Mary Poppins - the Complete Collection. P.L. Travers

      The letters slid round the arrow, dancing giddily. Suddenly the atmosphere seemed to grow bitterly cold, and the wind became so icy that Jane and Michael shut their eyes against it. When they opened them the Park had entirely disappeared – not a tree nor a green-painted seat nor an asphalt footpath was in sight. Instead, they were surrounded by great boulders of blue ice and beneath their feet snow lay thickly frosted upon the ground.

      “Oh, oh!” cried Jane, shivering with cold and surprise, and she rushed to cover the Twins with their perambulator rug. “What has happened to us?”

      Mary Poppins sniffed. She had no time to reply, however, for at that moment a white furry head peered cautiously round a boulder. Then a huge Polar Bear leapt out and, standing on his hind legs, proceeded to hug Mary Poppins.

      “I was afraid you might be trappers,” he said. “Welcome to the North Pole, all of you.”

      He put out a long pink tongue, rough and warm as a bath towel, and gently licked the children’s cheeks.

      They trembled. Did Polar Bears eat children, they wondered?

      “You’re shivering!” the Bear said kindly. “That’s because you need something to eat. Make yourselves comfortable on this iceberg.” He waved a paw at a block of ice. “Now, what would you like? Cod? Shrimps? Just something to keep the wolf from the door.”

      “I’m afraid we can’t stay,” Mary Poppins broke in. “We’re on our way round the world.”

      “Well, do let me get you a little snack. It won’t take me a jiffy.”

      He sprang into the blue-green water and came up with a herring. “I wish you could have stayed for a chat.” He tucked the fish into Mary Poppins’s hand. “I long for a bit of gossip.”

      “Another time perhaps,” she said. “And thank you for the fish.”

      “South!” she said to the compass.

      It seemed to Jane and Michael then that the world was spinning round them. As they felt the air getting soft and warm, they found themselves in a leafy jungle from which came a noisy sound of squawking.

      “Welcome!” shrieked a large Hyacinth Macaw who was perched on a branch, with outstretched wings. “You’re just the person we need, Mary Poppins. My wife’s off gadding, and I’m left to sit on the eggs. Do take a turn, there’s a good girl. I need a little rest.”

      He lifted a spread wing cautiously, disclosing a nest with two white eggs.

      “Alas, this is just a passing visit. We’re on our way round the world.”

      “Gracious, what a journey! Well, stay for a little moment so that I can get some sleep. If you can look after all those creatures” – he nodded at the children – “you can keep two small eggs warm. Do, Mary Poppins! And I’ll get you some bananas instead of that wriggling fish.”

      “It was a present,” said Mary Poppins.

      “Well, well, keep it if you must. But what madness to go gallivanting round the world when you could stay and bring up our nestlings. Why should we spend our time sitting when you could do it as well?”

      “Better, you mean!” sniffed Mary Poppins.

      Then, to Jane and Michael’s disappointment – they would dearly have liked some tropical fruit – she shook her head decisively and said, “East!”

      Again the world went spinning round them – or were they spinning round the world? And then, whichever it was ceased.

      They found themselves in a grassy clearing surrounded by bamboo trees. Green paperlike leaves rustled in the breeze. And above that quiet swishing they could hear a steady rhythmic sound – a snore, or was it a purr?

      Glancing round, they beheld a large furry shape – black with blotches of white, or was it white with blotches of black? They could not really be sure.

      Jane and Michael gazed at each other. Was it a dream from which they would wake? Or were they seeing, of all things, a Panda! And a Panda in its own home and not behind bars in a zoo.

      The dream, if it was a dream, drew a long breath.

      “Whoever it is, please go away, I rest in the afternoon.”

      The voice was as furry as the rest of him.

      “Very well, then, we will go away. And then perhaps” – Mary Poppins’s voice was at its most priggish – “you’ll be sorry you missed us.”

      The Panda opened one black eye. “Oh, it’s you, my dear girl,” he said sleepily. “Why not have let me know you were coming? Difficult though it would have been, for you I would have stayed awake.” The furry shape yawned and stretched itself. “Ah well, I’ll have to make a home for you all. There wouldn’t be enough room in mine.” He nodded at a neat shelter made of leaves and bamboo sticks. “But,” he added, eying the herring, “I will not allow that scaly sea-thing under any roof of mine. Fishes are far too fishy for me.”

      “We shall not be staying,” Mary Poppins assured him. “We’re taking a little trip round the world and just looked in for a moment.”

      “What nonsense!” The Panda gave an enormous yawn. “Traipsing wildly round the world when you could stay here with me. Never mind, my dear Mary, you always do what you want to do, however absurd and foolish. Pluck a few young bamboo shoots. They’ll sustain you till you get home. And you two” – he nodded at Jane and Michael – “tickle me gently behind the ears. That always sends me to sleep.”

      Eagerly they sat down beside him and stroked the silky fur. Never again – they were sure of it – would they have the chance of stroking a Panda.

      The furry shape settled itself and, as they stroked, the snore – or the purr – began its rhythm.

      “He’s asleep,” said Mary Poppins softly. “We mustn’t wake him again.” She beckoned to the children, and as they came on tiptoe towards her, she gave a flick of her wrist. And the compass, apparently, understood, for the spinning began again.

      Hills and lakes, mountains and forests went waltzing round them to unheard music. Then again the world was still, as if it had never moved.

      This time they found themselves on a long white shore, with wavelets lapping and curling against it.

      And immediately before them was a cloud of whirling, swirling sand from which came a series of grunts. Then slowly the cloud settled, disclosing a large black and grey Dolphin with a young one at her side.

      “Is that you, Amelia?” called Mary Poppins.

      The Dolphin blew some sand from her nose and gave a start of surprise. “Well, of all people, it’s Mary Poppins! You’re just in time to share our sand-bath. Nothing like a sand-bath for cleansing the fins and the tail.”

      “I had a bath this morning, thank you!”

      “Well, what about those young ones, dear? Couldn’t they do with a bit of scouring?”

      “They have no fins and tails,” said Mary Poppins, much to the children’s disappointment. They would have liked a roll in the sand.

      “Well, what on earth or sea are you doing here?” Amelia demanded briskly.

      “Oh, just going round the world, you know,” Mary Poppins said airily, as though going round the world was a thing you did every day.

      “Well, it’s a treat for Froggie and me – isn’t it, Froggie? Amelia butted him with her nose, and the young Dolphin gave a friendly squeak.

      “I call him Froggie because he so often strays away – just like the Frog that would a-wooing go, whether his mother would let him or no. Don’t you, Froggie?” Her answer was another squeak.

      “Well,