But the Boy did not hear the puddocky challenge. He was leaning back against the bridge, watching the Tramp on his broad wings flying into the sunset. Not with surprise—perhaps he was not yet old enough to be surprised at things—but his eyes had a look of lively interest.
He watched and watched till the sky grew dusky and the first stars twinkled out. And when the little flying speck was no longer even a speck, he drew a long, contented sigh and turned again to the earth.
That he was Corambo, he did not doubt. He had never doubted it. But now he knew he was other things, as well as a one-eyed pirate. And far above all—he rejoiced at it—he was just a bare-foot boy. And, moreover, a boy who was feeling peckish and ready for his supper.
"Come on!" he called to the Toy Monkey. He tucked it comfortably under his arm, with its tail around his wrist. And the two of them kept each other warm as they wandered home together.
The long day fell away behind him to join his other days. All he could think of now was the night. He could sense already the warmth of the kitchen, the sizzling pancakes on the stove and his mother bending above them. Her face, framed in its ring of curls, would be ruddy and weary—like the sun. For, indeed, as he had many times told her, the sun has a mother's face.
And presently, there he was on the doorstep and there was she as he had pictured her. He leaned against her checked apron and broke off a piece of pancake.
"Well, what have you been doing?" she smiled.
"Nothing," he murmured contentedly.
For he knew—and perhaps she knew it too—that nothing is a useful word. It can mean exactly what you like—anything—everything....
***
The end of the story died away.
Mary Poppins sat still and silent.
Around her lay the motionless children, making never a sound. Her gaze, coming back from the far horizon, flickered across their quiet faces and over the head of the Park Keeper, as it nodded dreamily.
"Humph!" she remarked, with a haughty sniff. "I recount a chapter of history and you all fall fast asleep!"
"I'm not asleep," Jane reassured her. "I'm thinking about the story."
"I heard every word," said Michael, yawning.
The Park Keeper rocked, as if in a trance. "A Nexplorer in disguise," he murmured, "sittin' in the midnight sun and climbin' the North Pole!"
"Ouch!" cried Michael, starting up. "I felt a drop on my nose!"
"And I felt one on my chin," said Jane.
They rubbed their eyes and looked about them. The syrupy sun had disappeared and a cloud was creeping over the Park. Plop! Plop! Patter, patter! The big drops drummed on the leaves.
The Park Keeper opened his eyes and stared.
"It's rainin'!" he cried in astonishment. "And me with no umbrella!"
He glanced at the dangling shape on the bough and darted towards the parrot.
"Oh, no, you don't!" said Mary Poppins. Quick as a needle, she grasped the handle.
"I've a long way to go and me chest is bad and I oughtn't to wet me feet!" The Park Keeper gave her a pleading glance.
"Then you'd better not go to the North Pole!" She snapped the parrot umbrella open and gathered up Annabel. "The Equator—that's the place for you!" She turned away with a snort of contempt.
"Wake up, John and Barbara, please! Jane and Michael, take the rug and wrap it round yourselves and the Twins."
Raindrops bigger than sugar-plums were tumbling all about them. They drummed and thumped on the children's heads as they wrapped themselves in the rug.
"We're a parcel!" cried Michael excitedly. "Tie us up with string, Mary Poppins, and send us through the post!"
"Run!" she commanded, taking no notice. And away they hurried, stumbling and tumbling, over the rainy grass.
The dogs came barking along beside them and, forgetting their promise to Mary Poppins, shook themselves over her skirt.
"All that sun and all this rain! One after another! Who'd 'ave thought it?"
The Park Keeper shook his head in bewilderment. He could still hardly believe it.
"An explorer would!" snapped Mary Poppins. She gave her head a satisfied toss. "And so would I—so there!"
"Too big for your boots—that's what you are!" The Park Keeper's words were worse than they sounded. For he whispered them into his coat-collar in case she should overhear. But, even so, perhaps she guessed them, for she flung at him a smile of conceit and triumph as she hurried after the children.
Off she tripped through the streaming Park, picking her way among the puddles. Neat and trim as a fashion-plate she crossed Cherry Tree Lane and flitted up the garden path of Number Seventeen....
