Chapter 1 THERE IS NO ONE LEFT

When Mary Lennox was sent to
Misselthwaite Manor to live with her uncle
everybody said she was the most
disagreeable-looking child ever seen. It
was true, too. She had a little thin face and a
little thin body, thin light hair and a sour
expression. Her hair was yellow, and her
face was yellow because she had been
born in India and had always been ill in one
way or another. Her father had held a
position under the English Government and
had always been busy and ill himself, and
her mother had been a great beauty who
cared only to go to parties and amuse
herself with gay people. She had not
wanted a little girl at all, and when Mary was
born she handed her over to the care of an
Ayah, who was made to understand that if
she wished to please the Mem Sahib she
must keep the child out of sight as much as
possible. So when she was a sickly, fretful,
ugly little baby she was kept out of the way,
and when she became a sickly, fretful,
toddling thing she was kept out of the way
also. She never remembered seeing
familiarly anything but the dark faces of her
Ayah and the other native servants, and as
they always obeyed her and gave her her
own way in everything, because the Mem
Sahib would be angry if she was disturbed
by her crying, by the time she was six years
old she was as tyrannical and selfish a little
pig as ever lived. The young English

-1-

"Pig! Pig! Daughter of Pigs!" she said,
because to call a native a pig is the worst
insult of all.

She was grinding her teeth and saying this
over and over again when she heard her
mother come out on the veranda with some
one. She was with a fair young man and
they stood talking together in low strange
voices. Mary knew the fair young man who
looked like a boy. She had heard that he
was a very young officer who had just come
from England. The child stared at him, but
she stared most at her mother. She always
did this when she had a chance to see her,
because the Mem Sahib—Mary used to call
her that oftener than anything else—was such
a tall, slim, pretty person and wore such
lovely clothes. Her hair was like curly silk
and she had a delicate little nose which
seemed to be disdaining things, and she
had large laughing eyes. All her clothes
were thin and floating, and Mary said they
were "full of lace." They looked fuller of lace
than ever this morning, but her eyes were
not laughing at all. They were large and
scared and lifted imploringly to the fair boy
officer's face.

"Is it so very bad? Oh, is it?" Mary heard her
say.

"Awfully," the young man answered in a
trembling voice. "Awfully, Mrs. Lennox. You
ought to have gone to the hills two weeks
ago."

The Mem Sahib wrung her hands.

"Oh, I know I ought!" she cried. "I only stayed
to go to that silly dinner party. What a fool I
was!"

At that very moment such a loud sound of
wailing broke out from the servants'
quarters that she clutched the young man's

-2-

wine made her so sleepy that she could
scarcely keep her eyes open and she lay
down on her bed and knew nothing more for
a long time.

Many things happened during the hours in
which she slept so heavily, but she was not
disturbed by the wails and the sound of
things being carried in and out of the
bungalow.

When she awakened she lay and stared at
the wall. The house was perfectly still. She
had never known it to be so silent before.
She heard neither voices nor footsteps, and
wondered if everybody had got well of the
cholera and all the trouble was over. She
wondered also who would take care of her
now her Ayah was dead. There would be a
new Ayah, and perhaps she would know
some new stories. Mary had been rather
tired of the old ones. She did not cry
because her nurse had died. She was not
an affectionate child and had never cared
much for any one. The noise and hurrying
about and wailing over the cholera had
frightened her, and she had been angry
because no one seemed to remember that
she was alive. Everyone was too panic-
stricken to think of a little girl no one was
fond of. When people had the cholera it
seemed that they remembered nothing but
themselves. But if everyone had got well
again, surely some one would remember
and come to look for her.

But no one came, and as she lay waiting the
house seemed to grow more and more
silent. She heard something rustling on the
matting and when she looked down she
saw a little snake gliding along and
watching her with eyes like jewels. She
was not frightened, because he was a
harmless little thing who would not hurt her
and he seemed in a hurry to get out of the
room. He slipped under the door as she

-3-

her foot. "Why does nobody come?"

The young man whose name was Barney
looked at her very sadly. Mary even thought
she saw him wink his eyes as if to wink
tears away.

"Poor little kid!" he said. "There is nobody
left to come."

It was in that strange and sudden way that
Mary found out that she had neither father
nor mother left; that they had died and been
carried away in the night, and that the few
native servants who had not died also had
left the house as quickly as they could get
out of it, none of them even remembering
that there was a Missie Sahib. That was
why the place was so quiet. It was true that
there was no one in the bungalow but
herself and the little rustling snake.

Chapter 2 MISTRESS MARY QUITE
CONTRARY

Mary had liked to look at her mother from a
distance and she had thought her very
pretty, but as she knew very little of her she
could scarcely have been expected to love
her or to miss her very much when she was
gone. She did not miss her at all, in fact, and
as she was a self-absorbed child she gave
her entire thought to herself, as she had
always done. If she had been older she
would no doubt have been very anxious at
being left alone in the world, but she was
very young, and as she had always been
taken care of, she supposed she always
would be. What she thought was that she
would like to know if she was going to nice
people, who would be polite to her and give
her her own way as her Ayah and the other
native servants had done.

She knew that she was not going to stay at
the English clergyman's house where she

-4-

stayed with them they called her "Mistress
Mary Quite Contrary" when they spoke of
her to each other, and often when they
spoke to her.

"You are going to be sent home," Basil said
to her, "at the end of the week. And we're
glad of it."

"I am glad of it, too," answered Mary. "Where
is home?"

"She doesn't know where home is!" said
Basil, with seven-year-old scorn. "It's
England, of course. Our grandmama lives
there and our sister Mabel was sent to her
last year. You are not going to your
grandmama. You have none. You are going
to your uncle. His name is Mr. Archibald
Craven."

"I don't know anything about him," snapped
Mary.

"I know you don't," Basil answered. "You
don't know anything. Girls never do. I heard
father and mother talking about him. He
lives in a great, big, desolate old house in
the country and no one goes near him. He's
so cross he won't let them, and they
wouldn't come if he would let them. He's a
hunchback, and he's horrid." "I don't believe
you," said Mary; and she turned her back
and stuck her fingers in her ears, because
she would not listen any more.

