It had been a month since Mary Poppins had led Jack and Angus out of unfamiliar territory. Jack had not seen or heard from her since, but he replayed the night over and over in his mind, making it as fresh as he could. He did not want to forget the sight of those lamps growing out of nothing, or the feeling of the delicate dials beneath his fingers, or the way the bike rode itself through the skies above them. He especially did not want to forget the lady with the bird-handled brolly. No one else's company, after hers, was quite the same as they had been before. Jack loved his friends and street family to distraction, and wouldn't trade them for all the magic nannies in the world. But there was definitely a longing for that commanding, whimsical presence to visit again.

Bert had not been surprised in the least when Jack and Angus told him what had happened. "One thing you oughta know 'bout our Mary Poppins," he had informed them brightly. "She never explains anything."

When Angus had gone to bed, Jack joined Bert on the rooftops of London. He was tired from his trip, but the memory of Mary Poppins had his mind rebelliously alert.

"Didn't tell me you'd got to see her," he reminded Bert, tone casual.

Bert kicked his legs a little as they dangled off the edge. "Well, bit surprised meself, wasn't I? Just popped up when I was earnin' me piece as a screever the other day." A screever was a chalk artist—one of the trades Jack was learning from him but wasn't very good at yet. When Jack didn't answer, Bert glanced at him, face drawn earnestly. "Meant to say, soon as I saw you. Cross my 'eart, I did, Jackie!"

Jack couldn't stay angry with the Match-Man for long. His gray expression was a weak one to begin with, and cleared off as Bert ruffled his hair. "She's lovely," he assured his mentor. "All like y'said."

"Tip o' the top, that's what she is," sighed Bert.

Jack remembered Poppins' promise to stay 'until the wind changed'. She hadn't expressly agreed to say goodbye to Bert when she did. And he decided, there on that rooftop, that he would agree to it for her. No matter how fantastical she was…well, if she didn't give Bert the farewell he was due, Jack would pull her down out of the sky himself. People talked about lasso-ing the moon, surely you could do it to a flying nanny? And if he couldn't—because even imagining it made him green about the gills; the look she might turn and give him!—he'd just have to warn Bert when she was leaving. He'd wait, feeling carefully for the wind to change.

It was the least he could do.

On a slightly wet, dull afternoon, Jack rode his bike into the park. With him was Bert's horn. His friend had forgotten it when he'd gone out to play the one-man-band, and as it was Jack's favorite instrument he used, he couldn't have Bert playing without it. So on his way out to be Sweep to the family in Number 19—his first solo chimney sweep job—he intended to bring the horn to its rightful owner before he began his show.

As he rode, he heard a shrill voice from over the hedge.

"Michael, do be careful! Look out for the—"

Something pointy and green flapped and staggered over the shrubs like a dying pigeon. A moment later, Michael Banks, now nine years old, crashed through the wall of leaves after it. His knees scraped against the grass as he lunged for the whatever-it-was and missed, landing on his belly.

"'Old on!" Jack's bike toppled sideways, lying haphazardly in the center of the path as he hurried to help Mr. Banks' heir to his feet.

"—the hedge. Michael." Jane Banks pushed primly through the branches, in hot pursuit of her brother. She was blinking and frowning as if the very sight of the boy in the grass was as exhausting as his dive had been.

The two Banks children stood in the middle of the field, turning and turning and looking up feverishly at the sky.

"Where did it go?" Michael moaned.

"Oh, it can't have got away again!" Jane harmonized.

Jack, now a few feet away from them as they went searching, squinted against the wind. For a moment, all he could do was look at them. They had never been this close before, save the day he and Michael had met. There was always a window or a bit of a drop between the three of them. Michael's hair was not as red as he had thought before—it was getting darker at the roots, he realized, and grinned when he saw that the boy was wearing a little blue tie. He looked very like Mr. Banks, if dirtier now.

