Pollyanna

Pollyanna decides she has time to go exploring around Pendleton Hill. She is in Pendleton Woods when she spots a dog who seems to demand her attention. She follows the dog to where it wants to take her and finds Mr. Pendleton lying motionless at the foot of a steep. He has hurt his leg. Pollyanna is aghast and Mr. Pendleton sternly asks her to use his telephone to call Dr. Chilton for help. As she goes to the telephone, she feels a thrill of trepidation at entering this mysterious house where only Mr. Pendleton’s servants go. Pollyanna calls the doctor and goes back to wait with Mr. Pendleton. She affectionately holds his head in her lap, and he cannot help being affected by her tenderness. After a long while, Dr. Chilton advances.

Pollyanna is late for supper on account of Mr. Pendleton, but she is not in trouble because Aunt Polly has gone to a funeral and only Nancy greets her.

She meets Jimmy Bean and tells him of her fruitless time with the Ladies’ Aid. On learning that his needs have been put second to those of boys in India, he is stoic, saying “of course things you don’t know about are always nicer’n things you do”, and how he wishes that he would look like a nice proposition to someone far away (97). Pollyanna responds by saying that she will see if someone from the Western branch of the Ladies’ Aid would be keen on taking Jimmy.

About a week after Mr. Pendleton’s accident, Pollyanna asks Aunt Polly whether she can take him Mrs. Snow’s ration of calf-foot jelly. She explains that Mrs. Snow will be laid up in bed forever, but that Mr. Pendleton’s broken leg is temporary. Aunt Polly exclaims when she hears Mr. Pendleton’s name and is surprised that Pollyanna knows him. She only finally acquiesces to let Pollyanna take the jelly if the latter promises to say that it is from her and not from Aunt Polly. Pollyanna thanks her, not really understanding what this is about.

Although Mr. Pendleton has entreated that he will have no visitors, Dr. Chilton insists that Pendleton’s staff grant Pollyanna access, deeming that “that little girl is better than a six-quart bottle of tonic any day. If anything or anybody can take the grouch out of Pendleton this afternoon, she can” (102). Pollyanna is escorted to Pendleton’s rooms, where he greets her with grouchy affection. Pollyanna chatters on, telling Mr. Pendleton that he should be happy he broke one leg and not two. When Mr. Pendleton complains about having to pay his servants and the doctor, Pollyanna responds sympathetically, saying that he is saving his money “for the heathen” (106). She lets slip that Nancy told her this information and that she lives with her aunt, a woman called Miss Polly Harrington. Pendleton is aghast at the mention of Aunt Polly’s name and Pollyanna guesses that he knows her. Mr. Pendleton says that he knew Aunt Polly and wants to ask if she was the one who sent the jelly. Pollyanna corrects him, saying that her aunt said, “I must be very sure not to let you think she did send it” (108). Pendleton looks away and Pollyanna leaves distressed.

The doctor offers to take Pollyanna home. On the way, he reports that she is enthusiastic about many things. She says she enthusiastic about everything that is her free time rather than the occupations her aunt sets her like sewing. The doctor informs her that some people must learn work skills to earn a living. Pollyanna feels sorry for him and tells him that as a doctor he has the happiest job because he helps people. The doctor is moved because he has a small, lonely life in which his profession is the main feature. He blesses Pollyanna before he drops her off.

When Pollyanna greets Aunt Polly and reassures her that she told Mr. Pendleton that Aunt Polly did not send the jelly, Aunt Polly turns pink, annoyed that Pollyanna does not understand the nuance between Mr. Pendleton not thinking that Aunt Polly sent the jelly and outright telling him that she did not. Pollyanna says that does not see the difference.

When Pollyanna spots Aunt Polly looking the better for having undone hair following a trip to the Ladies’ Aid society, she insists on doing her hair for her. Meanwhile, Aunt Polly tries to chastise Pollyanna for her impertinence in going to the Ladies’ Aid Society and pleading Jimmy Bean’s case. Aunt Polly continues to reproach Pollyanna, but she finds that she likes the attention and the compliment of being attractive. She also sees change in her reflection in the glass, noting that though her face is “not young” it is “alight with excitement and surprise” (115). Still, Aunt Polly affects shock when Pollyanna suggests she should go out in public with her new hairdo and brings down a coquettish white shawl from the attic. Dr. Chilton comes over, telling Pollyanna that Mr. Pendleton wants to see her, and he will take her in his carriage. Her aunt is embarrassed that someone has seen her in this state of undress. On the way to Mr. Pendleton’s, Pollyanna confesses her trouble with her aunt to the doctor. He agrees that her aunt looked lovely in a sighing voice. When Pollyanna says that she will tell her aunt, Dr. Chilton begs her not to, having his own reasons for the concealment. He is silent for almost the rest of the buggy ride.

