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"Take good care of that little chap, madam," said the Professor as he gave him to his mother; "he carries the heart of more than one of us buttoned under his soldier clothes. "

Of all Jack-a-Boy’s friends, the Woman Nobody Called On was certainly the strangest. She lived in Number 328 and no one ever went to see her. We knew very little of her, except that she was very handsome, with that large, blond, opulent sort of beauty that is seldom seen off the stage and that one somehow distrusts on sight. Her beauty was a little faded on close inspection, too. She lived well, for her alimony was said to be generous. Some people used to wonder that Jack-a-Boy’s mother allowed him to go to see her, but I think she was proud of her little son’s elasticity and charm and his power of bringing gladness into people’s lives. At any rate, Jack-a-Boy went often to see the woman in Number 328, and, as I passed, I used to see her watching for him at the window. Of all the people she had waited for in days gone by, I doubt if there was one for whom she had ever waited with such eagerness as she did for Jack-a-Boy. She always kept a supply of his favorite bonbons and was very careful to see that he did not eat too many. She knew so well what comes of having too much of what one likes, that Woman Nobody Called on.

One chilly April day, as Jack-a-Boy stretched himself out on the big Persian rug before her fire, he remarked:

"My! What pretty rooms you have; they are the nicest in the Terrace, I think. It’s a pity you haven’t got any little boys; they’d have such a good time here. "

The Woman Nobody Called On looked at him queerly.

"Should you like me for a mother, Jack-a-Boy? "

"Why, yes, of course I would, you are so beautiful. After my own mother, I think I would rather have you than any lady I know. I believe I would like to have a great many mothers, kind of second-best ones, you know. Sometimes on the street cars I see ladies I would like to have for mothers, and then there are others I wouldn’t. There is Miss Mellon now, who gave me the dog; she is a very nice lady, but I wouldn’t like to have her for a mother!" Jack-a-Boy wondered why the woman laughed and hugged him so.

Jack-a-Boy’s great f’te that year was his May-basket hanging. I think it meant even more to him than Christmas, because it was his nature to enjoy giving. He began to prepare for it about the middle of April. He got a large supply of tissue paper of many colors, and the old maid in Number 326 gave him a number of wooden baskets in which she bought her butter, and the Woman Nobody Called On gave him bonbon boxes of all shapes and sizes. I think there was no one in the Terrace who was not consulted about the construction of those baskets, but he made them all alone in his nursery, and never weakened into showing any one of us the basket intended for our neighbor. He used to come out from his work with an eager face and sticky fingers, and he confided to me that his mother was making him some paper flowers because the real ones were so expensive, and asked me if I didn’t think paper flowers would do pretty well with real leaves to make them look "realer. " On the afternoon of the first of May, Jack-a-Boy and I went for a walk, and we got a few dandelions, and I persuaded him to let me add some violets to his collection. I knew that at heart he loathed the paper flowers. The Professor had been selected for the honor of hanging the baskets with him, and when I saw the old gentleman slipping out that night at dusk with a big market basket covered with rustling tissue paper on his arm, and that joyous, shapely little figure skipping beside him, I did not try to conceal my jealousy. I felt rather lonely and ill-used, and I opened my window and sat down beside it in the darkness. There was just a pallid ghost of a new moon in the sky, a faint silver crescent curve, like Artemis’ bow, with a shred of gauzy cloud caught on its horn. The violet heavens were nebulous with the spring mistiness. Below, in the dusky street, I heard every little while the ring of a doorbell and the hurry of swift little feet down the steps and up the pavement, and sometimes a clear, silvery little peal of laughter, suddenly muffled. Once, on the other side of the street, I saw Jack-a-Boy scudding down the pavement like a gleeful young elf, with the Professor in the role of a decrepit Old Man of the Mountain shuffling after him.