Jane emerged from the plaid bundle and patted her soaking hair.
"Oh, bother!" she said. "I've lost my feather."
"That settles it, then," said Michael calmly. "You can't be Minnehaha!"
He unwound himself and felt in his pocket. "Ah, here's my ant! I've got him safely!"
"Oh, I don't mean Minnehaha, really—but somebody," persisted Jane, "somebody else inside me. I know. I always have the feeling."
The black ant hurried across the table.
"I don't," Michael said, as he gazed at it. "I don't feel anything inside me but my dinner and Michael Banks."
But jane was thinking her own thoughts.
"And Mary Poppins," she went on. "She's somebody in disguise, too. Everybody is."
"Oh, no, she's not!" said Michael stoutly. "I'm absolutely certain!"
A light step sounded on the landing.
"Who's not what?" enquired a voice.
"You, Mary Poppins!" Michael cried. "Jane says you're somebody in disguise. And I say you aren't. You're nobody!"
Her head went up with a quick jerk and her eyes had a hint of danger.
"I hope," she said, with awful calmness, "that I did not hear what I think I heard. Did you say I was nobody, Michael?"
"Yes! I mean—no!" He tried again. "I really meant to say, Mary Poppins, that you're not really anybody!"
"Oh, indeed?" Her eyes were now as black as a boot-button. "If I'm not anybody, Michael, who am I—I'd like to know!"
"Oh, dear!" he wailed. "I'm all muddled. You're not somebody, Mary Poppins—that's what I'm trying to say."
Not somebody in her tulip hat! Not somebody in her fine blue skirt! Her reflection gazed at her from the mirror, assuring her that she and it were an elegant pair of somebodies.
"Well!" She drew a deep breath and seemed to grow taller as she spoke. "You have often insulted me, Michael Banks. But I never thought I would see the day when you'd tell me I wasn't somebody. What am I, then, a painted portrait?"
She took a step towards him.
"I m-m-mean——" he stammered, clutching at Jane. Her hand was warm and reassuring and the words he was looking for leapt to his lips.
"I don't mean somebody, Mary Poppins! I mean not somebody else! You're Mary Poppins through and through! Inside and outside. And round about. All of you is Mary Poppins. That is how I like you!"
"Humph!" she said, disbelievingly. But the fierceness faded away from her face.
With a laugh of relief he sprang towards her, embracing her wet blue skirt.
"Don't grab me like that, Michael Banks. I am not a Dutch Doll, thank you!"
"You are!" he shouted. "No, you're not! You only look like one. Oh, Mary Poppins, tell me truly! You aren't anybody in disguise? I want you just as you are!"
A faint, pleased smile puckered her mouth. Her head gave a prideful toss.
"Me! Disguised! Certainly not!"
With a loud sniff at the mere idea, she disengaged his hands.
"But, Mary Poppins——" Jane persisted. "Supposing you weren't Mary Poppins, who would you choose to be?"
The blue eyes under the tulip hat turned to her in surprise.
There was only one answer to such a question.
"Mary Poppins!" she said.
CHAPTER TWO
The Faithful Friends
Faster, please!"
said Mary Poppins, tapping on the glass panel with the beak of her parrot-headed umbrella.
Jane and Michael had spent the morning at the Barber's shop, and the Dentist's, and because it was late, as a great treat, they were taking a taxi home.
The Taxi Man stared straight before him and gave his head a shake.
"If I go any faster," he shouted, "it'll make me late for me dinner."
"Why?" demanded Jane, through the window. It seemed such a silly thing to say. Surely, the quicker a Taxi Man drove the earlier he would arrive!
"Why?" echoed the Taxi Man, keeping his eye on the wheel. "A Naccident—that's why! If I go any faster, I'll run into something—and that'll be a Naccident. And a Naccident—it's plain enough!—will make me late for me dinner. Oh, dear!" he exclaimed, as he put on the brake. "Red again, I see!"
He turned and put his head through the window. His bulgy eyes and drooping whiskers made him look like a seal.
"There's always trouble at these 'ere signals!" He waved his hand at the stream of cars all waiting for the lights to change.
And now it was Michael who asked him why.
"Don't you know nothing?" the Taxi Man cried. "It's because of the chap on duty!"
