“Well, if you ain’t the beat’em for askin’ questions!” sighed the boy impatiently.

“I have to be,” retorted Pollyanna calmly, “else I couldn’t find out a thing about you.  If you’d talk more I wouldn’t talk so much.”

The boy gave a short laugh.  It was a sheepish laugh, and not quite a willing one; but his face looked a little pleasanter when he spoke this time.

“All right then—­here goes!  I’m Jimmy Bean, and I’m ten years old goin’ on eleven.  I come last year ter live at the Orphans’ Home; but they’ve got so many kids there ain’t much room for me, an’ I wa’n’t never wanted, anyhow, I don’t believe.  So I’ve quit.  I’m goin’ ter live somewheres else—­but I hain’t found the place, yet.  I’d like a home—­jest a common one, ye know, with a mother in it, instead of a Matron.  If ye has a home, ye has folks; an’ I hain’t had folks since—­dad died.  So I’m a-huntin’ now.  I’ve tried four houses, but—­they didn’t want me—­though I said I expected ter work, ’course.  There!  Is that all you want ter know?” The boy’s voice had broken a little over the last two sentences.

“Why, what a shame!” sympathized Pollyanna.  “And didn’t there anybody want you?  O dear!  I know just how you feel, because after—­after my father died, too, there wasn’t anybody but the Ladies’ Aid for me, until Aunt Polly said she’d take—­” Pollyanna stopped abruptly.  The dawning of a wonderful idea began to show in her face.

“Oh, I know just the place for you,” she cried.  “Aunt Polly’ll take you—­I know she will!  Didn’t she take me?  And didn’t she take Fluffy and Buffy, when they didn’t have any one to love them, or any place to go?—­and they’re only cats and dogs.  Oh, come, I know Aunt Polly’ll take you!  You don’t know how good and kind she is!”

Jimmy Bean’s thin little face brightened.

“Honest Injun?  Would she, now?  I’d work, ye know, an’ I’m real strong!” He bared a small, bony arm.

“Of course she would!  Why, my Aunt Polly is the nicest lady in the world—­now that my mama has gone to be a Heaven angel.  And there’s rooms—­heaps of ’em,” she continued, springing to her feet, and tugging at his arm.  “It’s an awful big house.  Maybe, though,” she added a little anxiously, as they hurried on, “maybe you’ll have to sleep in the attic room.  I did, at first.  But there’s screens there now, so ’twon’t be so hot, and the flies can’t get in, either, to bring in the germ-things on their feet.  Did you know about that?  It’s perfectly lovely!  Maybe she’ll let you read the book if you’re good—­I mean, if you’re bad.  And you’ve got freckles, too,”—­with a critical glance—­“so you’ll be glad there isn’t any looking-glass; and the outdoor picture is nicer than any wall-one could be, so you won’t mind sleeping in that room at all, I’m sure,” panted Pollyanna, finding suddenly that she needed the rest of her breath for purposes other than talking.

“Gorry!” exclaimed Jimmy Bean tersely and uncomprehendingly, but admiringly.  Then he added:  “I shouldn’t think anybody who could talk like that, runnin’, would need ter ask no questions ter fill up time with!”