“The child’s presence,” stammered Pollyanna, hastily. “Mr. Pendleton told me once, you see, that only a woman’s hand and heart or a child’s presence could make a—a home. And now he’s got it—the child’s presence.”

“Oh, I—see,” said Miss Polly very gently; and she did see—more than Pollyanna realized. She saw something of the pressure that was probably brought to bear on Pollyanna herself at the time John Pendleton was asking her to be the “child’s presence,” which was to transform his great pile of gray stone into a home. “I see,” she finished, her eyes stinging with sudden tears.

Pollyanna, fearful that her aunt might ask further embarrassing questions, hastened to lead the conversation away from the Pendleton house and its master.

“Dr. Chilton says so, too—that it takes a woman’s hand and heart, or a child’s presence, to make a home, you know,” she remarked.

Miss Polly turned with a start.

Dr. Chilton! How do you know—that?”

“He told me so. ’Twas when he said he lived in just rooms, you know—not a home.”

Miss Polly did not answer. Her eyes were out the window.

“So I asked him why he didn’t get ’em.—a woman’s hand and heart, and have a home.”

“Pollyanna!” Miss Polly had turned sharply. Her cheeks showed a sudden color.

“Well, I did. He looked so—so sorrowful.”

“What did he—say?” Miss Polly asked the question as if in spite of some force within her that was urging her not to ask it.

“He didn’t say anything for a minute; then he said very low that you couldn’t always get ’em for the asking.”

There was a brief silence. Miss Polly’s eyes had turned again to the window. Her cheeks were still unnaturally pink.

Pollyanna sighed.

“He wants one, anyhow, I know, and I wish he could have one.”

“Why, Pollyanna, how do you know?”

“Because, afterwards, on another day, he said something else. He said that low, too, but I heard him. He said that he’d give all the world if he did have one woman’s hand and heart. Why, Aunt Polly, what’s the matter?” Aunt Polly had risen hurriedly and gone to the window.

“Nothing, dear. I was changing the position of this prism,” said Aunt Polly, whose whole face now was aflame.


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