But she thought over it a great deal
afterward; and when Mrs. Crawford told her
that night that she was going to sail away to
England in a few days and go to her uncle,
Mr. Archibald Craven, who lived at
Misselthwaite Manor, she looked so stony
and stubbornly uninterested that they did not
know what to think about her. They tried to
be kind to her, but she only turned her face
away when Mrs. Crawford attempted to

-5-

all, but as she very seldom liked people
there was nothing remarkable in that;
besides which it was very evident Mrs.
Medlock did not think much of her.

"My word! she's a plain little piece of
goods!" she said. "And we'd heard that her
mother was a beauty. She hasn't handed
much of it down, has she, ma'am?"
"Perhaps she will improve as she grows
older," the officer's wife said good-
naturedly. "If she were not so sallow and had
a nicer expression, her features are rather
good. Children alter so much."

"She'll have to alter a good deal," answered
Mrs. Medlock. "And, there's nothing likely to
improve children at Misselthwaite—if you ask
me!" They thought Mary was not listening
because she was standing a little apart
from them at the window of the private hotel
they had gone to. She was watching the
passing buses and cabs and people, but
she heard quite well and was made very
curious about her uncle and the place he
lived in. What sort of a place was it, and
what would he be like? What was a
hunchback? She had never seen one.
Perhaps there were none in India.

Since she had been living in other people's
houses and had had no Ayah, she had
begun to feel lonely and to think queer
thoughts which were new to her. She had
begun to wonder why she had never
seemed to belong to anyone even when her
father and mother had been alive. Other
children seemed to belong to their fathers
and mothers, but she had never seemed to
really be anyone's little girl. She had had
servants, and food and clothes, but no one
had taken any notice of her. She did not
know that this was because she was a
disagreeable child; but then, of course, she
did not know she was disagreeable. She
often thought that other people were, but

-6-

"A more marred-looking young one I never
saw in my life," Mrs. Medlock thought.
(Marred is a Yorkshire word and means
spoiled and pettish.) She had never seen a
child who sat so still without doing anything;
and at last she got tired of watching her and
began to talk in a brisk, hard voice.

"I suppose I may as well tell you something
about where you are going to," she said.
"Do you know anything about your uncle?"

"No," said Mary.

"Never heard your father and mother talk
about him?"

"No," said Mary frowning. She frowned
because she remembered that her father
and mother had never talked to her about
anything in particular. Certainly they had
never told her things.

"Humph," muttered Mrs. Medlock, staring at
her queer, unresponsive little face. She did
not say any more for a few moments and
then she began again.

"I suppose you might as well be told
something—to prepare you. You are going to
a queer place."

Mary said nothing at all, and Mrs. Medlock
looked rather discomfited by her apparent
indifference, but, after taking a breath, she
went on.

"Not but that it's a grand big place in a
gloomy way, and Mr. Craven's proud of it in
his way—and that's gloomy enough, too. The
house is six hundred years old and it's on
the edge of the moor, and there's near a
hundred rooms in it, though most of them's
shut up and locked. And there's pictures
and fine old furniture and things that's been
there for ages, and there's a big park round

-7-

married and she was a trifle surprised. Mrs.
Medlock saw this, and as she was a
talkative woman she continued with more
interest. This was one way of passing some
of the time, at any rate.

"She was a sweet, pretty thing and he'd
have walked the world over to get her a
blade o' grass she wanted. Nobody thought
she'd marry him, but she did, and people
said she married him for his money. But she
didn't—she didn't," positively. "When she
died—"

Mary gave a little involuntary jump.

"Oh! did she die!" she exclaimed, quite
without meaning to. She had just
remembered a French fairy story she had
once read called "Riquet a la Houppe." It
had been about a poor hunchback and a
beautiful princess and it had made her
suddenly sorry for Mr. Archibald Craven.

"Yes, she died," Mrs. Medlock answered.
"And it made him queerer than ever. He
cares about nobody. He won't see people.
Most of the time he goes away, and when
he is at Misselthwaite he shuts himself up in
the West Wing and won't let any one but
Pitcher see him. Pitcher's an old fellow, but
he took care of him when he was a child and
he knows his ways."

It sounded like something in a book and it
did not make Mary feel cheerful. A house
with a hundred rooms, nearly all shut up and
with their doors locked—a house on the edge
of a moor—whatsoever a moor
was—sounded dreary. A man with a crooked
back who shut himself up also! She stared
out of the window with her lips pinched
together, and it seemed quite natural that
the rain should have begun to pour down in
gray slanting lines and splash and stream
down the window-panes. If the pretty wife

-8-

and chicken and beef. She ate a great deal
and afterward fell asleep herself, and Mary
sat and stared at her and watched her fine
bonnet slip on one side until she herself fell
asleep once more in the corner of the
carriage, lulled by the splashing of the rain
against the windows. It was quite dark when
she awakened again. The train had
stopped at a station and Mrs. Medlock was
shaking her.

"You have had a sleep!" she said. "It's time
to open your eyes! We're at Thwaite Station
and we've got a long drive before us."

Mary stood up and tried to keep her eyes
open while Mrs. Medlock collected her
parcels. The little girl did not offer to help
her, because in India native servants always
picked up or carried things and it seemed
quite proper that other people should wait
on one.

The station was a small one and nobody but
themselves seemed to be getting out of the
train. The station-master spoke to Mrs.
Medlock in a rough, good-natured way,
pronouncing his words in a queer broad
fashion which Mary found out afterward
was Yorkshire.

"I see tha's got back," he said. "An' tha's
browt th' young 'un with thee."

"Aye, that's her," answered Mrs. Medlock,
speaking with a Yorkshire accent herself
and jerking her head over her shoulder
toward Mary. "How's thy Missus?"

"Well enow. Th' carriage is waitin' outside
for thee."

A brougham stood on the road before the
little outside platform. Mary saw that it was a
smart carriage and that it was a smart
footman who helped her in. His long

-9-

At last the horses began to go more slowly,
as if they were climbing up-hill, and
presently there seemed to be no more
hedges and no more trees. She could see
nothing, in fact, but a dense darkness on
either side. She leaned forward and
pressed her face against the window just
as the carriage gave a big jolt.

