by Edward Eager
"Oh, what a, wicked one I went and been," said the man in the cap. "Now I'm sorry."
"I been twice as wicked as you was," said the woman in the red blouse. "I'm twice as sorry, too!"
"You ain't," said the man in the cap. "You ain't capable."
Tiring of this, Martha wished them twice as far as where they belonged, and they went away, probably to join the Salvation Army.
The next thing was to wish the stolen jewelry all back where it belonged, too, and this was a simple problem. Then came a harder one.
"I wish," said Martha, "that anybody who's been hurt or upset, or anything that's been broken, or gone wrong because I wished that wish, may be twice as good as it was before. And I wish that everything that has happened because I made that wish should go right out of everybody's mind, and be as though it were a dream. Only twice as much so."
"Except me, please," said the small gentleman. He was standing looking down at their mother in rather an odd way. "I should hate not to remember every bit of this afternoon."
"Except," Martha began. Then she broke off. "What's your name?"
"Smith," said the small gentleman.
"Except Mr. Smith," said Martha. "And us, too, of course," she added.
They stood listening.
In the distance the sound of the fire sirens and the police whistles and the crowd broke off suddenly. There was a silence. Then faintly, the normal roar of city traffic, usually so ugly, but for this one time so beautiful to hear, fell on their charmed ears.
Martha relaxed with a sigh.
"I was afraid it might wear out before it got through that one," she said.
"It was a pretty big wish," Mark agreed. "It must have been quite a strain on it. Maybe that'll be the last wish we get."
"Let's wait a while before we find out," said Katharine.
Their mother stirred, and opened her eyes. She looked around her.
"Where am I?" she said, just like fainted people in books. Then she saw the four children, and held out her arms.
The three girls ran to her. So, even though he was a boy, did Mark.
"I had such a terrible dream," their mother said. "I dreamed there was an awful panic in the city, and I was out in it, looking for you, and then—"
"And then you came into my shop and found them," said Mr. Smith.
Their mother looked at him.
"It really is you," she said.
"Yes," he said.
"But I thought—" their mother began.
"I could have sworn—" she began again.
She passed her hand over her forehead, and smiled rather palely at Mr. Smith. "Every time we meet I seem to think something strange has just happened!"
She got to her feet and looked round the room again.
"There really weren't any thieves or diamond necklaces, were there?" she said.
"What?" said Mark.
"You must have dreamed it," said Martha.
"I think I'd better go home and lie down," said their mother. "I feel very peculiar."
"Ahem," said Mr. Smith, clearing his throat nervously. "I have a better idea. Couldn't you all come out to dinner with me? We could go to a movie or something afterwards."
"We really couldn't," said their mother. "And yet I think I'd like to," she added suddenly, in rather a surprised voice.
"Only no movies, please," said Martha.
"Well, then," said their mother, rather shyly, "perhaps we could all go out to our house after dinner." She looked at Mr. Smith, and laughed. "We seem to be fated to know each other better!" she said.
And perhaps they were.
Because that's what they did.
6. What Happened to Jane
The dinner with Mr. Smith and the evening that followed were an almost complete success. And the biggest success of the evening, for Mark and Katharine and Martha, was Mr. Smith himself.
The four children generally divided all grown-ups into four classes. There were the ones like Miss Bick and Uncle Edwin and Aunt Grace and Mrs. Hudson who—frankly, and cruel as it might be to say it—just weren't good with children at all. There was nothing to do about these, the four children felt, except be as polite as possible and hope they would go away soon.
Then there were the ones like Miss Mamie King, who—when they were with children—always seemed to want to pretend they were children, too. This was no doubt kindly meant, but often ended with the four children's feeling embarrassed for them.
Somewhat better were the opposite ones who went around treating children as though the children were as grown-up as they were, themselves. This was flattering, but sometimes a strain to live up to. Many of the four children's school teachers fell into this class.
Last and best and rarest of all were the ones who seemed to feel that children were children and grown-ups were grown-ups and that was that, and yet at the same time there wasn't any reason why they couldn't get along perfectly well and naturally together, and even occasionally communicate, without changing that fact.
Mr. Smith turned out to be one of these.
He allowed, and even urged, the four children to choose anything they wanted from the menu at dinner, at the same time frankly advising Mark that he thought he would enjoy rare steak and fried onions more than he would codfish tongues.
Jane said she wasn't very hungry, and would her mother order something for her, please? And no, she didn't think she cared for any dessert, thank you. The other three stared at her in disbelief.
After dinner came the ride home, and that was exciting, for everyone did not own a motor car in those days, and the four children were among the ones who didn't. Mr. Smith showed them the way to shift from high into second without stopping, and Mark thought this almost as magical as anything the charm had done for them so far.
Jane said she had seen it before. The other three thought this rude of her.
When they arrived at home Mr. Smith proved an adept player of Fan Tan and I Doubt It, and when card-playing palled was enthralling in his description of his travels in Darkest Australia.
Jane said she was tired and didn't feel like playing games or talking, and she guessed she'd go to bed and finish Hildegarde's Harvest instead. The other three looked at each other, and decided they had better have a word with Jane later on.
