Page:Pollyanna.djvu/157

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DR. CHILTON

things you 'love' to do—eh?" he added, as they drove briskly away.

Pollyanna laughed.

"Why, I don't know. I reckon perhaps there are," she admitted. "I like to do 'most everything that's living. Of course I don't like the other things very well—sewing, and reading out loud, and all that. But they aren't living."

"No? What are they, then?"

"Aunt Polly says they're 'learning to live,'" sighed Pollyanna, with a rueful smile.

The doctor smiled now—a little queerly.

"Does she? Well, I should think she might say—just that."

"Yes," responded Pollyanna. "But I don't see it that way at all. I don't think you have to learn how to live. I didn't, anyhow."

The doctor drew a long sigh.

"After all, I'm afraid some of us—do have to, little girl," he said. Then, for a time he was silent. Pollyanna, stealing a glance at his face, felt vaguely sorry for him. He looked so sad. She wished, uneasily, that she could "do something." It was this, perhaps, that caused her to say in a timid voice:

"Dr. Chilton, I should think being a doctor would be the very gladdest kind of a business there was."

The doctor turned in surprise.

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