Mary Poppins Comes Back

by P. L. Travers

  “Thank you,” she said, as the Grocer handed her the change.

  “Thank you!” he remarked politely, leaning his arms on the counter. He smiled at her in a manner that was meant to be pleasant, and continued, “Keeps nice and fine, doesn’t it?” He spoke proudly, as though he, himself, had complete charge of the weather and had made it fine for her on purpose.

  “We want rain!” said Mary Poppins, snapping her mouth and her handbag at the same time.

  “That’s right,” said the Grocer hurriedly, trying not to offend her. “Rain’s always pleasant.”

  “Never!” retorted Mary Poppins, tossing Annabel into a more comfortable position on her arm.

  The Grocer’s face fell. Nothing he said was right.

  “I hope,” he remarked, opening the door courteously for Mary Poppins, “that we shall be favoured with your further custom, Madam.”

  “Good day!” Mary Poppins swept out.

  The Grocer sighed.

  “Here,” he said, scrabbling hurriedly in a box near the door. “Take these. I meant no harm, truly I didn’t. I only wanted to oblige.”

  Jane and Michael held out their hands. The Grocer slipped three Chocolate-drops into Michael’s hand and two in Jane’s.

  “One for each of you, one for the two little ones, and one for–” he nodded towards Mary Poppins’ retreating figure – “her!”

  They thanked the Grocer and hurried after Mary Poppins, munching their Chocolate-drops.

  “What’s that you’re eating?” she demanded, looking at the dark rim round Michael’s mouth.

  “Chocolates. The Grocer gave us one each. And one for you.” He held out the last Drop. It was very sticky.

  “Like his impudence!” said Mary Poppins, but she took the Chocolate-drop and ate it in two bites as though she thoroughly enjoyed it.

  “Is there much change left?” enquired Michael anxiously.

  “That’s as may be.”

  She swept into the Chemist’s and came out with a cake of soap, a mustard plaster and a tube of toothpaste.

  Jane and Michael, waiting with the Twins at the door, sighed heavily.

  The Pound Note, they knew, was disappearing fast.

  “She’ll hardly have enough left over for a stamp, and, even if she has, that won’t be very interesting,” said Jane.

  “Now to the Cake shop!” said Mary Poppins, examining her list and darting in at a dark door. Through the window they could see her pointing to a pile of Macaroons. The assistant handed her a large bag.

  “She’s bought a dozen at least,” said Jane sadly. Usually, the sight of anybody buying a Macaroon filled them with delight, but today they wished and wished that there wasn’t a Macaroon in the world.

  “Now where?” demanded Michael, hopping from one leg to the other in his anxiety to know if there was any of the Pound Note left. He felt sure there couldn’t be, and yet – he hoped.

  “Home,” said Mary Poppins.

  Their faces fell. There was no change, after all, not even a penny, or Mary Poppins would surely have spent it. But Mary Poppins, as she dumped the bag of Macaroons on Annabel’s chest and strode ahead, had such a look on her face that they did not dare to make any remark. They only knew that, for once, she had disappointed them and they felt they could not forgive her.

  “But – this isn’t the way home!” complained Michael, dragging his feet so that his toes scraped along the pavement.

  “Isn’t the Park on the way home, I’d like to know?” she demanded, turning fiercely upon him.

  “Yes – but—”

  “There are more ways than one of going through a Park,” she remarked, and led them round to a side of it they had never seen before.

  The sun shone warmly down. The tall trees bowed over the railings and rustled their leaves. Up in the branches two sparrows were fighting over a piece of straw. A fat squirrel hopped along the stone balustrade and sat up on his hindquarters, asking for nuts.

  But today these things did not matter. Jane and Michael were not interested. All they could think of was the fact that Mary Poppins had spent the whole Pound Note on unimportant things and had kept nothing over.

  Tired and disappointed, they trailed after her towards the Gates.

  Over the entrance, a new one they had never seen before, spread a tall stone arch, splendidly carved with a Lion and a Unicorn. And beneath the arch sat an old, old woman, her face as grey as the stone itself, and as withered and wrinkled as a walnut. On her little old knees she held a tray piled up with what looked like small coloured strips of rubber; and above her head, tied firmly to the Park railings, a cluster of bright balloons bobbed and bounced and bounded.