But when at last, very late, they were sent to bed, and stopped to peek into her room, she was asleep, or pretending to be.
And the next morning they didn't get a chance to ask her what had been the matter, because the next morning was Saturday and Saturday mornings in that house were always a thing of frenzy.
On Saturdays the children's mother came home from work early, and Miss Bick stayed only a half day, and those were two good things about Saturday.
But on Saturdays Miss Bick always seemed bent on cramming a whole day's fussing and nagging into one morning, and today the four children were kept so busy polishing silver and cleaning out bureau drawers and dusting and doing errands that they scarcely had time to exchange a word if two of them met by chance in the hall.
So it wasn't until along toward lunchtime that one or two, and finally three and four were able to gather together in Katharine and Martha's room and examine the outlook of the day.
The outlook of the day naturally hinged on the charm, and what they were going to do with it next.
"There's one thing bothers me," Martha was saying to Katharine, as Mark and then Jane joined them. "When I was only half there, where did the other half of me go?"
"Don't," said Katharine. "That's one of those questions that give you a headache just to think about. Like which came first, the chicken or the egg."
"All the same," said Mark, sitting down next to them, "it might be fun to find out."
"You mean wish ourselves there?" Katharine's eyes were round. "Wherever it is?"
"I don't want to!" said Martha. "It might be just nowhere at all! We might be just nothingness!"
"If we were, we wouldn't know it," Mark pointed out.
"But that's worse! Then we'd never get back at all!" Martha cried, getting excited. "I don't want to not know it! I don't want to be just nothingness! If we wish that, I won't come!"
"Well, you won't have to because we aren't going to!" said Jane, speaking for the first time. She walked over to the secret place and took out the charm. "It's my turn next and I don't feel like wishing. I may not make a wish for years and years. If ever." And putting the charm in her pocket, she started for the door.
"What's the matter with you?" said Mark, getting up to follow.
"Oh, nothing at all!" said Jane, turning on him. "Not a thing! Everything's just wonderful! Everything's just fine and dandy! Everything's just hunky-dory!"
"Well, isn't it?" asked Katharine.
"Everything's just spoiled, that's all!" Jane cried. "Everything's just utterly and completely ruined! All because some people have to tell everything they know!" And she glared at Martha.
"What did I do?" said Martha.
"As if you didn't know!" said Jane. "Here I thought we were going to have a wonderful, exciting, secret summer full of thrilling adventures, and you had to go and tell the whole thing to the first old stranger that came along!"
"You mean Mr. Smith?" said Martha, surprised. "He's not a stranger anymore. He's a friend."
"Oh, he is, is he?" said Jane. "That makes it all just lovely, doesn't it? And now I suppose we'll have grown-ups butting in and telling us what to wish all the time, and like as not wanting to borrow the charm and wasting its substance on their own devices and desires, and it's just all utterly and completely ruined!" And she went down the hall and into her own room and shut the door.
The others stared after her, amazed.
"Doesn't she like Mr. Smith?" said Martha.
"No," said Mark. "I don't think she does."
In her room Jane sat on the bed and gave way to gloom. She felt awful inside, the way you always do when you've been perfectly hateful to those you love best, and she didn't even know why she had done it. She didn't know why the mere thought of Mr. Smith upset her so—or if she did know the reason she didn't want to admit it, even to herself.
But the thing was that Jane was the only one of the four children who really remembered their father.
Martha was only a baby when their father died, and Katharine and even Mark were still very young, too young for them to recall very much about him now. But Jane remembered him clearly and with a great deal of love, and for that reason she couldn't bear the thought of Mr. Smith's coming into their lives and getting to know them better and better, and finally growing to be just like one of the family, and even trying to take the place of a father to them, which was what she was perfectly sure Mr. Smith hoped to do.
So now she sat in her room and thought and thought, and felt thoroughly miserable. Even the presence of the charm in her pocket was no comfort, because while it would serve the others right if she made a wish all by herself, the only wishes she could think of to make were horrible murderous ones, and she was old enough and nice enough to know that wishing herself invisible and going and pulling Mr. Smith's beard, or writing him a threatening letter with a pen dipped in blood wouldn't really be a bit of help or make her feel a bit better.
After a few minutes there was a knock at the door, and Mark and Katharine and Martha trooped in, looking solemn.
"We've been thinking," Mark said, "and we thought we ought to hold a Council."
"About Mr. Smith," said Martha.
"Go away," said Jane.
"You'd like him if you really got to know him," said Mark. "He was lots of fun last night."
"Humph!" said Jane.
"He was a big help when I wasn't all there," said Martha. "He's sensible about magic, not like most grown-ups at all."
"Ha!" said Jane.
"So we were thinking," said Katharine, and then trailed off, looking at Mark.
"Well?" said Jane.
"You tell her," said Katharine to Mark.
"We were thinking," said Mark, "that maybe before we make another wish we ought to go see Mr. Smith and sort of ask his advice. Just in a general way.
"What?" said Jane.
"I think we ought to take him along in the wish with us," said Martha. "Then he could help us out again if we get in more trouble!"