He pointed to the signal-box, where a helmeted figure, with his head on his hand, was gazing into the distance.
"Absent-minded—that's what 'e is. Always staring and moping. And 'alf the time 'e forgets the lights. I've known them stay red for a whole morning. If it's goin' to be like that today I'll never get me dinner. You 'aven't got a sangwidge on you?" He looked at Michael, hopefully. "No? Nor yet a chocolate drop?" Jane smiled and shook her head.
The Taxi Man sighed despondently.
"Nobody thinks of nobody these days."
"I'm thinking of someone!" said Mary Poppins. And she looked so stern and disapproving that he turned away in dismay.
"They're green!" he cried, as he looked at the lights. And, huddling nervously over the wheel, he drove along Park Avenue as though pursued by wolves.
Bump! Bump! Rattle! Rattle! The three of them jolted and bounced on their seats.
"Sit up straight!" said Mary Poppins, sliding into a corner. "You are not a couple of Jack-in-the-boxes!"
"I know I'm not," said Michael, gasping. "But I feel like one and my bones are shaking——" He gulped quickly and bit his tongue and left the sentence unfinished. For the taxi had stopped with a frightful jerk and flung them all to the floor.
"Mary Poppins," said Jane in a muffled voice, "I think you're sitting on me!"
"My foot! My foot! It's caught in something!"
"I'll thank you, Michael," said Mary Poppins, "to take it out of my hat!"
She rose majestically from the floor, and seizing her parrot-headed umbrella sprang out on to the pavement.
"Well, you said to go faster," the Taxi Man muttered, as she thrust the fare into his hand. She glared at him in offended silence. And in order to escape that look he shrank himself down inside his collar so that nothing was left but his whiskers.
"Don't bother about a tip," he begged. "It's really been a p-p-pleasure."
"I had no intention of bothering!" She opened the gate of Number Seventeen with an angry flick of her hand.
The Taxi Man started up his engine and jerked away down the Lane. "She's upset me, that's what she's done!" he murmured. "If I do get home in time for me dinner I shan't be able to eat it!"
Mary Poppins tripped up the path, followed by Jane and Michael.
Mrs. Banks stood in the front hall, looking up at the stairs.
"Oh, do be careful, Robertson Ay!" she was saying anxiously. He was carrying a cardboard box and lurching slowly from stair to stair as though he were almost asleep.
"Never a moment's peace!" he muttered. "First it's one thing, then another. There!" He gave a sleepy heave, thrust the package into the nursery and fell in a snoring heap on the landing.
Jane dashed upstairs to look at the label.
"What's in it—a present?" shouted Michael.
The Twins, bursting with curiosity, were jumping up and down. And Annabel peered through her cot railings and banged her rattle loudly.
"Is this a nursery or a bear-pit?" Mary Poppins stepped over Robertson Ay as she hurried into the room.
"A bear-pit!" Michael longed to answer. But he caught her eye and refrained.
"Really!" Mrs. Banks protested, as she stumbled over Robertson Ay. "He chooses such inconvenient places! Oh, gently, children! Do be careful! That box belongs to Miss Andrew!"
Miss Andrew! Their faces fell.
"Then it isn't presents!" said Michael blankly. He gave the box a push.
"It's probably full of medicine bottles!" said Jane, in a bitter voice.
"It's not," insisted Mrs. Banks. "Miss Andrew has sent us all her treasures. And I thought, Mary Poppins"—she glanced at the stiff white shape beside her—"I thought, perhaps, you could keep them here!" She nodded towards the mantelpiece.
Mary Poppins regarded her in silence. If a pin had fallen you could have heard it.
"Am I an octopus?" she enquired, finding her voice at last.
"An octopus?" cried Mrs. Banks. Had she ever suggested such a thing? "Of course you're not, Mary Poppins."
"Exactly!" Mary Poppins retorted. "I have only one pair of hands."
Mrs. Banks nodded uneasily. She had never expected her to have more.
"And that one pair has enough to do without dusting anyone's treasures."