  “Balloons! Balloons!” shouted Jane. And, loosening her hand from John’s sticky fingers, she ran towards the old woman. Michael bounded after her, leaving Barbara alone and lost in the middle of the pavement.

  “Well, my deary-ducks!” said the Balloon Woman, in an old, cracked voice. “Which will you have? Take your choice! And take your time!” She leant forward and shook her tray in front of them.

  “We only came to look,” Jane explained. “We’ve got no money.”

  “Tch, tch, tch! What’s the good of looking at a balloon? You’ve got to feel a balloon, you’ve got to hold a balloon, you’ve got to know a balloon. Coming to look! What good will that do you?”

  The old woman’s voice crackled like a little flame. She rocked herself on her stool.

  Jane and Michael stared at her helplessly. They knew she was speaking the truth. But what could they do?

  “When I was a girl,” the old woman went on, “people really understood balloons. They didn’t just come and look! They took – yes, they took! There wasn’t a child that went through these gates without one. They wouldn’t have insulted the Balloon Woman in those days by just looking and passing by!”

  She bent her head back and gazed up at the bouncing balloons above her.

  “Ah, my loves and doves!” she cried. “They don’t understand you any more – nobody but the old woman understands. You’re old-fashioned now. Nobody wants you!”

  “We do want one!” said Michael stoutly. “But we haven’t any money. She spent the whole Pound Note on—”

  “And who is ‘she’?” enquired a voice close behind him.

  He turned, and his face went pink.

  “I meant – er – that you – er—” he began nervously.

  “Speak politely of your betters!” remarked Mary Poppins, and, stretching her arm over his shoulder, she put half-a-crown on the Balloon Woman’s tray.

  Michael stared at it, shining there among the limp unblown balloons.

  “Then there was some change left over!” said Jane, wishing she had not thought so crossly of Mary Poppins.

  The Balloon Woman, her old eyes sparkling, picked up the coin and gazed at it for a long moment.

  “Shiny, shiny, King-and-Crown!” she cried. “I haven’t seen one of these since I was a girl.” She cocked her head at Mary Poppins. “Do you want a balloon, my lass?”

  “If you please!” said Mary Poppins, with haughty politeness.

  “How many, my deary-duck, how many?”

  “Four!”

  Jane and Michael, almost jumping out of their skins, turned and flung their arms round Mary Poppins.

  “Oh, Mary Poppins, do you mean it? One each? Really? – Really?”

  “I hope I always say what I mean,” she said primly, looking very conceited.

  They sprang towards the tray and began to turn over the coloured balloon-cases.

  The Balloon Woman slipped the silver coin into a pocket of her skirt. “There, my shiny!” she said, giving the pocket a loving pat. Then, with excited, trembling hands, she helped the children turn over the cases.

  “Go carefully, my Deary-Ducks!” she warned them. “Remember, there’s balloons and balloons. Take your choice and take your time. There’s many a child got the wrong balloon and his life was never the same after.”

>   “I’ll have this one!” said Michael, choosing a yellow one with red markings.

  “Well, let me blow it up and you can see if it’s the right one,” said the Balloon Woman.

  She took it from him and with one gigantic puff blew it up. Zip! There it was. You could hardly think such a tiny person could have so much breath in her body. The yellow balloon, neatly marked with red, bobbed at the end of its string.

  “But, I say!” said Michael, staring. “It’s got my name on it!”

  And, sure enough, the red markings on the balloon were letters spelling out the two words – “Michael Banks”.

  “Aha!” cackled the Balloon Woman. “What did I tell you? You took your time and the choice was right!”

  “See if mine is!” said Jane, handing the Balloon Woman a limp blue balloon.

  She puffed and blew it up, and there appeared across the fat blue globe the words “Jane Caroline Banks” in large white letters.

  “Is that your name, my deary-duck?” said the Balloon Woman.

  Jane nodded.

  The Balloon Woman laughed to herself, a thin, old cackling laugh, as Jane took the balloon from her and bounced it on the air.