"The way we always seem to," said Katharine.
"Then you could really get to know him," said Mark.
"And everything would be all right again," said Martha.
Jane was looking at them as if she couldn't believe her ears. "Has everyone in this family gone utterly and completely insane?" she cried. "Don't you know why he's so interested in us and nice about things? Haven't you seen the way he and Mother keep looking at each other? Do you want some old stepfather moving in here and changing everything?"
The others looked surprised at this, but not really terribly shocked.
"I should think he might make kind of an ideal one," said Katharine.
"It's good for a growing boy, having a man around the house," said Mark.
"I've always wished I had a father," said Martha.
Jane began to storm. "Do you really think he could ever take Father's place? Him and his old beard! Don't you know what stepfathers always turn out to be like, once the fatal deed is done? Don't you remember Mr. Murdstone? Oh!" she cried, glaring round at them all. "It's no use! You don't understand! I wish..."
She broke off in alarm, remembering the charm. Then, a prey to utter recklessness, she plunged her hand into her pocket, grasped the charm firmly, and went on. "Yes, I do! I wish I belonged to some other family! I wish it twice!"
Mark and Katharine and Martha gasped. This was the worst thing that had happened yet. They hardly dared look at Jane, for fear she might start turning into someone else before their eyes.
But when they did look, there stood the same brown-haired, blue-eyed, snub-nosed Jane they had grown to know and love through the years. Nothing seemed to have happened. Maybe nothing had. Mark decided to find out.
"Look here, old Jane-ice," he said, putting his hand on her arm and using a pet name that was reserved for unusual serious moments. "You didn't mean it, did you?"
"You let me go, you bully!" remarked a prim, lady-like voice none of the children had ever heard before in their lives. "You horrid big boy! I don't like boys! And I don't like you!"
"Oh!" cried Martha, turning pale. "She doesn't know us!"
"Of course she does," said Katharine. "You know me, don't you, dear? Kathie, that you've been through thick and thin with?"
"No. I don't know you and I don't wish to. Your frock is soiled," said the voice that, to their horror, seemed to be coming out of Jane. "My mama told me never to play with strange children."
Martha began to sniff.
"What an insanitary little girl," said the voice. "Tell her to use a handkerchief. She'll give me a germ."
"Oh, what's the matter with her?" Martha's voice rose to a wail.
"It's not her fault," Katharine said, trying to be reassuring for Martha's sake. "It's the way she's been brought up, I suppose. By that other family she belongs to, now. It does show what a good influence we've been, doesn't it? She was lots nicer under our tender care."
"I don't believe it," said Mark. "She's just trying to fool us, aren't you, Jane-ice?"
"Don't call me that," said the voice. "That's not my name."
"All right, then," said Mark, turning on her suddenly. "If that isn't your name, what is?"
The strange girl who looked like Jane, yet was Jane no longer, seemed startled for a moment, as if she weren't quite sure of the answer. Then her face cleared.
"My mother calls me her Little Comfort," she said.
Mark made a gagging noise.
Katharine looked disgusted. "To think one of us should have come to this!" she mourned.
"It would be an errand of mercy to put the poor thing out of her misery," Mark agreed.
She-who-was-no-longer-Jane was staring aroun
d the room.
"I don't like this house," she said. "The furnishings are in poor taste. It is gaudy." Her lower lip began to tremble. "I want to go home."
"Oh, you do, do you?" said Mark. "Well, I can fix that. No sooner said than done." And he made a dive for the pocket where he knew the charm lay concealed.
But She (who was no longer Jane) pulled away, and gave him a surprisingly hard slap for such a miminy-piminy, ladylike type.
"Take that!" she cried. "You are a thief, as well as a bully!" She glared round at them all. "You are a lot of badly-brought-up children. You kidnapped me, and then tried to rob me. I'm going to tell my mother!"
And with these words, she flounced out into the hall and started down the stairs. By the time the others had recovered from their shock and dashed after her, she was in the act of mincing out the front door.
Mark and Katharine took the stairs three at a time. Martha used the banister. But in the lower hall Miss Bick leaped forth and barred the way.
"No, you don't!" she said. "Not a soul leaves this house until the table's set for lunch!"
There was nothing the children could do about this, and nothing that they felt prepared to say. They didn't even point out that Jane had already left. As Katharine said afterwards, the way Jane was acting, right then she probably didn't have a soul!
But never was table set with such wild abandon, never did silver fly through the air with such great ease as it then flew. Hardly more than one precious minute had been wasted in idle drudgery before Mark and Katharine and Martha rushed out the front door and down the steps onto the sidewalk, and stood scanning the offing in all directions.
Far down Maplewood Avenue they could just make out a genteel figure in Jane's dress, picking its way along and toeing out in a way that the real Jane would have scorned to be seen doing in public. As they watched, the figure turned to the right, into Virginia Street.
And as they started to dash after it, a car drove up before the house, and Mr. Smith got out and held the door open for their mother.
"Company for lunch!" tl^eir mother called, blushing pink and looking embarrassed and pretty. "Where's Jane?"