"Eh! We're on the moor now sure enough,"
said Mrs. Medlock.

The carriage lamps shed a yellow light on a
rough-looking road which seemed to be cut
through bushes and low-growing things
which ended in the great expanse of dark
apparently spread out before and around
them. A wind was rising and making a
singular, wild, low, rushing sound.

"It's—it's not the sea, is it?" said Mary,
looking round at her companion.

"No, not it," answered Mrs. Medlock. "Nor it
isn't fields nor mountains, it's just miles and
miles and miles of wild land that nothing
grows on but heather and gorse and broom,
and nothing lives on but wild ponies and
sheep."

"I feel as if it might be the sea, if there were
water on it," said Mary. "It sounds like the
sea just now."

"That's the wind blowing through the
bushes," Mrs. Medlock said. "It's a wild,
dreary enough place to my mind, though
there's plenty that likes it—particularly when
the heather's in bloom."

On and on they drove through the darkness,
and though the rain stopped, the wind
rushed by and whistled and made strange
sounds. The road went up and down, and
several times the carriage passed over a
little bridge beneath which water rushed

-10-

small and lost and odd as she looked.

A neat, thin old man stood near the
manservant who opened the door for them.

"You are to take her to her room," he said in
a husky voice. "He doesn't want to see her.
He's going to London in the morning."

"Very well, Mr. Pitcher," Mrs. Medlock
answered. "So long as I know what's
expected of me, I can manage."

"What's expected of you, Mrs. Medlock," Mr.
Pitcher said, "is that you make sure that
he's not disturbed and that he doesn't see
what he doesn't want to see."

And then Mary Lennox was led up a broad
staircase and down a long corridor and up a
short flight of steps and through another
corridor and another, until a door opened in
a wall and she found herself in a room with a
fire in it and a supper on a table.

Mrs. Medlock said unceremoniously:

"Well, here you are! This room and the next
are where you'll live—and you must keep to
them. Don't you forget that!"

It was in this way Mistress Mary arrived at
Misselthwaite Manor and she had perhaps
never felt quite so contrary in all her life.

Chapter 4 MARTHA

When she opened her eyes in the morning it
was because a young housemaid had
come into her room to light the fire and was
kneeling on the hearth-rug raking out the
cinders noisily. Mary lay and watched her
for a few moments and then began to look
about the room. She had never seen a room
at all like it and thought it curious and
gloomy. The walls were covered with

-11-

expression. The native servants she had
been used to in India were not in the least
like this. They were obsequious and servile
and did not presume to talk to their masters
as if they were their equals. They made
salaams and called them "protector of the
poor" and names of that sort. Indian
servants were commanded to do things, not
asked. It was not the custom to say "please"
and "thank you" and Mary had always
slapped her Ayah in the face when she was
angry. She wondered a little what this girl
would do if one slapped her in the face. She
was a round, rosy, good-natured-looking
creature, but she had a sturdy way which
made Mistress Mary wonder if she might
not even slap back—if the person who
slapped her was only a little girl.

"You are a strange servant," she said from
her pillows, rather haughtily.

Martha sat up on her heels, with her
blackingbrush in her hand, and laughed,
without seeming the least out of temper.

"Eh! I know that," she said. "If there was a
grand Missus at Misselthwaite I should
never have been even one of th' under
house-maids. I might have been let to be
scullerymaid but I'd never have been let
upstairs. I'm too common an' I talk too much
Yorkshire. But this is a funny house for all it's
so grand. Seems like there's neither Master
nor Mistress except Mr. Pitcher an' Mrs.
Medlock. Mr. Craven, he won't be troubled
about anythin' when he's here, an' he's
nearly always away. Mrs. Medlock gave me
th' place out o' kindness. She told me she
could never have done it if Misselthwaite
had been like other big houses." "Are you
going to be my servant?" Mary asked, still in
her imperious little Indian way.

Martha began to rub her grate again.

-12-

heard you was comin' from India I thought
you was a black too."

Mary sat up in bed furious.

"What!" she said. "What! You thought I was a
native. You—you daughter of a pig!"

Martha stared and looked hot.

"Who are you callin' names?" she said. "You
needn't be so vexed. That's not th' way for a
young lady to talk. I've nothin' against th'
blacks. When you read about 'em in tracts
they're always very religious. You always
read as a black's a man an' a brother. I've
never seen a black an' I was fair pleased to
think I was goin' to see one close. When I
come in to light your fire this mornin' I crep'
up to your bed an' pulled th' cover back
careful to look at you. An' there you was,"
disappointedly, "no more black than me—for
all you're so yeller."

Mary did not even try to control her rage and
humiliation. "You thought I was a native! You
dared! You don't know anything about
natives! They are not people—they're
servants who must salaam to you. You know
nothing about India. You know nothing about
anything!"

She was in such a rage and felt so helpless
before the girl's simple stare, and
somehow she suddenly felt so horribly
lonely and far away from everything she
understood and which understood her, that
she threw herself face downward on the
pillows and burst into passionate sobbing.
She sobbed so unrestrainedly that good-
natured Yorkshire Martha was a little
frightened and quite sorry for her. She went
to the bed and bent over her.

"Eh! you mustn't cry like that there!" she
begged. "You mustn't for sure. I didn't know

-13-

up" her little sisters and brothers but she had
never seen a child who stood still and
waited for another person to do things for
her as if she had neither hands nor feet of
her own.

"Why doesn't tha' put on tha' own shoes?"
she said when Mary quietly held out her foot.

"My Ayah did it," answered Mary, staring. "It
was the custom."

She said that very often—"It was the custom."
The native servants were always saying it. If
one told them to do a thing their ancestors
had not done for a thousand years they
gazed at one mildly and said, "It is not the
custom" and one knew that was the end of
the matter.

