Pollyanna

While Pollyanna prattles on about how grateful she is to have a temporary sickness like Mr. Pendleton’s broken legs and not a permanent one like Mrs. Snow, Aunt Polly looks sad. She has a secret about Pollyanna’s condition that she will not share.

Meanwhile, Nancy gossips to Old Tom about Mr. Pendleton visiting Miss Polly. She explains she was wrong about thinking Mr. Pendleton was Miss Polly’s former lover. Old Tom then states that after Pollyanna’s mother Jennie rejected Mr. Pendleton, Miss Polly tried “ter be nice to him. Maybe she overdid it a little” (168). Some people gossiped that Miss Polly was chasing Mr. Pendleton herself. After this, there was trouble with Miss Polly’s own lover, who Old Tom will not name.

Mr. Pendleton has turned up to ask Miss Polly how Pollyanna is. She shares the sad news that Pollyanna has acquired a spinal injury which appears to have paralyzed her from the hips down. She explains that she has not yet told Pollyanna the news. Both are tearful. Mr. Pendleton confesses how he has tried to get Pollyanna to live with him, explaining how “I am fond of her both for her own sake, and for her mother’s” and “stood ready to give Pollyanna the love that has been twenty-five years in storage” (170). He explains that Pollyanna would not come for love of her aunt. Aunt Polly thanks Mr. Pendleton for his visit and promises to update him on Pollyanna’s condition.

Aunt Polly says that she has engaged a specialist from New York to see Pollyanna. Pollyanna maintains that she wants Dr. Chilton because she loves him. Aunt Polly blushes and maintains that she will do anything she can to keep Pollyanna happy, except seeing Dr. Chilton. She indulges her, allowing the cat and dog to come upstairs and for the nurse to do her hair. However, even when the specialist from New York cannot come, she still will not permit Dr. Chilton’s visit.

Nancy talks to Old Tom hoping to scope out more information on Miss Polly’s lover. Old Tom says that he will not tell, intimating that he cannot believe that Nancy has not guessed it.

However, Pollyanna shows no signs of recovering and despite her efforts to remain animated as she talks about resuming her activities when she is better, she grows pale and thin.

When tall, broad-shouldered Dr. Mead, the New York specialist arrives, Pollyanna tells him he looks a lot like her doctor, Dr. Chilton. This makes Aunt Polly blush. Then the door is closed while the adults talk. They think that the cat, who poked at the unlatched door to come in, is the one who enabled Pollyanna to overhear Aunt Polly saying: “Not that! Doctor, not that! You don’t mean—the child—will NEVER WALK again!” (179). Aunt Polly faints and must be revived by the doctors, while Pollyanna who has overheard begs the nurse for her aunt. She tries to gain reassurance from Miss Hunt that the doctor has not said the truth. Miss Hunt gives Pollyanna palliatives. Still, the full horror does not leave Pollyanna, who cannot see how she will ever feel hopeful again if she cannot walk.

Miss Polly sends Nancy to break the news about Pollyanna to Mr. Pendleton. She tells him that it is harder to play the glad game now when she cannot see beyond the gloomy fact of never walking again.

Soon, the whole town knows that the New York specialist said Pollyanna would never walk again and they mourn the fact openly.

Mr. Pendleton comes to the house to tell Aunt Polly that he will take in Jimmy Bean. Miss Polly is astounded and rushes to tell the news to Pollyanna. Pollyanna beams with happiness and then reveals that Dr. Chilton, like Mr. Pendleton, also thinks that “a woman’s hand and heart, or a child’s presence” are necessary to making a home (187). Aunt Polly blushes and blushes, as Pollyanna relates the how Dr. Chilton would “give all the world if he did have one woman’s hand and heart” (188).

Miss Polly receives a barrage of visitors all expressing sorrow for Pollyanna’s sickness and gratitude to her for having taught them the glad game. Miss Polly is baffled, as she will not hear of the game because it began with Pollyanna’s father. The guests include Milly Snow, who explains how her mother Mrs. Snow played the glad game to be grateful that she has use of her arms and to take up knitting, and the widow Mrs. Benton, who on Pollyanna’s entreaty begins to wear color. Finally, Mrs. Payson, a poor woman of ill-repute who is on the brink of divorce, says that Pollyanna’s visits and her accident made them think of staying together.

Miss Polly demands that Nancy tell her the story of the glad game. Nancy says that it began with Pollyanna’s father and the story of the crutches instead of the doll. Miss Polly determines that she too will play the game with Pollyanna. She goes to Pollyanna’s bedside, rhapsodizing about her influence on the town. Pollyanna responds that “I can be glad I’ve HAD my legs, anyway—else I couldn’t have done that” (201).

Pollyanna tries to make the best of her new situation, continuing to play the glad game and happy that Aunt Polly is playing it along with her. She has visitors like Mr. John Pendleton and Jimmy Bean, who has been adopted by him. However, as winter turns to spring, all of Beldingsville is upset that the prescribed treatment does not appear to have worked, and that the New York doctor’s prediction seems to be coming true.

Dr. Chilton comes over to see Mr. Pendleton, explaining his predicament. He chooses Mr. Pendleton because he is one of the few who knows about his affair with Miss Polly. He believes that he knows a way that he can cure Pollyanna and help her walk again, but this will be impossible if he does not see her. He knows of a college friend who was able to cure a case very like Pollyanna’s. However, Miss Polly has said that the next time she permitted him to enter the house “I might as well take it that she was begging my pardon, and that all would be as before—which meant that she’d marry me” (203). This, in addition to matters of professional pride means that he has not been able to see Pollyanna, although Dr. Warren has suggested to Miss Polly that she should seek Dr. Chilton’s opinion.

Pendleton demands to know the nature of the quarrel, but Chilton is vague, dismissing it as a lovers’ tiff that is insignificant in comparison to the good he could do if he saw Pollyanna. Meanwhile, Jimmy Bean who is working in the garden, overhears this conversation decides that he will go directly to Miss Polly.

Miss Polly is surprised when Jimmy wants to see her and even more so when she learns the subject of his entreaty. Although she indignant at Jimmy for eavesdropping and bringing up the matter of her disagreement with Dr. Chilton, when she sees that her attitude has been an obstacle to Pollyanna’s recovery, she changes her mind. She instructs Dr. Warren that he should invite Dr. Chilton in at once.

Pollyanna is delighted to see Dr. Chilton and Aunt Polly assures her that she was the one who invited him to come. There is a tender moment as “the adoring happiness that had leaped to Dr. Chilton’s eyes was unmistakable and Miss Polly had seen it” (210). She whispers to Pollyanna that “some day I’m going to give Dr. Chilton to you for your […] uncle” and that she is the one who has orchestrated it (210). Pollyanna is so happy that Aunt Polly is the woman Dr. Chilton longed for that she says she does not mind her legs.

Aunt Polly is cautious of filling Pollyanna with false hope, but tells her that the following week, she will travel to a specialist friend of Dr. Chilton’s to see what can be done for her mobility.

Pollyanna writes a joyous letter to her Aunt Polly and her Uncle Tom (Dr. Chilton), informing them that she can now walk. She said she had a joyous audience of overwhelmed doctors and nurses.

Pollyanna is ecstatic saying that she shall soon go home and that when that day comes, she would almost wish to walk there. She is grateful to her aunt and new uncle for getting married by her bedside and sends them her love.