Page:Pollyanna Grows Up.djvu/59

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The Game and Mrs. Carew
41


that she almost never went. But with Pollyanna's confident little face and happy eyes before her, she could not do it.

"Why, I suppose—about quarter past ten—if we walk," she said then, almost crossly. "It's only a little way."

Thus it happened that Mrs. Carew on that bright September morning occupied for the first time in months the Carew pew in the very fashionable and elegant church to which she had gone as a girl, and which she still supported liberally—so far as money went.

To Pollyanna that Sunday morning service was a great wonder and joy. The marvelous music of the vested choir, the opalescent rays from the jeweled windows, the impassioned voice of the preacher, and the reverent hush of the worshiping throng filled her with an ecstasy that left her for a time almost speechless. Not until they were nearly home did she fervently breathe:

"Oh, Mrs. Carew, I've just been thinking how glad I am we don't have to live but just one day at a time!"

Mrs. Carew frowned and looked down sharply. Mrs. Carew was in no mood for preaching. She had just been obliged to endure it from the pulpit, she told herself angrily, and she would not listen to it from this chit of a child. Moreover, this "living one day at a time" theory was a particularly pet doctrine of Della's. Was not Della always saying: "But you only have to live one minute at a time, Ruth, and any one can endure anything for one minute at a time!"