It had not been the custom that Mistress
Mary should do anything but stand and allow
herself to be dressed like a doll, but before
she was ready for breakfast she began to
suspect that her life at Misselthwaite Manor
would end by teaching her a number of
things quite new to her—things such as
putting on her own shoes and stockings,
and picking up things she let fall. If Martha
had been a well-trained fine young lady's
maid she would have been more
subservient and respectful and would have
known that it was her business to brush hair,
and button boots, and pick things up and lay
them away. She was, however, only an
untrained Yorkshire rustic who had been
brought up in a moorland cottage with a
swarm of little brothers and sisters who had
never dreamed of doing anything but
waiting on themselves and on the younger
ones who were either babies in arms or just
learning to totter about and tumble over
things.

If Mary Lennox had been a child who was
ready to be amused she would perhaps

-14-

before her.

"I don't want it," she said.

"Tha' doesn't want thy porridge!" Martha
exclaimed incredulously.

"No."

"Tha' doesn't know how good it is. Put a bit
o' treacle on it or a bit o' sugar."

"I don't want it," repeated Mary.

"Eh!" said Martha. "I can't abide to see good
victuals go to waste. If our children was at
this table they'd clean it bare in five
minutes."

"Why?" said Mary coldly. "Why!" echoed
Martha. "Because they scarce ever had
their stomachs full in their lives. They're as
hungry as young hawks an' foxes."

"I don't know what it is to be hungry," said
Mary, with the indifference of ignorance.

Martha looked indignant.

"Well, it would do thee good to try it. I can see
that plain enough," she said outspokenly.
"I've no patience with folk as sits an' just
stares at good bread an' meat. My word!
don't I wish Dickon and Phil an' Jane an' th'
rest of 'em had what's here under their
pinafores."

"Why don't you take it to them?" suggested
Mary.

"It's not mine," answered Martha stoutly.
"An' this isn't my day out. I get my day out
once a month same as th' rest. Then I go
home an' clean up for mother an' give her a
day's rest."

-15-

her way downstairs.

"If tha' goes round that way tha'll come to th'
gardens," she said, pointing to a gate in a
wall of shrubbery. "There's lots o' flowers in
summer-time, but there's nothin' bloomin'
now." She seemed to hesitate a second
before she added, "One of th' gardens is
locked up. No one has been in it for ten
years."

"Why?" asked Mary in spite of herself. Here
was another locked door added to the
hundred in the strange house.

"Mr. Craven had it shut when his wife died
so sudden. He won't let no one go inside. It
was her garden. He locked th' door an' dug
a hole and buried th' key. There's Mrs.
Medlock's bell ringing—I must run."

After she was gone Mary turned down the
walk which led to the door in the shrubbery.
She could not help thinking about the
garden which no one had been into for ten
years. She wondered what it would look like
and whether there were any flowers still
alive in it. When she had passed through the
shrubbery gate she found herself in great
gardens, with wide lawns and winding
walks with clipped borders. There were
trees, and flower-beds, and evergreens
clipped into strange shapes, and a large
pool with an old gray fountain in its midst.
But the flower-beds were bare and wintry
and the fountain was not playing. This was
not the garden which was shut up. How
could a garden be shut up? You could
always walk into a garden.

She was just thinking this when she saw
that, at the end of the path she was
following, there seemed to be a long wall,
with ivy growing over it. She was not
familiar enough with England to know that
she was coming upon the kitchen-gardens

-16-

"If tha' likes. But there's nowt to see."

Mary made no response. She went down
the path and through the second green door.
There, she found more walls and winter
vegetables and glass frames, but in the
second wall there was another green door
and it was not open. Perhaps it led into the
garden which no one had seen for ten
years. As she was not at all a timid child and
always did what she wanted to do, Mary
went to the green door and turned the
handle. She hoped the door would not open
because she wanted to be sure she had
found the mysterious garden—but it did open
quite easily and she walked through it and
found herself in an orchard. There were
walls all round it also and trees trained
against them, and there were bare fruit-
trees growing in the winter-browned
grass—but there was no green door to be
seen anywhere. Mary looked for it, and yet
when she had entered the upper end of the
garden she had noticed that the wall did not
seem to end with the orchard but to extend
beyond it as if it enclosed a place at the
other side. She could see the tops of trees
above the wall, and when she stood still she
saw a bird with a bright red breast sitting on
the topmost branch of one of them, and
suddenly he burst into his winter
song—almost as if he had caught sight of her
and was calling to her.

She stopped and listened to him and
somehow his cheerful, friendly little whistle
gave her a pleased feeling—even a
disagreeable little girl may be lonely, and
the big closed house and big bare moor and
big bare gardens had made this one feel as
if there was no one left in the world but
herself. If she had been an affectionate
child, who had been used to being loved,
she would have broken her heart, but even
though she was "Mistress Mary Quite
Contrary" she was desolate, and the bright-

-17-

"I have been into the other gardens," she
said.

"There was nothin' to prevent thee," he
answered crustily.

"I went into the orchard."

"There was no dog at th' door to bite thee,"
he answered.

"There was no door there into the other
garden," said Mary.

"What garden?" he said in a rough voice,
stopping his digging for a moment.

"The one on the other side of the wall,"
answered Mistress Mary. "There are trees
there—I saw the tops of them. A bird with a
red breast was sitting on one of them and
he sang."

To her surprise the surly old weather-
beaten face actually changed its
expression. A slow smile spread over it and
the gardener looked quite different. It made
her think that it was curious how much nicer
a person looked when he smiled. She had
not thought of it before.

He turned about to the orchard side of his
garden and began to whistle—a low soft
whistle. She could not understand how such
a surly man could make such a coaxing
sound. Almost the next moment a wonderful
thing happened. She heard a soft little
rushing flight through the air—and it was the
bird with the red breast flying to them, and
he actually alighted on the big clod of earth
quite near to the gardener's foot.

"Here he is," chuckled the old man, and then
he spoke to the bird as if he were speaking
to a child.

-18-

curious—bless me, there never was his like
for curiosity an' meddlin'. He's always
comin' to see what I'm plantin'. He knows
all th' things Mester Craven never troubles
hissel' to find out. He's th' head gardener,
he is."

