Page:Pollyanna.djvu/258

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POLLYANNA

cries, an' says it don't seem the same, somehow. She says it's easy ter tell lifelong invalids how ter be glad, but 'tain't the same thing when you're the lifelong invalid yerself, an' have ter try ter do it. She says she's told herself over an' over again how glad she is that other folks ain't like her; but that all the time she's sayin' it, she ain't really thinkin' of anythin' only how she can't ever walk again."

Nancy paused, but the man did not speak. He sat with his hands over his eyes.

"Then I tried ter remind her how she used ter say the game was all the nicer ter play when—when it was hard," resumed Nancy, in a dull voice. "But she says that, too, is diff'rent—when it really is hard. An' I must be goin', now, sir," she broke off abruptly.

At the door she hesitated, turned, and asked timidly:

"I couldn't be tellin' Miss Pollyanna that—that you'd seen Jimmy Bean again, I s'pose, sir, could I?"

"I don't see how you could—as I haven't seen him," observed the man a little shortly. "Why?"

"Nothin', sir, only—well, ye see, that's one of the things that she was feelin' bad about, that she couldn't take him ter see you, now. She said she'd taken him once, but she didn't think he showed off very well that day, and that she was afraid you

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