“Oh, no, I don’t mind it at all,” she explained to Nancy.  “I’m happy just to walk around and see the streets and the houses and watch the people.  I just love people.  Don’t you, Nancy?”

“Well, I can’t say I do—­all of ’em,” retorted Nancy, tersely.

Almost every pleasant afternoon found Pollyanna begging for “an errand to run,” so that she might be off for a walk in one direction or another; and it was on these walks that frequently she met the Man.  To herself Pollyanna always called him “the Man,” no matter if she met a dozen other men the same day.

The Man often wore a long black coat and a high silk hat—­two things that the “just men” never wore.  His face was clean shaven and rather pale, and his hair, showing below his hat, was somewhat gray.  He walked erect, and rather rapidly, and he was always alone, which made Pollyanna vaguely sorry for him.  Perhaps it was because of this that she one day spoke to him.

“How do you do, sir?  Isn’t this a nice day?” she called cheerily, as she approached him.

The man threw a hurried glance about him, then stopped uncertainly.

“Did you speak—­to me?” he asked in a sharp voice.

“Yes, sir,” beamed Pollyanna.  “I say, it’s a nice day, isn’t it?”

“Eh?  Oh!  Humph!” he grunted; and strode on again.

Pollyanna laughed.  He was such a funny man, she thought.

The next day she saw him again.

" ’Tisn’t quite so nice as yesterday, but it’s pretty nice,” she called out cheerfully.

“Eh?  Oh!  Humph!” grunted the man as before; and once again Pollyanna laughed happily.

When for the third time Pollyanna accosted him in much the same manner, the man stopped abruptly.

“See here, child, who are you, and why are you speaking to me every day?”

“I’m Pollyanna Whittier, and I thought you looked lonesome.  I’m so glad you stopped.  Now we’re introduced—­only I don’t know your name yet.”

“Well, of all the—­” The man did not finish his sentence, but strode on faster than ever.

Pollyanna looked after him with a disappointed droop to her usually smiling lips.

“Maybe he didn’t understand—­but that was only half an introduction.  I don’t know his name, yet,” she murmured, as she proceeded on her way.

Pollyanna was carrying calf’s-foot jelly to Mrs. Snow to-day.  Miss Polly Harrington always sent something to Mrs. Snow once a week.  She said she thought that it was her duty, inasmuch as Mrs. Snow was poor, sick, and a member of her church—­it was the duty of all the church members to look out for her, of course.  Miss Polly did her duty by Mrs. Snow usually on Thursday afternoons—­not personally, but through Nancy.  To-day Pollyanna had begged the privilege, and Nancy had promptly given it to her in accordance with Miss Polly’s orders.

“And it’s glad that I am ter get rid of it,” Nancy had declared in private afterwards to Pollyanna; “though it’s a shame ter be tuckin’ the job off on ter you, poor lamb, so it is, it is!”