The robin hopped about busily pecking the
soil and now and then stopped and looked
at them a little. Mary thought his black
dewdrop eyes gazed at her with great
curiosity. It really seemed as if he were
finding out all about her. The queer feeling in
her heart increased. "Where did the rest of
the brood fly to?" she asked.

"There's no knowin'. The old ones turn 'em
out o' their nest an' make 'em fly an' they're
scattered before you know it. This one was
a knowin' one an, he knew he was lonely."

Mistress Mary went a step nearer to the
robin and looked at him very hard.

"I'm lonely," she said.

She had not known before that this was one
of the things which made her feel sour and
cross. She seemed to find it out when the
robin looked at her and she looked at the
robin.

The old gardener pushed his cap back on
his bald head and stared at her a minute.

"Art tha' th' little wench from India?" he
asked.

Mary nodded.

"Then no wonder tha'rt lonely. Tha'lt be
lonlier before tha's done," he said.

He began to dig again, driving his spade
deep into the rich black garden soil while
the robin hopped about very busily

-19-

"He's made up his mind to make friends
with thee," replied Ben. "Dang me if he
hasn't took a fancy to thee."

"To me?" said Mary, and she moved toward
the little tree softly and looked up.

"Would you make friends with me?" she said
to the robin just as if she was speaking to a
person. "Would you?" And she did not say it
either in her hard little voice or in her
imperious Indian voice, but in a tone so soft
and eager and coaxing that Ben
Weatherstaff was as surprised as she had
been when she heard him whistle.

"Why," he cried out, "tha' said that as nice
an' human as if tha' was a real child instead
of a sharp old woman. Tha' said it almost
like Dickon talks to his wild things on th'
moor."

"Do you know Dickon?" Mary asked, turning
round rather in a hurry.

"Everybody knows him. Dickon's wanderin'
about everywhere. Th' very blackberries an'
heather-bells knows him. I warrant th' foxes
shows him where their cubs lies an' th'
skylarks doesn't hide their nests from him."

Mary would have liked to ask some more
questions. She was almost as curious
about Dickon as she was about the
deserted garden. But just that moment the
robin, who had ended his song, gave a little
shake of his wings, spread them and flew
away. He had made his visit and had other
things to do.

"He has flown over the wall!" Mary cried out,
watching him. "He has flown into the
orchard—he has flown across the other
wall—into the garden where there is no door!"

"He lives there," said old Ben. "He came out

-20-

moor which seemed to spread out on all
sides and climb up to the sky, and after she
had stared for a while she realized that if
she did not go out she would have to stay in
and do nothing—and so she went out. She
did not know that this was the best thing she
could have done, and she did not know that,
when she began to walk quickly or even run
along the paths and down the avenue, she
was stirring her slow blood and making
herself stronger by fighting with the wind
which swept down from the moor. She ran
only to make herself warm, and she hated
the wind which rushed at her face and
roared and held her back as if it were some
giant she could not see. But the big breaths
of rough fresh air blown over the heather
filled her lungs with something which was
good for her whole thin body and whipped
some red color into her cheeks and
brightened her dull eyes when she did not
know anything about it.

But after a few days spent almost entirely
out of doors she wakened one morning
knowing what it was to be hungry, and when
she sat down to her breakfast she did not
glance disdainfully at her porridge and push
it away, but took up her spoon and began to
eat it and went on eating it until her bowl
was empty.

"Tha' got on well enough with that this
mornin', didn't tha'?" said Martha.

"It tastes nice today," said Mary, feeling a
little surprised her self.

"It's th' air of th' moor that's givin' thee
stomach for tha' victuals," answered
Martha. "It's lucky for thee that tha's got
victuals as well as appetite. There's been
twelve in our cottage as had th' stomach an'
nothin' to put in it. You go on playin' you out
o' doors every day an' you'll get some flesh
on your bones an' you won't be so yeller."

-21-

He did answer. He twittered and chirped
and hopped along the wall as if he were
telling her all sorts of things. It seemed to
Mistress Mary as if she understood him,
too, though he was not speaking in words. It
was as if he said:

"Good morning! Isn't the wind nice? Isn't the
sun nice? Isn't everything nice? Let us both
chirp and hop and twitter. Come on! Come
on!"

Mary began to laugh, and as he hopped and
took little flights along the wall she ran after
him. Poor little thin, sallow, ugly Mary—she
actually looked almost pretty for a moment.

"I like you! I like you!" she cried out, pattering
down the walk; and she chirped and tried to
whistle, which last she did not know how to
do in the least. But the robin seemed to be
quite satisfied and chirped and whistled
back at her. At last he spread his wings and
made a darting flight to the top of a tree,
where he perched and sang loudly. That
reminded Mary of the first time she had
seen him. He had been swinging on a tree-
top then and she had been standing in the
orchard. Now she was on the other side of
the orchard and standing in the path outside
a wall—much lower down—and there was the
same tree inside.

"It's in the garden no one can go into," she
said to herself. "It's the garden without a
door. He lives in there. How I wish I could
see what it is like!"

She ran up the walk to the green door she
had entered the first morning. Then she ran
down the path through the other door and
then into the orchard, and when she stood
and looked up there was the tree on the
other side of the wall, and there was the
robin just finishing his song and, beginning
to preen his feathers with his beak.

-22-

full of brothers and sisters, and she found it
dull in the great servants' hall downstairs
where the footman and upper-housemaids
made fun of her Yorkshire speech and
looked upon her as a common little thing,
and sat and whispered among themselves.
Martha liked to talk, and the strange child
who had lived in India, and been waited
upon by "blacks," was novelty enough to
attract her.

She sat down on the hearth herself without
waiting to be asked.

"Art tha' thinkin' about that garden yet?" she
said. "I knew tha' would. That was just the
way with me when I first heard about it."

"Why did he hate it?" Mary persisted.

Martha tucked her feet under her and made
herself quite comfortable.

"Listen to th' wind wutherin' round the
house," she said. "You could bare stand up
on the moor if you was out on it tonight."

Mary did not know what "wutherin'" meant
until she listened, and then she understood.
It must mean that hollow shuddering sort of
roar which rushed round and round the
house as if the giant no one could see were
buffeting it and beating at the walls and
windows to try to break in. But one knew he
could not get in, and somehow it made one
feel very safe and warm inside a room with
a red coal fire.