And then he was looking at Jane, for quite a bit longer than her brother. Her coat was on over a sunny yellow frock, and up close her eyes were bluer. She smelled like soap; he caught it on the wind. And her little slippers were so polished, the sun blazing off their toes nearly blinded him. Had she always looked like this? He'd been cheated by the night and the low light of the lamp. She seemed less like an angel and more like an ordinary girl out here—or perhaps that was because they were just a bit older. This more realistic version, only six or seven steps away from him, was even better than the China doll on the balcony every other night.

Jack had only to blink once or twice to focus on the stress flashing from both children in waves on the breeze. They were frantic, looking for something high up in the clouds that clearly was not going to show itself any time soon.

A slight flapping sound caught his attention, and Jack saw the strange object poking out of a patch of chrysanthemums.

"'Ere," he cried, "this wouldn't be yours, would it?" And he pulled it from the flowerbed, carrying it over to them. It had a wooden frame, and green paper—but the paper was all poked through and scratched up. Still, he saw the general shape now that it was in his hands and realized with glee what he was holding. "A kite!"

Michael, recognizing Jack in a moment, casually tugged the kite from his grasp as though they shared it on the daily. "It's not a very good one," he complained, pursing his lips. "It doesn't fly right and it keeps getting away."

"Needs a bit 'o spit an' polish, I say," Jack determined, chewing the inside of his cheek and looking it over.

He was incurably aware of Jane as she joined them, and wondered briefly why it was so much more important to him what sound her feet made on the grass than what sound her brother's made. Or why he couldn't tell you what color Michael's trousers were minutes later, but could see every thread of Jane's hat without looking straight at her. It was green, the same color as her petticoat and the kite and her whole outfit was akin to the sun on the leaves. She must have simply been more interesting because she was his age (or thereabouts). Or because there were no little girl workhands he knew.

Whatever the reason, Jack embraced the fluttering feeling it gave him when she glanced up at him and talked as if they still spoke every night. It felt too nice to ignore and was too rare to him to be embarrassed by.

"We thought Father might mend it today," Jane explained somberly, "but Mother says he's too busy."

"So we took it out anyway!" Michael said. His tone added a harrumph that his throat refused to produce. "It was my idea," he continued with a stretch on his tiptoes of pride. "I said we could get the kite to fly today because of all the wind. And if we can't mend it, our nanny can."

"She can do all sorts of things," Jane put in with a sudden smile.

Jack thumbed the brim of his hat up, away from his eyes. "I think it's a right pretty kite," he informed them cheerily. "Don't need much mending if you ask me."

"What's that?" Michael demanded, pulling Bert's horn out of Jack's free hand and honking it once or twice. A look of unbridled joy crossed his round face and he kept at it, not tiring of the sound.

"That's my mate's." Jack did not reach for the horn immediately, instead sitting back to see Michael play with it. Bert wouldn't mind, so long as it didn't break. "He needs it for his business—'round here somewhere." He glanced to the north, trying to see past the gazebo and toward the gate. Usually his mentor was in that direction, working the entry crowd.

"What is it for?" Jane asked, taking it from Michael with a look that was clearly supposed to be stern. It melted instead into curiosity of her own, and she gave it a gentler squeeze. The horn released a halfhearted, gurgling sort of blast.

"Music." Jack's smile went all dazzly, watching her. "He's a one-man-band today, he is."

"Can we trade the kite for it?" Michael begged.

"Michael, don't be rude," Jane shushed him, glancing sideways. "We can't give him the kite—we're going to fly it with Father and Mother."

"But they can't fly it," argued her brother. "It won't lift!"

"Can you mend it, Jack?" Jane turned to the leerie with such a wide look of hope in those blueberries, Jack went warm all the way to the end of his nose. She had even remembered his name.

He was an inch or so taller than she was, and at least half a year older than her, so she and her younger sibling thought he could do lots of things they couldn't. But he had never mended a kite before—Bert had taught him how to build one—sometimes they sold kites in the spring—not to fix one that had been ripped up like this.