"But Mary Poppins, I never dreamed——" Mrs. Banks was getting more and more flustered. "Ellen is here to do the dusting. And it's only until Miss Andrew comes back—if, of course, she ever does. She behaved so strangely when she was here. Why are you giggling, Jane?"
But Jane only snickered and shook her head. She remembered that strange behaviour!
"Where has she gone to?" Michael asked.
"She seems to have had some sort of a shock—what are you laughing at, children?—and the doctor has ordered a long voyage, away to the South Seas. She says——" Mrs. Banks fished into her pocket and brought out a crumpled letter. "And while I am away," she read out,
"I shall leave my valuables with you. Be sure they are put in a safe place where nothing can happen to them. I shall expect, on my return, to find everything exactly as it is—nothing broken, nothing mended. Tell George to wear his overcoat. This weather is changeable."
"So you see, Mary Poppins," said Mrs. Banks, looking up with a flattering smile, "the nursery does seem the best place. Anything left in your charge is always perfectly safe!"
"There's safety and safety!" sniffed Mary Poppins. "And I hope I see further than my nose!" It was tilted upwards, as she spoke, even more than usual.
"Oh, I am sure you do!" murmured Mrs. Banks, wondering, for the hundredth time, why Mary Poppins—no matter what the situation—was always so pleased with herself.
"Well, now I think I must go and——" But without saying what she was going to do, she ran out of the nursery, jumped over Robertson Ay's legs and bustled away down the stairs.
"Allow me, Michael, if you please!" Mary Poppins seized his wrist, as he pulled the lid off the box. "Remember what curiosity did—it killed the cat, you know!"
Her quick hands darted among the papers, and briskly unwrapped a little bundle. Out came a bird with a chipped nose and a Chelsea china lamb.
"Funny sort of treasures," said Michael. "I could mend this bird with a piece of putty. But I mustn't—so Miss Andrew said. They're to stay exactly as they are."
"Nothing does that," said Mary Poppins, with a priggish look on her face.
"You do!" he insisted, gallantly.
She sniffed, and glanced at the nursery mirror. Her reflection gave a similar sort of sniff and glanced at Mary Poppins. Each of them, it was easy to see, highly approved of the other.
"I wonder why she kept this?" Jane took an old cracked tile from the box. The picture showed a boatload of people rowing towards an island.
"To remind
her of her youth," said Michael.
"To give more trouble," snapped Mary Poppins, shaking the dust from another wrapping.
Back and forth the children ran, collecting and setting up the treasures—a cottage in a snowstorm, with Home Sweet Home on the glass globe; a pottery hen on a yellow nest; a red-and-white china clown; a winged horse of celluloid, prancing on its hind legs; a flower vase in the shape of a swan; a little red fox of carved wood; an egg-shaped piece of polished granite; a painted apple with a boy and a girl playing together inside it; and a roughly made, full-rigged ship in a jam-jar.
"I hope that's all," grumbled Michael. "The mantelpiece is crowded."
"Only one more," said Mary Poppins, as she drew out a knobbly bundle. A couple of china ornaments came forth from the paper wrapper. Her eyebrows went up as she looked at them and she gave a little shrug. Then she handed one each to Jane and Michael.
Weary of running back and forth, they set the ornaments hurriedly at either end of the mantelpiece. Then Jane looked at hers and blinked her eyes.
A china lion, with his paw on the chest of a china huntsman, was reclining beneath a banana tree which, of course, was also china. The man and the animal leaned together, smiling blissfully. Never, thought Jane, in all her life, had she seen two happier creatures.
"He reminds me of somebody!" she exclaimed, as she gazed at the smiling huntsman. Such a manly figure he looked, too, in his spruce blue jacket and black top-boots.
"Yes," agreed Michael. "Who can it be?"
He frowned as he tried to recall the name. Then he looked at his half of the china pair and gave a cry of dismay.
"Oh! Jane! What a pity! My lion has lost his huntsman!"
It was true. There stood another banana tree, there sat another painted lion. But in the other huntsman's place there was only a gap of roughened china. All that remained of his manly shape was one black shiny boot.
"Poor lion!" said Michael. "He looks so sad!"
And, indeed, there was no denying it. Jane's lion was wreathed in smiles, but his brother had such a dejected look that he seemed to be almost in tears.