"But why did he hate it so?" she asked, after
she had listened. She intended to know if
Martha did.

Then Martha gave up her store of
knowledge.

"Mind," she said, "Mrs. Medlock said it's not

-23-

not outside it. It was far away, but it was
inside. She turned round and looked at
Martha.

"Do you hear any one crying?" she said.

Martha suddenly looked confused.

"No," she answered. "It's th' wind.
Sometimes it sounds like as if some one
was lost on th' moor an' wailin'. It's got all
sorts o' sounds."

"But listen," said Mary. "It's in the
house—down one of those long corridors."

And at that very moment a door must have
been opened somewhere downstairs; for a
great rushing draft blew along the passage
and the door of the room they sat in was
blown open with a crash, and as they both
jumped to their feet the light was blown out
and the crying sound was swept down the
far corridor so that it was to be heard more
plainly than ever.

"There!" said Mary. "I told you so! It is some
one crying—and it isn't a grown-up person."

Martha ran and shut the door and turned the
key, but before she did it they both heard the
sound of a door in some far passage
shutting with a bang, and then everything
was quiet, for even the wind ceased
"wutherin'" for a few moments.

"It was th' wind," said Martha stubbornly.
"An' if it wasn't, it was little Betty
Butterworth, th' scullery-maid. She's had
th' toothache all day."

But something troubled and awkward in her
manner made Mistress Mary stare very hard
at her. She did not believe she was
speaking the truth.

-24-

attracted by the mother and Dickon. When
Martha told stories of what "mother" said or
did they always sounded comfortable.

"If I had a raven or a fox cub I could play with
it," said Mary. "But I have nothing."

Martha looked perplexed.

"Can tha' knit?" she asked.

"No," answered Mary.

"Can tha'sew?"

"No."

"Can tha' read?"

"Yes."

"Then why doesn't tha, read somethin', or
learn a bit o' spellin'? Tha'st old enough to
be learnin' thy book a good bit now."

"I haven't any books," said Mary. "Those I
had were left in India."

"That's a pity," said Martha. "If Mrs.
Medlock'd let thee go into th' library, there's
thousands o' books there."

Mary did not ask where the library was,
because she was suddenly inspired by a
new idea. She made up her mind to go and
find it herself. She was not troubled about
Mrs. Medlock. Mrs. Medlock seemed
always to be in her comfortable
housekeeper's sitting-room downstairs. In
this queer place one scarcely ever saw any
one at all. In fact, there was no one to see
but the servants, and when their master was
away they lived a luxurious life below stairs,
where there was a huge kitchen hung about
with shining brass and pewter, and a large
servants' hall where there were four or five

-25-

would be something to do on this morning
when she could not go out. She had never
been taught to ask permission to do things,
and she knew nothing at all about authority,
so she would not have thought it necessary
to ask Mrs. Medlock if she might walk about
the house, even if she had seen her.

She opened the door of the room and went
into the corridor, and then she began her
wanderings. It was a long corridor and it
branched into other corridors and it led her
up short flights of steps which mounted to
others again. There were doors and doors,
and there were pictures on the walls.
Sometimes they were pictures of dark,
curious landscapes, but oftenest they were
portraits of men and women in queer, grand
costumes made of satin and velvet. She
found herself in one long gallery whose
walls were covered with these portraits.
She had never thought there could be so
many in any house. She walked slowly
down this place and stared at the faces
which also seemed to stare at her. She felt
as if they were wondering what a little girl
from India was doing in their house. Some
were pictures of children—little girls in thick
satin frocks which reached to their feet and
stood out about them, and boys with puffed
sleeves and lace collars and long hair, or
with big ruffs around their necks. She
always stopped to look at the children, and
wonder what their names were, and where
they had gone, and why they wore such odd
clothes. There was a stiff, plain little girl
rather like herself. She wore a green
brocade dress and held a green parrot on
her finger. Her eyes had a sharp, curious
look.

"Where do you live now?" said Mary aloud to
her. "I wish you were here."

Surely no other little girl ever spent such a
queer morning. It seemed as if there was no

-26-

ivory. They were of different sizes, and
some had their mahouts or palanquins on
their backs. Some were much bigger than
the others and some were so tiny that they
seemed only babies. Mary had seen carved
ivory in India and she knew all about
elephants. She opened the door of the
cabinet and stood on a footstool and played
with these for quite a long time. When she
got tired she set the elephants in order and
shut the door of the cabinet.

In all her wanderings through the long
corridors and the empty rooms, she had
seen nothing alive; but in this room she saw
something. Just after she had closed the
cabinet door she heard a tiny rustling sound.
It made her jump and look around at the
sofa by the fireplace, from which it seemed
to come. In the corner of the sofa there was
a cushion, and in the velvet which covered it
there was a hole, and out of the hole
peeped a tiny head with a pair of tightened
eyes in it.

Mary crept softly across the room to look.
The bright eyes belonged to a little gray
mouse, and the mouse had eaten a hole
into the cushion and made a comfortable
nest there. Six baby mice were cuddled up
asleep near her. If there was no one else
alive in the hundred rooms there were seven
mice who did not look lonely at all.

"If they wouldn't be so frightened I would
take them back with me," said Mary.

She had wandered about long enough to
feel too tired to wander any farther, and she
turned back. Two or three times she lost her
way by turning down the wrong corridor and
was obliged to ramble up and down until
she found the right one; but at last she
reached her own floor again, though she
was some distance from her own room and
did not know exactly where she was.

-27-

to stay or you'll find yourself locked up. The
master had better get you a governess,
same as he said he would. You're one that
needs some one to look sharp after you. I've
got enough to do."

She went out of the room and slammed the
door after her, and Mary went and sat on the
hearth-rug, pale with rage. She did not cry,
but ground her teeth.

"There was some one crying—there
was—there was!" she said to herself.

She had heard it twice now, and sometime
she would find out. She had found out a
great deal this morning. She felt as if she
had been on a long journey, and at any rate
she had had something to amuse her all the
time, and she had played with the ivory
elephants and had seen the gray mouse
and its babies in their nest in the velvet
cushion.