  “Me! Me!” cried John and Barbara, plunging fat hands among the balloon-cases. John drew out a pink one and, as she blew it up, the Balloon Woman smiled. There, round the balloon, the words could clearly be seen. “John and Barbara Banks – one between them because they are twins.”

  “But,” said Jane, “I don’t understand. How did you know? You never saw us before.”

  “Ah, my deary-duck, didn’t I tell you there was balloons and balloons and that these were extra-special?”

  “But did you put the names on them?” said Michael.

  “I?” the old woman chuckled. “Nary I!”

  “Then who did?”

  “Ask me another, my deary-duck! All I know is that the names are there! And there’s a balloon for every single person in the world if only they choose properly.”

  “One for Mary Poppins too?”

  The Balloon Woman cocked her head and looked at Mary Poppins with a curious smile.

  “Let her try!” She rocked herself on her little stool. “Take your choice and take your time! Choose and see!”

  Mary Poppins sniffed importantly. Her hand hovered for a moment over the empty balloons and then pounced on a red one. She held it out at arm’s length and, to their astonishment, the children saw it slowly filling with air of its own accord. Larger and larger it grew till it became the size of Michael’s. But still it swelled until it was three times as large as any other balloon. And across it appeared in letters of gold the two words “Mary Poppins”.

  The red balloon bounced through the air; the old woman tied a string to it, and, with a little cackling laugh, handed it back to Mary Poppins.

  Up into the dancing air danced the four balloons. They tugged at their strings as though they wanted to be free of their moorings. Then the wind caught them and flung them backwards and forwards, to the North, to the South, to the East, to the West.

  “Balloons and balloons, my deary-ducks! One for everybody if only they knew it!” cried the Balloon Woman happily.

  At that moment an elderly gentleman in a top-hat, turning in at the Park Gates, looked across and saw the balloons. The children saw him give a little start. Then he hurried up to the Balloon Woman.

  “How much?” he said, jingling his money in his pocket.

  “Sevenpence-halfpenny. Take your choice and take your time!”

  He took a brown one and the Balloon Woman blew it up. The words “The Honourable William Wetherall Wilkins” appeared on it in green letters.

  “Good gracious!” said the elderly gentleman. “Good gracious, that’s my name!”

  “You chose well, my deary-duck. Balloons and balloons!” said the old woman.

  The elderly gentleman stared at his balloon as it tugged at its string.

  “Extraordinary!” he said, and blew his nose with a trumpeting sound. “Forty years ago, when I was a boy, I tried to buy a balloon here. But they wouldn’t let me. Said they couldn’t afford it. Forty years – and it’s been waiting for me all this time. Most extraordinary!’

  And he hurried away, bumping into the Arch because his eyes were fixed on the balloon. The children saw him giving little excited leaps in the air as he went.

  “Look at him!” cried Michael, as the Elderly Gentleman bobbed higher and higher. But at that moment his own balloon began pulling at the string and he felt himself lifted off his feet.

  “Hello, hello! How funny! Mine’s doing it too!”

  “Balloons and balloons, my deary-duck!” said the Balloon Woman, and broke into her cackling laugh as the Twins, both holding their balloon by its single string, bounced off the ground.

  “I’m going, I’m going!” shrieked Jane as she, too, was borne upwards.

  “Home, please!” said Mary Poppins.

  Immediately, the red balloon soared up, dragging Mary Poppins after. Up and down she bounced, with Annabel and the parcels in her arms. Through the Gates and above the path the red balloon bore Mary Poppins, her hat very straight, her hair very tidy, and her feet as trimly walking the air as they usually walked the earth. Jane and Michael and the Twins, tugged jerkily up and down by their balloons, followed her.

  “Oh, oh, oh!” cried Jane, as she was whirled past the branch of an elm tree. “What a delicious feeling!”

  “I feel as if I were made of air!” said Michael, knocking into a Park seat and bouncing off it again. “What a lovely way to go home!”

  “O-o-h! E-e-e-h!” squeaked the Twins, tossing and bobbing together.

  “Follow me, please, and don’t dawdle!” said Mary Poppins, looking fiercely over her shoulder, for all the world as if they were walking sedately on the ground instead of being tugged through the air.

