Mary Jane's City Home

by Clara Ingram Judson

Mary Jane found that she liked school every bit as much as she had thought she would. She liked her teacher, a charming Miss Treavor, and she liked her studies. But most of all she liked the fun she had on the playground. In the big cities, like Chicago, where lots of girls and boys have no yards, the school yards are the only places were children can play. So, to make everything safe and orderly, the school folks have a playground teacher stay at school all the day, to help in the games and to see that every one has a happy time. The playground teacher at Mary Jane’s school liked little girls very much and she knew many good games for them to play. So in addition to “London Bridge” and “Drop the Handkerchief” and “Tag” that all children play, Mary Jane learned “Roman Soldiers” and “Ghost Walk” and “Three times Three.”

Of the new ones, Mary Jane liked “Ghost Walk” the best. To play it, the girls and boys made a big circle, then they selected some one to be “Ghost.” This person stood in the middle of the circle and everybody shut eyes tight, very tight. Then the Ghost, while every one kept very quiet, tried to tip-toe to the edge of the circle, slip out between two folks and get away without being caught. That may sound easy, but played in a yard full of romping boys and girls, it is not really as easy as it might seem and it was lots of fun, because often folks would think the “Ghost” was near them and would try to grab—and the joke was on them because all the while, maybe, the “ghost” was in another part of the ring. And whenever folks thought they caught the “Ghost” and didn’t, then every one opened their eyes, the person who had made the mistake had to get out of the circle and the game began again. But if the “Ghost” really did get out of the circle without being caught, then the “Ghost” could hide anywhere in the yard and the game became an old-fashioned hide-and-seek with everybody hunting one lucky person.

One day, when Mary Jane was “Ghost,” she was determined she would get out of that circle without getting caught. She had tried it many a time before and failed; this time she was going to do it. She tiptoed, oh, so softly over the loose gravel to the edge of the circle. Then noiselessly she dropped down on hands and knees and, without a thought for her dress, crawled slowly between Ann and the girl next to her. She could hardly keep from giggling, it was so funny to be so close she almost bumped them and yet not to be discovered. Now she was right between them, now she was almost outside—now she was free and away she dashed to the spot she had long ago picked out as a hiding place for just such a time as this.

The folks in the circle waited—but nobody was caught, so they shouted, “Ghost Walk?” and when the “ghost” didn’t answer they opened their eyes and—no Mary Jane was there!

“I’ll get her,” shouted Ann, “I’ll find her! I’ll bet she got out on your side of the circle, Janny, she never could have passed me!”

“I’ll find her myself,” answered Janny, “but she never passed by me, she didn’t!”

So they hunted, up and down the yard, around the bushes, by the doorway, everywhere they could think of. But no sign of Mary Jane did they discover. They hunted and they hunted till the gong sounded and they had to go into school again. But not a sign of any Mary Jane did they find. Was Mary Jane lost? Miss Treavor must be told so everybody could hunt, for something surely must have happened to a little girl who didn’t answer the recess bell when it rang for school to begin.

Now it happened that some days before, when Mary Jane had first learned to play “Ghost walk” she hunted around the yard for a good place to hide—in case she ever succeeded in getting out of the circle so she could hide. She didn’t want to hide among the bushes because that was the first place the children looked; she didn’t want to hide in the doorway because that was against rules and if a child was discovered there by a teacher, the child had to go straight upstairs and stay the rest of recess. And there didn’t seem to be any other place. But there was another hiding place—and Mary Jane found it. Around the corner of the building, on the side nearest the furnace entrance, there was a jog in the brick wall. And in front of the little niche made by this jog, boards left by some carpenters had been carelessly tossed.

“I could climb over the boards,” Mary Jane had thought, “and hide down behind and nobody’d ever find me—ever.”

So when her time came, and she really did get out of the circle without being caught, she didn’t have to stop and hunt a hiding place; she knew exactly where she wanted to go.