Chapter 7 THE KEY TO THE GARDEN

Two days after this, when Mary opened her
eyes she sat upright in bed immediately,
and called to Martha.

"Look at the moor! Look at the moor!"

The rainstorm had ended and the gray mist
and clouds had been swept away in the
night by the wind. The wind itself had
ceased and a brilliant, deep blue sky
arched high over the moorland. Never,
never had Mary dreamed of a sky so blue. In
India skies were hot and blazing; this was of
a deep cool blue which almost seemed to
sparkle like the waters of some lovely
bottomless lake, and here and there, high,
high in the arched blueness floated small
clouds of snow-white fleece. The far-
reaching world of the moor itself looked
softly blue instead of gloomy purple-black

-28-

never used tha' legs since tha' was born, it
seems to me. Tha' couldn't walk five mile.
It's five mile to our cottage."

"I should like to see your cottage."

Martha stared at her a moment curiously
before she took up her polishing brush and
began to rub the grate again. She was
thinking that the small plain face did not look
quite as sour at this moment as it had done
the first morning she saw it. It looked just a
trifle like little Susan Ann's when she
wanted something very much.

"I'll ask my mother about it," she said.
"She's one o' them that nearly always sees
a way to do things. It's my day out today an'
I'm goin' home. Eh! I am glad. Mrs. Medlock
thinks a lot o' mother. Perhaps she could
talk to her."

"I like your mother," said Mary.

"I should think tha' did," agreed Martha,
polishing away.

"I've never seen her," said Mary.

"No, tha' hasn't," replied Martha.

She sat up on her heels again and rubbed
the end of her nose with the back of her
hand as if puzzled for a moment, but she
ended quite positively.

"Well, she's that sensible an' hard workin'
an' goodnatured an' clean that no one could
help likin' her whether they'd seen her or
not. When I'm goin' home to her on my day
out I just jump for joy when I'm crossin' the
moor."

"I like Dickon," added Mary. "And I've never
seen him."

-29-

when she had finished she felt in better
spirits. The sunshine made the whole place
look different. The high, deep, blue sky
arched over Misselthwaite as well as over
the moor, and she kept lifting her face and
looking up into it, trying to imagine what it
would be like to lie down on one of the little
snow-white clouds and float about. She
went into the first kitchen-garden and found
Ben Weatherstaff working there with two
other gardeners. The change in the weather
seemed to have done him good. He spoke
to her of his own accord. "Springtime's
comin,'" he said. "Cannot tha' smell it?"

Mary sniffed and thought she could.

"I smell something nice and fresh and
damp," she said.

"That's th' good rich earth," he answered,
digging away. "It's in a good humor makin'
ready to grow things. It's glad when plantin'
time comes. It's dull in th' winter when it's
got nowt to do. In th' flower gardens out
there things will be stirrin' down below in th'
dark. Th' sun's warmin' 'em. You'll see bits
o' green spikes stickin' out o' th' black earth
after a bit."

"What will they be?" asked Mary.

"Crocuses an' snowdrops an'
daffydowndillys. Has tha' never seen
them?"

"No. Everything is hot, and wet, and green
after the rains in India," said Mary. "And I
think things grow up in a night."

"These won't grow up in a night," said
Weatherstaff. "Tha'll have to wait for 'em.
They'll poke up a bit higher here, an' push
out a spike more there, an' uncurl a leaf this
day an' another that. You watch 'em."

-30-

people to like—when you were not used to
liking. She thought of the robin as one of the
people. She went to her walk outside the
long, ivy-covered wall over which she could
see the tree-tops; and the second time she
walked up and down the most interesting
and exciting thing happened to her, and it
was all through Ben Weatherstaff's robin.

She heard a chirp and a twitter, and when
she looked at the bare flower-bed at her left
side there he was hopping about and
pretending to peck things out of the earth to
persuade her that he had not followed her.
But she knew he had followed her and the
surprise so filled her with delight that she
almost trembled a little.

"You do remember me!" she cried out. "You
do! You are prettier than anything else in the
world!"

She chirped, and talked, and coaxed and
he hopped, and flirted his tail and twittered.
It was as if he were talking. His red
waistcoat was like satin and he puffed his
tiny breast out and was so fine and so grand
and so pretty that it was really as if he were
showing her how important and like a
human person a robin could be. Mistress
Mary forgot that she had ever been contrary
in her life when he allowed her to draw
closer and closer to him, and bend down
and talk and try to make something like
robin sounds.

Oh! to think that he should actually let her
come as near to him as that! He knew
nothing in the world would make her put out
her hand toward him or startle him in the
least tiniest way. He knew it because he
was a real person—only nicer than any other
person in the world. She was so happy that
she scarcely dared to breathe.

The flower-bed was not quite bare. It was

-31-

that something strange must have
happened to it during ten years. Besides
that, if she liked it she could go into it every
day and shut the door behind her, and she
could make up some play of her own and
play it quite alone, because nobody would
ever know where she was, but would think
the door was still locked and the key buried
in the earth. The thought of that pleased her
very much.

Living as it were, all by herself in a house
with a hundred mysteriously closed rooms
and having nothing whatever to do to amuse
herself, had set her inactive brain to
working and was actually awakening her
imagination. There is no doubt that the
fresh, strong, pure air from the moor had a
great deal to do with it. Just as it had given
her an appetite, and fighting with the wind
had stirred her blood, so the same things
had stirred her mind. In India she had always
been too hot and languid and weak to care
much about anything, but in this place she
was beginning to care and to want to do
new things. Already she felt less "contrary,"
though she did not know why.

She put the key in her pocket and walked up
and down her walk. No one but herself ever
seemed to come there, so she could walk
slowly and look at the wall, or, rather, at the
ivy growing on it. The ivy was the baffling
thing. Howsoever carefully she looked she
could see nothing but thickly growing,
glossy, dark green leaves. She was very
much disappointed. Something of her
contrariness came back to her as she
paced the walk and looked over it at the
tree-tops inside. It seemed so silly, she
said to herself, to be near it and not be able
to get in. She took the key in her pocket
when she went back to the house, and she
made up her mind that she would always
carry it with her when she went out, so that if
she ever should find the hidden door she

-32-

more to talk about. I dare say they would like
to hear about riding on elephants and
camels, and about the officers going to hunt
tigers."

