“But we’ll be quite old by then!” said Jane.
“Maybe,” he replied, with a little shrug. “But at least not as old as I am!”
And with that he kissed Mary Poppins on both cheeks and hustled them out of the room.
The last thing they saw was his jubilant smile as he began to fix a Penny-in-the-Slot to Mrs Clump’s palace. . .
Later, when they came to think about it, Jane and Michael could never remember how they got out of Mr Twigley’s house and into Cherry Tree Lane. It seemed as though at one moment they were on the dusty stairs and the next they were following Mary Poppins through the pearly evening light.
Jane glanced back for one last look at the little house.
“Michael!” she said in a startled whisper. “It’s gone. Everything’s gone!”
He looked round. Yes! Jane was right. The little street and the old-fashioned houses were nowhere to be seen. There was only the shadowy Park before them and the well-known curve of Cherry Tree Lane.
“Well, where have we been all afternoon?” said Michael, staring about him.
But it needed someone wiser than Jane to answer that question truly.
“We must have been somewhere,” she said sensibly.
But that was not enough for Michael. He rushed away to Mary Poppins and pulled at her best blue skirt.
“Mary Poppins, where have we been today? What’s happened to Mr Twigley?”
“How should I know?” snapped Mary Poppins. “I’m not an Encyclopaedia.”
“But he’s gone! And the street’s gone! And I suppose the musical box has gone too – the one he went round on this afternoon!”
Mary Poppins stood still on the kerb and stared.
“A cousin of mine on a musical box? What nonsense you do talk, Michael Banks!”
“But he did!” cried Jane and Michael together. “We all went round on musical boxes. Each of us to our own true music. And yours was ‘Pop Goes the Weasel’.”
Her eyes blazed sternly through the darkness. She seemed to grow larger as she glared.
“Each to our – weasel? Round and round?” Really, she was so angry she could hardly get the words out.
“On top of a musical box, did you say? So, this is what I get for my pains! You spend the afternoon with a well-brought-up, self-respecting pair like my cousin and myself. And all you can do afterwards is to make a mock of us. Round and round with a weasel, indeed! For Two Pins I’d leave you – here, on this spot – and never come back! I warn you!”
“On top of a musical weasel!” she fumed, as she stalked through the gathering dusk.
Snap, snap, went her heels along the pavement. Even her back had an angry look.
Jane and Michael hurried after her. It was no good arguing with Mary Poppins, especially when she looked like that. The best thing to do was to say nothing. And be glad there was nobody in the Lane to offer her Two Pins. In silence they walked along beside her, and thought of the afternoon’s adventure and looked at each other and wondered. . .
* * *
“Oh, Mary Poppins!” said Mrs Banks brightly, as she opened the front door. “I’m sorry, but I don’t need your cousin, after all. I tried the piano again just now. And it’s quite in tune. In fact, better than ever.”
“I’m glad of that, ma’am,” said Mary Poppins, stealing a glance at herself in the mirror. “My cousin will make no charge.”
“Well, I should think not!” cried Mrs Banks indignantly. “Why, he hasn’t even been here.”
“Exactly, ma’am,” said Mary Poppins. She sniffed as she turned towards the stairs.
Jane and Michael exchanged a secret look.
“That must have been the seventh wish!” Michael whispered. And Jane gave an answering nod.
Jug, jug, jug, jug – tereu!
From the Park came a shower of wild sweet music. It had a familiar sound.
“What can that be?” cried Mrs Banks, as she ran to the door to listen. “Good gracious! It’s a Nightingale!”
Down from the branches fell the song, note by note, like plums from a tree. It burnt upon the evening air. It throbbed through the listening dusk.
“How very strange!” said Mrs Banks. “They never sing in the city!”
Behind her back the children nodded and looked at each other wisely.
“It’s Mr Twigley’s,” murmured Jane.
“He’s set it free!” answered Michael softly.
And they knew, as they listened to the burning song that somewhere, somehow, Mr Twigley was true – as true as his little golden bird that was singing now in the Park.
The Nightingale sang once more and was silent.
Mrs Banks sighed and shut the door. “I wish I knew where he came from!” she said dreamily.
But Jane and Michael, who could have told her, were already halfway up the stairs. So they said nothing. There were things that could be explained, they knew, and things that could not be explained.
Besides, there were Currant Buns for Tea and they knew what Mary Poppins would say if they dared to keep her waiting. . .
Chapter Three
THE CAT THAT LOOKED AT A KING
MICHAEL HAD TOOTHACHE. He lay in bed groaning and looking at Mary Poppins out of the corner of his eye to see if she was noticing.
There she sat, in the old armchair, busily winding wool. Jane knelt before her, holding the skein. Up from the garden came the cries of the Twins as they played on the lawn with Ellen and Annabel. It was quiet and peaceful in the Nursery. Mary Poppins’ ball grew larger and larger. The clock made a clucking, satisfied sound like a hen that has laid an egg.
“Why should I have toothache and not Jane?” complained Michael. He pulled the scarf Mary Poppins had lent him more tightly round his cheek.
“Because you ate too many sweets yesterday,” Mary Poppins replied tartly.
“But it was my Birthday!” he protested.
“A Birthday’s no reason for turning yourself into a Dustbin! I don’t have toothache after mine.”
Michael glared at her. Sometimes he wished Mary Poppins was not quite so Perfectly Perfect. But he never dared say so.
“If I die,” he warned her, “you’ll be sorry. You’ll wish you’d been a bit nicer!”
She sniffed contemptuously and went on winding.
Holding his cheek in his two hands he gazed round the Nursery, looking for comfort. Everything there had the familiar look of an old friend. The wallpaper, the rocking-horse, the worn red carpet. His eyes wandered to the mantelpiece.
There lay the Compass and the Royal Doulton Bowl, the jam-jar full of daisies, the stick of his old Kite and Mary Poppins’ Tape Measure. And there too was the present Aunt Flossie had given him yesterday – the little Cat of white china patterned with blue-and-green flowers. It sat there with its paws together and its tail neatly curled about them. The sunlight shone on its china back; its green eyes gazed gravely across the room. Michael gave it a friendly smile. He was fond of Aunt Flossie and he liked the present she had brought him.
Then his tooth gave another dreadful stab.
“Ow!” he shrieked. “It’s digging a hole right into my gum!” He glanced pathetically at Mary Poppins. “And nobody cares!” he added bitterly.