Still, he worked his jaw, mouth drawn taut like a sack's whose string has been jerked tight. Brown eyes struck the kite with a hunger to please. "I'll give it a go!" he decided heroically, taking it from them again.

He crouched in the grass with the toy spread before him. The Banks children squatted with him, the wind knocking Jane's hair in front of her and Michael's cap clean off. The two higher classes had to hold down their kite while the lamplighter examined it.

"Could do with some glue," he announced after a moment.

"We didn't bring any." Upon this revelation, Michael seemed to give up, deflating where he sat.

"Tell you what," Jack mumbled, licking his lips. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a few chunks of candle wax. "I reckon this might do the trick—"

"Shouldn't we melt it first?" Jane interrupted, appalled. She was staring as though he might just rub their precious creation down with the hard substance, like stable hands rubbed down their masters' horses every day.

"Right you are." Jack grinned, looking at her out of the tops of his eyes as he pulled a match from his jacket pocket.

Jane seemed about to smile back, but she couldn't help looking nervously at the match. She had no doubt been taught very thoroughly that matches were not for children.

Jack grew serious again. "Stand back, now…"

He lit the match, holding it up to the wax. Another gust of wind wrapped them up, and the flame whisked out right away. The Bankses made exclamations of outrage, but Jack held up a placating hand.

Another match was retrieved, but again the fire was killed. This happened at least twice more before Michael sat back on his haunches in defeat.

The youngest looked at Jack in obvious apology before he said, "Why don't we just get Mary Poppins to mend it?"

Jack dropped the wax harmlessly in the grass, flopping back to lean on his palms as though they had each struck him at once. "'Ang on! Mary Poppins is your new nanny?"

And suddenly he realized that the bow in Jane's hair was securely fasted, soft and tight enough to stay all day without annoying her or giving her a headache. Tied in with careful, perfect hands.

Jane nodded hard, sitting up on her knees in her excitement. "Oh yes, Katie Nanna left—"

"So we put out an advertisement—"

"Father helped—"

"—and she came up the bannister—"

"—and now Mary Poppins is looking after us!" Jane's dress seemed yellower and her cheeks pinker with the joy this fact clearly seemed to sprinkle upon them both. "She's the best nanny we've ever had! We've been to lots of wonderful places already. She took us inside a chalk drawing and we had tea on Uncle Albert's ceiling and she taught us the loveliest new word…"

Jack could only stare at her as she went on. Jane and Michael were Mary Poppins' charges! They had been in Bert's chalk picture! Why, she had probably gone home the very night she'd met him and Angus and told these two all about Lady Hyacinth Macaw!

For a split second, he seethed and wriggled with jealousy.

He didn't know what for—it had something to do with the fact that he couldn't remember his mother. And the little girl and boy across from him had their own still with them, only now they had Mary Poppins as well. That spectacular lady holding Bert's heart and calling Jack silly, as if she'd known him his whole life—living with them in their nursery!

Then it passed. He watched Jane and Michael's bright faces and saw—as only a Tradesman, a helper from the outside, might see—a loneliness behind the brightness. If Bert's colorful lady was governess over the Banks children, it was for a good reason. He couldn't be jealous for long—the truth was, they needed her and he did not. And he found he was glad they had her.

"Do you know Mary Poppins?" Michael asked him suspiciously.

"Know 'er!" Jack stood up, opening his mouth to describe the alleyways full of floating lanterns. To describe Bert and the way the man's chest puffed out with pleasure at the mere mention of Mary Poppins.

But he didn't get the chance. At that very moment, the nanny herself appeared behind them, the hedge parting and opening as if it were a great mouth, making room for her. Not one branch caught on her coat, not a leaf stuck to her skirts.

Jane and Michael forgot Jack and the kite at once and went rushing over to her.

"We're terribly sorry we ran off," Jane began, wringing her rose petal hands.