  Past the Park Keeper’s house they went and down the Lime Walk. The Elderly Gentleman was there, bouncing along ahead of them.

  Michael turned for a moment and looked behind him.

  “Look, Jane, look! Everybody’s got one!”

  She turned. In the distance a group of people, all carrying balloons, were being jerked up and down in the air.

  “The Ice Cream Man has bought one!” she cried, staring and just missing a statue.

  “Yes, and the Sweep! And there – do you see? – is Miss Lark!”

  Across the lawn a familiar figure came bouncing, hatted and gloved, and holding a balloon bearing the name “Lucinda Emily Lark”. She bobbed across the Elm Walk, looking very pleased and dignified, and disappeared round the edge of a fountain.

  By this time the Park was filling with people and every one of them had a balloon with a name on it, and everyone was bouncing in the air.

  “Heave ho, there! Room for the Admiral! Where’s my port? Heave ho!” shouted a huge, nautical voice, as Admiral and Mrs Boom went rolling through the air. They held the string of a large white balloon with their name on it in blue letters.

  “Masts and mizzens! Cockles and shrimps! Haul away, my hearties!” roared Admiral Boom, carefully avoiding a large oak tree.

  The crowd of balloons and people grew thicker. There was hardly a patch of air in the park that was not rainbowy with balloons. Jane and Michael could see Mary Poppins threading her way primly among them and they, too, hurried as fast as they could through the throng, with John and Barbara bobbing at their heels.

  “Oh, dear! Oh, dear! My balloon won’t bounce me. I must have chosen the wrong one!” said a voice at Jane’s elbow.

  An old-fashioned lady with a quill in her hat and a feather boa round her neck was standing on the path just below Jane. At her feet lay a purple balloon across which was written in letters of gold, “The Prime Minister”.

  “What shall I do?” she cried. “The old woman at the Gates said ‘Take your choice and take your time, my deary-duck!’And I did. But I’ve got the wrong one. I’m not the Prime Minister!”

  �
�Excuse me, but I am!” said a voice at her side, as a tall man, very elegantly dressed and carrying a rolled umbrella, stepped up to her.

  The lady turned. “Oh, then this is your balloon! Let me see if you’ve got mine!”

  The Prime Minister, whose balloon was not bouncing him at all, showed it to her. Its name was “Lady Muriel Brighton-Jones”.

  “Yes, you have! We’ve got mixed!” she cried, and handing the Prime Minister his balloon, she seized her own. Presently they were off the ground, and flying among the trees, talking as they went.

  “Are you married?” Jane and Michael heard Lady Muriel ask.

  And the Prime Minister answered, “No. I can’t find the right sort of middle-aged lady – not too young and not too old and rather jolly, because I’m so serious myself.”

  “Would I do?” said Lady Muriel Brighton-Jones. “I can enjoy myself quite a lot.”

  “Yes, I think you’d do very nicely,” said the Prime Minister and, hand in hand, they joined the tossing throng.

  By this time the Park was really rather crowded. Jane and Michael, bobbing across the lawns after Mary Poppins, constantly bumped into other bouncing figures who had bought balloons from the Balloon Woman. A tall man, wearing a long moustache, a blue suit and a helmet, was being tugged through the air by a balloon marked “Police Inspector”, and another, bearing the words “Lord Mayor”, dragged along a round, fat person in a three-cornered hat, a red overall and a large, brass necklace.

  “Move on, please! Don’t crowd the Park. Observe the Regulations! All Litter to be deposited in the Rubbish Baskets!”

  The Park Keeper, roaring and ranting, and holding a small, cherry-coloured balloon marked “F. Smith”, threaded his way through the crowd. With a wave of his hand he moved on two dogs – a bull-dog, with the word “Cu” written on his balloon, and a fox-terrier whose name appeared to be “Albertine”.

  “Leave my dogs alone! Or I shall take your number and report you!” cried a lady whose balloon said she was “The Duchess of Mayfield”.

  But the Park Keeper took no notice and went bobbing by, crying “All Dogs on a Lead! Don’t crowd the Park! No smoking! Observe the Regulations!” till his voice was hoarse.