love different things and people! Her first and always her supreme delight in Beldingsville, therefore, had been her long rambles about the town and the charming visits with the new friends she had made. Quite naturally, in consequence, Boston, as she first saw it, seemed to Pollyanna even more delightfully promising in its possibilities.
Thus far, however, Pollyanna had to admit that in one respect, at least, it had been disappointing: she had been here nearly two weeks and she did not yet know the people who lived across the street, or even next door. More inexplicable still, Mrs. Carew herself did not know many of them, and not any of them well. She seemed, indeed, utterly indifferent to her neighbors, which was most amazing from Pollyannas point of view; but nothing she could say appeared to change Mrs. Carews attitude in the matter at all.
They do not interest me, Pollyanna, was all she would say; and with this, Pollyanna whom they did interest very much was forced to be content.
To-day, on her walk, however, Pollyanna had started out with high hopes, yet thus far she seemed destined to be disappointed. Here all about her were people who were doubtless most delightful if she only knew them. But she did not know them. Worse yet, there seemed to be no prospect that she would know them, for they did not, apparently, wish to know her: Pollyanna was still smarting under the nurses sharp warning concerning strange children.