"The kite went over the hedge!" put in Michael, pointing accusingly to their toy. Clearly he wanted someone to blame. "It hasn't got a tail—"

"He couldn't hang on. Oh, please don't be cross, Mary Poppins," said Jane, taking Mary Poppins' fingers in her palms and pulling gently. It was quite as if she were trying to keep her nanny on the ground. "We shan't do it again—"

"Pish-posh," was Mary Poppins' brisk response to this. "Kites are only as well-behaved as one builds them." She strolled up to Jack and plucked the kite off of the grass. "And I'm afraid this one could do with a bit of a lesson—it is rather like a sunken ship, isn't it?"

Jane and Michael were staring at her as if she had sprouted a halo and left a trail of candy in her wake. If they had thought she was perfect before, Jack decided as he observed them, they simply didn't know what to make of her now. Clearly they had been expecting the worst—all over losing a kite! But Mary Poppins held the handle of her trusty umbrella to her chin, looking thoughtful instead of furious at her charges' disappearance. Jack suspected she had known where they were all along. It was in the sturdy line her shoulders made.

Then she looked down at him, just for a moment, with those fathomless irises. If Jane's were blueberries, Mary Poppins' eyes were twin pieces of a midnight sky. "Ah, Jack. Your shirt has come loose round the front; kindly tuck it in before someone mistakes you for a bedsheet."

Jack's hands scrambled to obey, yanking his faded red, hand-me-down waistcoat into submission while his face remained fixed on hers.

"Thank you." Mary Poppins ran a finger down the frame of the toy. "Well," she sighed, "it seems flying a kite will have to be omitted from today's schedule. I do hate revising a perfect checklist."

"Can't you mend it?" Michael pleaded. He and Jane came to stand on either side of their governess, each of them near enough to lean against her; Jane was already inching in that direction.

"Me, mend this kite?" Mary Poppins clucked. "What a suggestion!"

Jack tilted his head. He could think of a hundred different ways Mary Poppins might cause the Banks' kite to sail, at least one of them involving a pair of real wings. But the expression she wore said Michael's request was deeply offensive. Indeed, the Bankses were looking forlornly from the kite to Poppins with the obvious air of people who knew they would not get their way. Michael even seemed a bit sheepish to have asked, though he couldn't possibly understand her any more than the other two did.

"There it is, then," Jack relented, biting his lip in apology toward Jane and her brother. "Them wot broke it fixes it."

"But…we don't know how to mend a kite," complained Jane.

"Oh, no." The nanny passed the kite on to her charges, speaking quickly, as though she'd already moved on to more important matters without them. "Neither is the job yours, I must say. Quite unsuitable. We shall just have to wait and see."

"Wait and see what?" demanded Michael, nearly stomping his foot in frustration.

"And now," Mary Poppins sniffed, as if she hadn't heard him, "we really must be going. Shopping in town is next on the list." Said list was nowhere in sight, but the way she spoke gave Jack a tense feeling, as if he himself were in a great hurry and wasting time.

"I don't want to go shopping," Michael huffed, pulling the kite from his sister's hands—not angrily, but sort of desperately. "I want to fix our kite! Then Father will see how well it flies."

"Perhaps he'll fly it with us," Jane added hopefully, folding her hands in front of her. But her gaze was on Mary Poppins, and her feet twitched and rocked in place. She was clearly fighting the urge to just dart off in obedience.

Michael seemed to have no trouble with that. "I'm staying here and mending it!"

Mary Poppins was powdering her nose, not minding the children much anymore. "Very well then, just as you like. Jane and I shall fetch the gingerbread, and you stay and mend the kite."

Jack's mouth watered at the very word, and Michael almost did a jig of alarm.

"Gingerbread?" he repeated dumbly.

"Yes. But I'm afraid one can't carry a kite and a pound of gingerbread at once. We can manage without you."

"I could give you a 'and or two," Jack offered, trying not to look at Michae, and irreverent grin starting to growl beneath a wrinkling nose. "It's been ages since I had a bit o' gingerbread, Mary Poppins."

