Page:Pollyanna Grows Up.djvu/79

Rh stay in that room, and I ain't goin' to go to any old library to read, neither. It's our last half-holiday this year—and an extra one, at that; and I'm going to have a good time—for once. I'm just as young, and I like to laugh and joke just as well as them girls I sell bows to all day. Well, to-day I'm going to laugh and joke."

Pollyanna smiled and nodded her approval.

"I'm glad you feel that way. I do, too. It's a lot more fun—to be happy, isn't it? Besides, the Bible tells us to;—rejoice and be glad, I mean. It tells us to eight hundred times. Probably you know about 'em, though—the rejoicing texts."

The pretty girl shook her head. A queer look came to her face.

"Well, no," she said dryly. "I can't say I was thinkin'—of the Bible."

"Weren't you? Well, maybe not; but, you see, MY father was a minister, and he—"

"A minister?"

"Yes. Why, was yours, too?" cried Pollyanna, answering something she saw in the other's face.

"Y-yes." A faint color crept up to the girl's forehead.

"Oh, and has he gone like mine to be with God and the angels?"

The girl turned away her head.

"No. He's still living—back home," she answered, half under her breath.

"Oh, how glad you must be," sighed Pollyanna, enviously. "Sometimes I get to thinking, if only I