After all, the parcel had come undone.
For a moment longer they saw her prancing up the airy stair, and then a bank of cloud hid her from their eyes. They knew she was behind it, though, because of the brightness that shone about its thick dark edge.
“Well, I’m jiggered!” said the Policeman, staring upwards and scratching his head under its helmet.
“And well you might be!” said Mary Poppins, with such a ferocious snap that anyone else might have thought she was really cross with the Policeman. But Jane and Michael were not taken in by that snap. For they could see in Mary Poppins’ eyes something that, if she were anybody else but Mary Poppins, might have been described as tears. . .
“Could we have imagined it?” said Michael, when they got home and told the story to their Mother.
“Perhaps,” said Mrs Banks. “We imagine strange and lovely things, my darling.”
“But what about Mary Poppins’s gloves?” said Jane.
“We saw her give them away to Maia. And she’s not wearing them now. So it must be true!”
“What, Mary Poppins!” exclaimed Mrs Banks. “Your best fur-topped gloves! You gave them away!”
Mary Poppins sniffed.
“My gloves are my gloves and I do what I like with them!” she said haughtily.
And she straightened her hat and went down to the kitchen to have her tea. . .
IT WAS THE first day of Spring.
Jane and Michael knew this at once, because they heard Mr Banks singing in his bath, and there was only one day in the year when he did that.
They always remembered that particular morning. For one thing, it was the first time they were allowed to come downstairs for breakfast, and for another Mr Banks lost his black bag. So that the day began with two extraordinary happenings.
“Where is my BAG?” shouted Mr Banks, turning round and round in the hall like a dog chasing its tail.
And everybody else began running round and round too – Ellen and Mrs Brill and the children. Even Robertson Ay made a special effort and turned round twice. At last Mr Banks discovered the bag himself in his study, and he rushed into the hall with it, holding it aloft.
“Now,” he said, as though he were delivering a sermon, “my bag is always kept in one place. Here. On the umbrella stand. Who put it in the study?” he roared.
“You did, my dear, when you took the Income Tax papers out of it last night,” said Mrs Banks.
Mr Banks gave her such a hurt look that she wished she had been less tactless and had said she had put it there herself.
“Humph – Urrumph!” he said, blowing his nose very hard and taking his overcoat from its peg. He walked with it to the front door.
“Hullo,” he said more cheerfully, “the Parrot tulips are in bud!” He went into the garden and sniffed the air. “H’m wind’s in the West, I think.” He looked down towards Admiral Boom’s house where the telescope weathercock swung. “I thought so,” he said. “Westerly weather. Bright and balmy. I won’t take an overcoat.”
And with that he picked up his bag and his bowler hat and hurried away to the City.
“Did you hear what he said?” Michael grabbed Jane’s arm.
She nodded. “The wind’s in the West,” she said slowly.
Neither of them said any more, but there was a thought in each of their minds that they wished was not there.
They forgot it soon, however, for everything seemed to be as it always was, and the Spring sunlight lit up the house so beautifully that nobody remembered it needed a coat of paint and new wallpapers. On the contrary, they all found themselves thinking that it was the best house in Cherry Tree Lane.
But trouble began after luncheon.
Jane had gone down to dig in the garden with Robertson Ay. She had just sown a row of radish seed when she heard a great commotion in the Nursery and the sound of hurrying footsteps on the stairs. Presently Michael appeared, very red in the face and panting loudly.
“Look, Jane, look!” he cried, and held out his hand. Within it lay Mary Poppins’ compass, with the disc frantically swinging round the arrow as it trembled in Michael’s shaking hand.
“The compass?” said Jane, and looked at him questioningly.
Michael suddenly burst into tears.
“She gave it to me,” he wept. “She said I could have it all for myself now. Oh, oh, there must be something wrong! What is going to happen? She has never given me anything before.”
“Perhaps she was only being nice,” said Jane to soothe him, but in her heart she felt as disturbed as Michael was. She knew very well that Mary Poppins never wasted time in being nice.
And yet, strange to say, during that afternoon Mary Poppins never said a cross word. Indeed, she hardly said a word at all. She seemed to be thinking very deeply, and when they asked questions she answered them in a far-away voice. At last Michael could bear it no longer.
“Oh, do be cross, Mary Poppins! Do be cross again! It is not like you. Oh, I feel so anxious.” And indeed, his heart felt heavy with the thought that something, he did not quite know what, was about to happen at Number Seventeen, Cherry Tree Lane.
“Trouble trouble and it will trouble you!” retorted Mary Poppins crossly, in her usual voice.
And immediately he felt a little better.
“Perhaps it’s only a feeling,” he said to Jane. “Perhaps everything is all right and I’m just imagining – don’t you think so, Jane?”
“Probably,” said Jane slowly. But she was thinking hard and her heart felt tight in her body.
The wind grew wilder towards evening, and blew in little gusts about the house. It went pulling and whistling down the chimneys, slipping through the cracks under the windows, turning the Nursery carpet up at the corners.
Mary Poppins gave them their supper and cleared away the things, stacking them neatly and methodically. Then she tidied up the Nursery and put the kettle on the hob.
“There!” she said, glancing round the room to see that everything was all right. She was silent for a minute. Then she put one hand lightly on Michael’s head and the other on Jane’s shoulder.
“Now,” she said, “I am just going to take the shoes down for Robertson Ay to clean. Behave yourselves, please, till I come back.” She went out and shut the door quietly behind her.
Suddenly, as she went, they both felt they must run after her, but something seemed to stop them. They remained quiet, with their elbows on the table waiting for her to come back. Each was trying to reassure the other without saying anything.
“How silly we are,” said Jane presently. “Everything’s all right.” But she knew she said it more to comfort Michael than because she thought it was true.
The Nursery clock ticked loudly from the mantelpiece. The fire flickered and crackled and slowly died down. They still sat there at the table, waiting.
At last Michael said uneasily: “She’s been gone a very long