He almost faltered when Jane's head whipped toward him, appalled at his lack of pity for the nine-year-old gaping beside her. Then he couldn't help it—Michael looked so like a codfish with his mouth opening and shutting like that—the smile reached his eyes and he winked at her. Jane's own mouth dropped even further in shocked disapproval, but he thought (hoped?) he saw a glitter of laughter there somewhere.

"Would you, Jack?" Mary Poppins gave him the most brilliant, charmed smile, and he almost believed it was a genuine one. "How very thoughtful of you!"

Michael couldn't seem to find words. Gingerbread was his favorite. "But—but—"

"Oh, do let him come, Mary Poppins," Jane said in sympathy. "He didn't mean it—really!"

Jack pursed his lips to keep the smile back and slipped his hands in his pockets. He dare not continue his joke, not with Jane begging for her brother's release. He did want to try gingerbread, though. Perhaps some other time—anything was possible when Mary Poppins was in town, of that he was certain. Besides, Michael was acting as if someone had just set fire to his toy chest.

"Very well." Mary Poppins closed her handbag with a snap and turned on her heel. "You may come along after all, but I warn you, if you can't keep up we'll be home in a twink. An absolute twink!"

"Yes, Mary Poppins!" Michael bounded to her side, kite firmly clutched in one hand. "I can carry it this way, see? Then can I hold the gingerbread, please?"

"May I hold the gingerbread, Michael." Mary Poppins smoothed her skirt and glanced over her shoulder at the lamplighter. "In the future you ought to be more careful handling wax, Jack. You never know what might happen round a free flame."

"Right, Mary Poppins." Jack tipped his hat to her, a steady grin reappearing.

Mary Poppins must have seen something of Bert in his movements, because her smile this time was genuine. "And don't forget the horn."

Jack jumped, realizing he had nearly left it behind. Michael had discarded it in the grass when they'd all knelt to fix the kite together, and he retrieved it hastily. He had to pull out his rag and wipe it down in case of dirt specks; Bert sometimes liked to hit it with his head when hands were occupied.

Mary Poppins nodded to him. "Until we meet again."

Jack nodded back, though his eyes drifted to Jane and Michael. Michael was not watching him; instead he was sticking his fingers carefully through one of the holes in the kite, clearly distracted. But Jane met his gaze and immediately tugged again on her nanny's hand.

"Please, can't Jack come shopping as well?" she asked kindly. "It has been ages since he's tasted gingerbread!"

Even her voice made him lighter. Jack very much wanted Mary Poppins to agree, to insist he tag along. The thought of gingerbread and magic ladies and the Banks children at his side….But the horn was heavy in his hand and he knew his place was not, at this moment, with the Bankses and their governess. He could just sort of feel it. Perhaps that was something else Bert had been teaching him, without his knowing it. How to read situations and their players—and the image of himself trailing behind these three fine people downtown simply wouldn't come to mind.

Graciously he smiled, shaking his head as he scrambled backward, toward his bike, which still lay neglected in the path. "That's all right," he told them, shrugging. "Got a bit o' work to do meself today—might be late if I don't shake a leg."

"Come along, then, Jane—kindly stop sagging." Mary Poppins straightened the collar of Jane's coat smartly. "Michael. Spit-spot."

"Goodbye, Jack!" Jane called out sweetly, waving to him. Michael, jerking to attention, mirrored her and offered Jack a jaunty sort of smirk that suited his round face.

"G'bye, Miss Jane," he answered, mounting his bike. "Master Michael."

Resisting the urge to watch them until they were out of sight, he began to pedal. He would have to be alert, listening for Bert's one-man-band shtick, but his head was full of funny ideas now. The rush he'd been in that morning had disappeared. All he could think of were kites being magically repaired, piles of gingerbread, Mary Poppins' smile as he teased them, and the echo of Jane's request to have him remain with them that afternoon. If you couldn't have the perfect day, it was almost as nice to imagine it.