Mr. Pendleton greets Pollyanna cheerfully, thanking her for her good service in saving him and showing her a box of curios from his travels. They talk about her and her life at Aunt Polly’s and back West. At the end of the visit, Pendleton asks her to come again because he is lonely and moved by finding out the truth of her identity. For a while, he tried to not see Pollyanna because she reminded him “more vividly of the thing I was so wanting to forget” (122). However, now he realizes that he will never forget. She tells him she would love to return.

Later, when she relates all to Nancy, Nancy conjectures that Mr. Pendleton is the lover of Miss Polly’s that Old Tom told her about. Her conjecture is founded on Mr. Pendleton’s enthusiasm for Pollyanna following the discovery of her identity. Pollyanna speculates that if this is true, it is logical that these old lovers would wish to reunite.

Pollyanna continues to visit Mr. Pendleton but finds to her dismay that her visits do not appear to cheer him. Although she does not doubt that he was Miss Polly’s one-time lover, when she talks to him about her aunt, he does not react warmly. Her aunt too does not listen when she talks about Mr. Pendleton. However, one time when Pollyanna is sick and says that if she worsens Aunt Polly will have to contact Dr. Chilton, she notices that Aunt Polly “seemed particularly bitter against Dr. Chilton” as she announces that the family physician is Dr. Warren (128). She is discomfited when Pollyanna mentions the occasion when Dr. Chilton saw her dressed down through the window.

At Mr. Pendleton’s bedside, Pollyanna shares a tender moment with him when he takes a prism and a candlestick and performs an experiment that allows Pollyanna to “live in a rainbow” (130). She tells him about the glad game, beginning with the time that she received crutches instead of a doll. He tells Pollyanna that she is the finest type of prism or rainbow-maker.

When Pollyanna enters school with children of her own age, Mr. Pendleton complains at her absence. He asks Pollyanna to come and live with him. Pollyanna moves to say she cannot because of her duty to Aunt Polly and then comes up with the solution that he can marry Aunt Polly and take them both. He seems astonished and then with a pained look explains how “long years ago I loved somebody very much” and “hoped to bring her, some day, to this house” (134). However, it did not work out. Dr. Chilton’s visit ends Pollyanna’s own and he jokes that Mr. Pendleton has had an “overdose of your tonic” (136).

After Sunday school, Dr. Chilton overtakes Pollyanna and asks to drive her as he wants to talk to her. He jokes that she was less comforting than upsetting to Mr. Pendleton the previous day. When Pollyanna blames Aunt Polly, the doctor reacts strongly. She tells him her theory about Aunt Polly and Mr. Pendleton being lovers and about Mr. Pendleton asking her to live with him. The doctor reacts vaguely to this suggestion.

Dr. Chilton drives her to Mr. Pendleton. He is astounded by the claim that Aunt Polly and he were lovers. He then confesses that Pollyanna’s mother was the one that he pursued, but she did not love him back and went off with Pollyanna’s father. After that “the whole world suddenly seemed to turn black under my fingers” (140). He has been miserable thus far and is convinced that he will be miserable ever after unless Pollyanna consents to live with him. He promises that he will spend his money to fulfil all her wishes. Pollyanna reminds him that he has already been spending his money on prisms for her and Mrs. Snow, and on a gold coin for Nancy.

Pollyanna mentions her aunt and says that her theory about Mr. Pendleton and Aunt Polly being lovers has only gotten as far as the doctor. He gives an inexplicable “queer little laugh” (142).

When Pollyanna learns from Nancy that Aunt Polly worries about her and that she has softened and become almost humane through Pollyanna’s influence, she knows she cannot leave her.

Pollyanna dreads telling Mr. Pendleton her decision and she feels sorry for his loneliness. However, she soon hatches a plan for how she can abate it. She goes over to him the next day and proposes that he should adopt Jimmy Bean instead of her. At first Mr. Pendleton is indignant, but Pollyanna explains Jimmy’s plight and how even the Ladies’ Aid out West will not take him. Pendleton finds his “heart already strangely softened” and agrees to accept a call with Pollyanna and Jimmy Bean the following Saturday (149).

The Reverend Paul Ford takes a walk in Pendleton Woods, upset because his local parish is enduring scandal after scandal and the church services are dwindling in attendance. He feels compelled to act and begins prescribing a sermon denouncing hypocrisy and other wrongdoings. He falls to the foot of a tree in despair. This is when Pollyanna sees him. She is empathetic with his pain, saying that her father who was a minister also used to despair. However, he relied upon the 800 “rejoicing texts” in the Bible to give himself encouragement (155). She tells the minister how this evolved into the glad game and the minister finds himself revitalized. Walking hand in hand with Pollyanna, he decides that he will write a more encouraging sermon as “what men and women need is encouragement. Their natural resisting powers should be strengthened, not weakened” (157). He decides that Pollyanna’s type of optimistic character is the most revolutionary thing of all and lets it permeate his next Sunday’s sermon.