Поллианна вырастает

УДК 372.8
ББК 81.2 Англ-93
П60

ISBN 978-5-9925-1177-2

Портер, Элинор.
П60 Поллианна вырастает: книга для чтения на английском языке. — Санкт-Петербург : КАРО, 2017. — 
352 с. — (Classical Literature).

ISBN 978-5-9925-1177-2.

Элинор Портер (1868–1920) — американская детская писательница. Предлагаем вниманию читателей продолжение ее 
книги-бестселлера «Поллианна». Героиня книги выросла, но 
не забыла свою «игру в радость» и осталась такой же доброй и 
жизнерадостной, какой ее полюбили читатели во всем мире.
Книга адресована всем любителям англоязычной литературы.
УДК 372.8
ББК 81.2 Англ-93

© КАРО, 2016

Chapter I

DELLA SPEAKS HER MIND 

Della Wetherby tripped up the somewhat imposing 
steps of her sister’s Commonwealth Avenue home 
and pressed an energetic fi nger against the electricbell button. From the tip of her wing-trimmed hat 
to the toe of her low-heeled shoe she radiated health, 
capability, and alert decision. Even her voice, as she 
greeted the maid that opened the door, vibrated with 
the joy of living.
“Good morning, Mary. Is my sister in?”
“Y-yes, ma’am, Mrs. Carew is in,” hesitated the girl; 
“but — she gave orders she’d see no one.”
“Did she? Well, I’m no one1,” smiled Miss Wetherby, 
“so she’ll see me. Don’t worry — I’ll take the blame,” 
she nodded, in answer to the frightened remonstrance 
in the girl’s eyes. “Where is she — in her sittingroom?”
“Y-yes, ma’am; but — that is, she said —” Miss 
Wetherby, however, was already halfway up the broad 

1 I’m no one — (зд.) я не никто

To My Cousin Walter

stairway; and, with a despairing backward glance, the 
maid turned away.
In the hall above Della Wetherby unhesitatingly 
walked toward a half-open door, and knocked.
“Well, Mary,” answered a “dear-me-what-now1” 
voice. “Haven’t I — Oh, Della!” Th e voice grew suddenly warm with love and surprise. “You dear girl, 
where did you come from?”
“Yes, it’s Della,” smiled that young woman, blithely, 
already halfway across the room. “I’ve come from an 
over-Sunday at the beach with two of the other nurses, 
and I’m on my way back to the Sanatorium now. Th at 
is, I’m here now, but I sha’n’t be long. I stepped in for — 
this,” she fi nished, giving the owner of the “dear-mewhat-now” voice a hearty kiss.
Mrs. Carew frowned and drew back a little coldly. 
Th e slight touch of joy and animation that had come 
into her face fl ed, leaving only a dispirited fretfulness 
that was plainly very much at home there.
“Oh, of course! I might have known,” she said. “You 
never stay — here.”
“Here!” Della Wetherby laughed merrily, and threw 
up her hands; then, abruptly, her voice and manner 
changed. She regarded her sister with grave, tender 
eyes. “Ruth, dear, I couldn’t — I just couldn’t live in this 
house. You know I couldn’t,” she fi nished gently.

1 dear-me-what-now — (зд.) «господи, ну кто там еще 
пришел»

Mrs. Carew stirred irritably.
“I’m sure I don’t see why not,” she fenced.
Della Wetherby shook her head.
“Yes, you do, dear. You know I’m entirely out of 
sympathy with it all: the gloom, the lack of aim, the 
insistence on misery and bitterness.”
“But I AM miserable and bitter.”
“You ought not to be.”
“Why not? What have I to make me otherwise?”
Della Wetherby gave an impatient gesture.
“Ruth, look here,” she challenged. “You’re thirtythree years old. You have good health — or would have, 
if you treated yourself properly — and you certainly 
have an abundance of time and a superabundance 
of money. Surely anybody would say you ought to 
find SOMETHING to do this glorious morning 
besides sitting moped up in this tomb-like house with 
instructions to the maid that you’ll see no one.”
“But I don’t WANT to see anybody.”
“Th en I’d MAKE myself want to.”
Mrs. Carew sighed wearily and turned away her 
head.
“Oh, Della, why won’t you ever understand? I’m 
not like you. I can’t — forget.”
A swift  pain crossed the younger woman’s face.
“You mean — Jamie, I suppose. I don’t forget — 
that, dear. I couldn’t, of course. But moping won’t help 
us — fi nd him.”

“As if I hadn’t TRIED to fi nd him, for eight long 
years — and by something besides moping,” fl ashed 
Mrs. Carew, indignantly, with a sob in her voice.
“Of course you have, dear,” soothed the other, 
quickly; “and we shall keep on hunting, both of us, 
till we do fi nd him — or die. But THIS sort of thing 
doesn’t help.”
“But I don’t want to do — anything else,” murmured 
Ruth Carew, drearily.
For a moment there was silence. The younger 
woman sat regarding her sister with troubled, disapproving eyes.
“Ruth,” she said, at last, with a touch of exasperation, 
“forgive me, but — are you always going to be like this? 
You’re widowed, I’ll admit; but your married life lasted 
only a year, and your husband was much older than 
yourself. You were little more than a child at the time, 
and that one short year can’t seem much more than 
a dream now. Surely that ought not to embitter your 
whole life!”
“No, oh, no,” murmured Mrs. Carew, still drearily.
“Th en ARE you going to be always like this?”
“Well, of course, if I could fi nd Jamie —”
“Yes, yes, I know; but, Ruth, dear, isn’t there anything in the world but Jamie — to make you ANY 
happy1?”

1 to make you ANY happy — (разг.) что сделало бы вас 
хоть немного счастливее

“Th ere doesn’t seem to be, that I can think of,” 
sighed Mrs. Carew, indiff erently.
“Ruth!” ejaculated her sister, stung into something 
very like anger. Th en suddenly she laughed. “Oh, Ruth, 
Ruth, I’d like to give you a dose of Pollyanna. I don’t 
know any one who needs it more!”
Mrs. Carew stiff ened a little.
“Well, what pollyanna may be I don’t know, but 
whatever it is, I don’t want it,” she retorted sharply, nettled in her turn. “Th is isn’t your beloved Sanatorium, and I’m not your patient to be dosed and 
bossed, please remember.”
Della Wetherby’s eyes danced, but her lips remained 
unsmiling.
“Pollyanna isn’t a medicine, my dear,” she said 
demurely, “— though I have heard some people call 
her a tonic. Pollyanna is a little girl.”
“A child? Well, how should I know,” retorted the 
other, still aggrievedly. “You have your ‘belladonna,’ so 
I’m sure I don’t see why not ‘pollyanna.’ Besides, you’re 
always recommending something for me to take, and 
you distinctly said ‘dose’ — and dose usually means 
medicine, of a sort1.”
“Well, Pollyanna IS a medicine — of a sort,” smiled 
Della. “Anyway, the Sanatorium doctors all declare that 
she’s better than any medicine they can give. She’s a 
little girl, Ruth, twelve or thirteen years old, who was at 

1 of a sort — (разг.) в каком-то смысле

the Sanatorium all last summer and most of the winter. I 
didn’t see her but a month or two, for she left  soon aft er 
I arrived. But that was long enough for me to come fully 
under her spell. Besides, the whole Sanatorium is still 
talking Pollyanna, and playing her game.”
“GAME!”
“Yes,” nodded Della, with a curious smile. “Her 
‘glad game.’ I’ll never forget my fi rst introduction 
to it. One feature of her treatment was particularly 
disagreeable and even painful. It came every Tuesday 
morning, and very soon aft er my arrival it fell to 
my lot to give it to her. I was dreading it, for I knew 
from past experience with other children what to 
expect: fretfulness and tears, if nothing worse. To my 
unbounded amazement she greeted me with a smile 
and said she was glad to see me; and, if you’ll believe 
it, there was never so much as a whimper from her 
lips through the whole ordeal, though I knew I was 
hurting her cruelly.
“I fancy I must have said something that showed 
my surprise, for she explained earnestly: ‘Oh, yes, I 
used to feel that way, too, and I did dread it so, till I 
happened to think ’twas just like Nancy’s wash-days, 
and I could be gladdest of all on TUESDAYS, ’cause 
there wouldn’t be another one for a whole week.’”
“Why, how extraordinary!” frowned Mrs. Carew, 
not quite comprehending. “But, I’m sure I don’t see 
any GAME to that.”

“No, I didn’t, till later. Th en she told me. It seems 
she was the motherless daughter of a poor minister 
in the West, and was brought up by the Ladies’ Aid 
Society and missionary barrels. When she was a tiny 
girl she wanted a doll, and confi dently expected it in 
the next barrel; but there turned out to be nothing but 
a pair of little crutches.
“Th e child cried, of course, and it was then that her 
father taught her the game of hunting for something 
to be glad about, in everything that happened; and he 
said she could begin right then by being glad she didn’t 
NEED the crutches. Th at was the beginning. Pollyanna 
said it was a lovely game, and she’d been playing it ever 
since; and that the harder it was to fi nd the glad part1, 
the more fun it was, only when it was too AWFUL 
hard, like she had found it sometimes.”
“Why, how extraordinary!” murmured Mrs. Carew, 
still not entirely comprehending.
“You’d think so — if you could see the results of 
that game in the Sanatorium,” nodded Della; “and 
Dr. Ames says he hears she’s revolutionized the whole 
town where she came from, just the same way. He 
knows Dr. Chilton very well — the man that married 
Pollyanna’s aunt. And, by the way, I believe that 
marriage was one of her ministrations. She patched 
up an old lovers’ quarrel between them.

1 harder it was to fi nd the glad part — (разг.) чем труднее было найти повод для радости

“You see, two years ago, or more, Pollyanna’s father 
died, and the little girl was sent East to this aunt. In 
October she was hurt by an automobile, and was 
told she could never walk again. In April Dr. Chilton 
sent her to the Sanatorium, and she was there till last 
March — almost a year. She went home practically 
cured. You should have seen the child! Th ere was 
just one cloud to mar her happiness: that she couldn’t 
WALK all the way there. As near as I can gather, the 
whole town turned out to meet her with brass bands 
and banners.
“But you can’t TELL about Pollyanna. One has to 
SEE her. And that’s why I say I wish you could have a 
dose of Pollyanna. It would do you a world of good.”
Mrs. Carew lift ed her chin a little.
“Really, indeed, I must say I beg to diff er with you1,” 
she returned coldly. “I don’t care to be ‘revolutionized,’ 
and I have no lovers’ quarrel to be patched up; and 
if there is ANYTHING that would be insuff erable 
to me, it would be a little Miss Prim with a long face 
preaching to me how much I had to be thankful for. I 
never could bear —” But a ringing laugh interrupted 
her.
“Oh, Ruth, Ruth,” choked her sister, gleefully. 
“Miss Prim, indeed — POLLYANNA! Oh, oh, if only 
you could see that child now! But there, I might have 

1 I beg to diff er with you — (уст.) я с вами не согласна