“He’s the funniest thing I ever saw!” laughed Bonny-Gay, so merrily that the Gray Gentleman drew near to join in the fun. After him trailed an army of young “farmers” and in another moment the visitor had ceased to be a stranger to anybody there.
“Let’s see-saw!” cried Joe Stebbins, seizing her hand and drawing her to the playground. Then somebody swung Mary Jane and the baby upon the beam beside her, some other girls took the opposite end, and they all went tilting up and down, up and down, in the most exciting manner possible. Then there was the Maypole, furnished with ropes instead of ribbons, from the ends of which they hung and swung, around and around, till they dropped off for sheer weariness. And here Bonny-Gay was proud to see that Mary Jane could beat the whole company. Her arms were so long and so strong, they could cling and outswing all the others; and when she had held to her rope until she was the very last one left her laughter rang out in a way that was good to hear.
“Seems to me I never heard so much laughing in all my life!” exclaimed Bonny-Gay to the Gray Gentleman when, tired out with fun, she nestled beside him as he rested on a bench.
“Yes, it’s a fine thing, a fine thing. And you see that it doesn’t take big houses or rich clothes to make happiness. All these new friends of yours belong to those tiny homes we passed on our way down.”
“They do! Even Mary Jane, my sister?”
“Even in an humbler. Dingy street is just what its name implies. But we’ll drive that way back and what do you say to giving Mary Jane a ride thus far?”
“Oh! I’d love it! She’s so jolly and friendly and seems never to think of her—her poor back and—things.”
“You’ll like her better and better—if you should ever meet again. She won my heart the first time I saw her, over a month ago. I met her dragging home a basket of her mother’s laundry work, in that same soap-box wagon she utilizes for the baby. The family chariot it seems to be. I was taking a stroll this way, quite by myself, and thinking of other things than where I was walking when I stumbled and my hat flew off. Then I heard a rattle and squeak of rusty small wheels, and there was Mary Jane hopping up to me on her ‘wooden feet’ and holding out my hat, with the most sympathetic smile in the world. ‘Here it is, Mister, and I do hope it isn’t hurt; nor you either,’ said she; and in just that one glimpse I had of her I saw how sweet and brave and helpful she was. So I’ve been proud to call her my friend ever since.”
Just then arose a cry so sudden and boisterous it could have been uttered by no lips except the baby’s. For a teacher had tapped a bell, and somebody had cried ‘Luncheon!’ and he knew what that meant as well as anyone.
So Mary Jane swung round to where he lay upon his back in the sunshine and set him up against a rock, and thrust a piece of the loaf she had brought into his chubby fists, and cocked her head admiringly while she cried out: