“I’m glad that’s fixed before I forgot. Because I’m in dreadful trouble, myself.”
“You look it!” he exclaimed, smiling into her confiding face; then dropped his playful manner as he saw that she was really in earnest.
Whereupon she promptly told him about Mrs. McClure and why, in anticipation of her father’s possible return, she must, she must go home every night. “And how can I? I mustn’t put them out—they are so good to me. I mustn’t stay away, if Bonny-Gay needs me. There’s all the dolls to be dressed, you see; and the canaries must be fed, or they’d die; and Polly is about as much care as the baby. She’s always dropping things and squawking till she gets them picked up for her—though she throws them right straight down again. I don’t see how Bonny-Gay can be so patient with that bird, do you?”
“I’m sure I shouldn’t be.”
“So, I couldn’t not come, course. And what I want you to tell me, please, is there a shorter way I could come? So I could walk here? ’Cause I couldn’t ride in the car. We couldn’t afford that.”
“If you would ride in the car I know, without asking, that Mrs. McClure would be more than glad to bear the expense.”
“But father wouldn’t like that. He never likes me to have rich folks do things for me. He—he seems to about hate them. He wouldn’t let me go to the Empty Stocking Trees, ’cause he does. You’re the only one he doesn’t mind. And he likes the ‘Playgrounds’ ’cause they’re not charity. They belong to the city and we do, same’s the rich ones. They teach the children to work and learn farming, too. He likes that. But I couldn’t take the money from her. I wouldn’t so displease him, even if I had to stay away.”
The Gray Gentleman pondered deeply. He would not offend the confiding child by offering himself to pay her car fare. He too greatly respected her honest pride and her loyalty to her father to do that. But, after a moment, he looked up.
“Miss Mary Jane Bump, once before I invited you to call at my house and you declined. Now, I invite you again. I think I have something there that will solve your difficulties—and my own. May I have the pleasure? I’ll detain you from the Poll parrot but a few moments.”
“Oh! I’d love it!”