“I was born on a Sunday morning. That’s how.”
“Ah, indeed? But I don’t quite understand.”
“Don’t you? Seems easy. Let’s sit down here by ‘Father George’ and I’ll explain. If I can.”
The Gray Gentleman was very tall and dignified, yet he had a habit of doing whatever Bonny-Gay asked him. So he now doubled himself up and perched on the low curb surrounding the monument, while the little girl and the big black dog dropped easily down beside him. Then he leaned his head back against the iron railing and gazed reflectively into the face of the big bronze lion, just opposite.
Both the child and the man were fond of the wonderful lion, which seemed a mighty guardian of the beautiful Place, and he, at least, knew it to be a world-famous work of art. Bonny-Gay loved it as she loved all animals, alive or sculptured, and with much the same devotion she gave to Max. The park without either of these four-footed creatures would have seemed strange indeed to her, for they were her earliest playmates and remained still her dearest.
“Now you can tell me,” again suggested the Gray Gentleman.
“It was Easter, too. All the people were going to the churches, the bells were ringing, the organs playing, and everything just beautiful. Nurse Nance began it, my mother says. ‘For the child that is born on the Sabbath Day is lucky, and bonny, and wise, and gay.’ But my father says there isn’t any ‘luck’ and a child like me isn’t ‘wise,’ so they had to leave them out and I’m only Bonny-Gay. That’s all.”
“A very satisfactory explanation,” said the Gray Gentleman, with one of his rare smiles, and laying his hand kindly upon the golden curls. “And now, my dear, one question more. In which of these beautiful houses do you live?”
As he spoke, the stranger’s glance wandered all about that aristocratic neighborhood of Mt. Vernon Place, to which he had returned after many years of absence to make his own home. Since he had gone away all the small people whom he used to know and love had grown up, and he had felt quite lost and lonely, even in that familiar scene, till he had chanced to meet Bonny-Gay, just one week before. Since then, and her ready adoption of himself as a comrade, he had had no time for loneliness. She was always out in the charming Square, as much a part of it as the Washington monument, which the little folks called “Father George,” or the bronzes, and the smooth lawns. She seemed as bright as the sunshine and almost as well-beloved, for the other children flocked about her, the keeper consulted her and the keeper’s dog followed her like a shadow.
With a toss of her yellow locks she pointed her forefinger westward.