Eleanor H. Porter: Pollyanna

15. CHAPTER XV. DR. CHILTON (continued)

"Oh, no! It couldn't be till doomsday, you know, when the angel Gabriel blows his trumpet, unless it should come quicker than we think it will--oh, of course, I know the Bible says it may come quicker than we think, but I don't think it will--that is, of course I believe the Bible; but I mean I don't think it will come as much quicker as it would if it should come now, and--"

John Pendleton laughed suddenly--and aloud. The nurse, coming in at that moment, heard the laugh, and beat a hurried--but a very silent--retreat. He had the air of a frightened cook who, seeing the danger of a breath of cold air striking a half-done cake, hastily shuts the oven door.

"Aren't you getting a little mixed?" asked John Pendleton of Pollyanna.

The little girl laughed.

"Maybe. But what I mean is, that legs don't last--broken ones, you know--like lifelong invalids, same as Mrs. Snow has got. So yours won't last till doomsday at all. I should think you could be glad of that."

"Oh, I am," retorted the man grimly.

"And you didn't break but one. You can be glad 'twasn't two." Pollyanna was warming to her task.

"Of course! So fortunate," sniffed the man, with uplifted eyebrows; "looking at it from that standpoint, I suppose I might be glad I wasn't a centipede and didn't break fifty!"

Pollyanna chuckled.

"Oh, that's the best yet," she crowed. "I know what a centipede is; they've got lots of legs. And you can be glad--"

"Oh, of course," interrupted the man, sharply, all the old bitterness coming back to his voice; "I can be glad, too, for all the rest, I suppose--the nurse, and the doctor, and that confounded woman in the kitchen!"