"My word!" cried delighted Martha. "It would
set 'em clean off their heads. Would tha'
really do that, Miss? It would be same as a
wild beast show like we heard they had in
York once."

"India is quite different from Yorkshire,"
Mary said slowly, as she thought the matter
over. "I never thought of that. Did Dickon and
your mother like to hear you talk about me?"

"Why, our Dickon's eyes nearly started out
o' his head, they got that round," answered
Martha. "But mother, she was put out about
your seemin' to be all by yourself like. She
said, 'Hasn't Mr. Craven got no governess
for her, nor no nurse?' and I said, 'No, he
hasn't, though Mrs. Medlock says he will
when he thinks of it, but she says he mayn't
think of it for two or three years.'"

"I don't want a governess," said Mary
sharply.

"But mother says you ought to be learnin'
your book by this time an' you ought to have
a woman to look after you, an' she says:
'Now, Martha, you just think how you'd feel
yourself, in a big place like that, wanderin'
about all alone, an' no mother. You do your
best to cheer her up,' she says, an' I said I
would."

Mary gave her a long, steady look.

"You do cheer me up," she said. "I like to
hear you talk."

Presently Martha went out of the room and
came back with something held in her
hands under her apron.

-33-

cottager had the impudence to be doing
under their very noses. But Martha did not
even see them. The interest and curiosity in
Mistress Mary's face delighted her, and she
went on skipping and counted as she
skipped until she had reached a hundred.

"I could skip longer than that," she said when
she stopped. "I've skipped as much as five
hundred when I was twelve, but I wasn't as
fat then as I am now, an' I was in practice."

Mary got up from her chair beginning to feel
excited herself.

"It looks nice," she said. "Your mother is a
kind woman. Do you think I could ever skip
like that?"

"You just try it," urged Martha, handing her
the . "You can't skip a hundred at first, but if
you practice you'll mount up. That's what
mother said. She says, 'Nothin' will do her
more good than skippin' rope. It's th'
sensiblest toy a child can have. Let her play
out in th' fresh air skippin' an' it'll stretch her
legs an' arms an' give her some strength in
'em.'"

It was plain that there was not a great deal
of strength in Mistress Mary's arms and
legs when she first began to skip. She was
not very clever at it, but she liked it so much
that she did not want to stop.

"Put on tha' things and run an' skip out o'
doors," said Martha. "Mother said I must tell
you to keep out o' doors as much as you
could, even when it rains a bit, so as tha'
wrap up warm."

Mary put on her coat and hat and took her
skipping-rope over her arm. She opened
the door to go out, and then suddenly
thought of something and turned back rather
slowly.

-34-

skipped down the walk toward him and he
lifted his head and looked at her with a
curious expression. She had wondered if
he would notice her. She wanted him to see
her skip.

"Well!" he exclaimed. "Upon my word.
P'raps tha' art a young 'un, after all, an'
p'raps tha's got child's blood in thy veins
instead of sour buttermilk. Tha's skipped
red into thy cheeks as sure as my name's
Ben Weatherstaff. I wouldn't have believed
tha' could do it."

"I never skipped before," Mary said. "I'm
just beginning. I can only go up to twenty."

"Tha' keep on," said Ben. "Tha' shapes well
enough at it for a young 'un that's lived with
heathen. Just see how he's watchin' thee,"
jerking his head toward the robin. "He
followed after thee yesterday. He'll be at it
again today. He'll be bound to find out what
th' skippin'-rope is. He's never seen one.
Eh!" shaking his head at the bird, "tha'
curiosity will be th' death of thee sometime
if tha' doesn't look sharp."

Mary skipped round all the gardens and
round the orchard, resting every few
minutes. At length she went to her own
special walk and made up her mind to try if
she could skip the whole length of it. It was a
good long skip and she began slowly, but
before she had gone half-way down the
path she was so hot and breathless that she
was obliged to stop. She did not mind
much, because she had already counted up
to thirty. She stopped with a little laugh of
pleasure, and there, lo and behold, was the
robin swaying on a long branch of ivy. He
had followed her and he greeted her with a
chirp. As Mary had skipped toward him she
felt something heavy in her pocket strike
against her at each jump, and when she
saw the robin she laughed again.

-35-

closed ten years and she put her hand in her
pocket, drew out the key and found it fitted
the keyhole. She put the key in and turned it.
It took two hands to do it, but it did turn.

And then she took a long breath and looked
behind her up the long walk to see if any one
was coming. No one was coming. No one
ever did come, it seemed, and she took
another long breath, because she could not
help it, and she held back the swinging
curtain of ivy and pushed back the door
which opened slowly—slowly.

Then she slipped through it, and shut it
behind her, and stood with her back against
it, looking about her and breathing quite fast
with excitement, and wonder, and delight.

She was standing inside the secret garden.

Chapter 9 THE STRANGEST HOUSE ANY
ONE EVER LIVED IN

It was the sweetest, most mysterious-
looking place any one could imagine. The
high walls which shut it in were covered with
the leafless stems of climbing roses which
were so thick that they were matted
together. Mary Lennox knew they were
roses because she had seen a great many
roses in India. All the ground was covered
with grass of a wintry brown and out of it
grew clumps of bushes which were surely
rosebushes if they were alive. There were
numbers of standard roses which had so
spread their branches that they were like
little trees. There were other trees in the
garden, and one of the things which made
the place look strangest and loveliest was
that climbing roses had run all over them
and swung down long tendrils which made
light swaying curtains, and here and there
they had caught at each other or at a far-
reaching branch and had crept from one
tree to another and made lovely bridges of

-36-

But she was inside the wonderful garden
and she could come through the door under
the ivy any time and she felt as if she had
found a world all her own.

The sun was shining inside the four walls
and the high arch of blue sky over this
particular piece of Misselthwaite seemed
even more brilliant and soft than it was over
the moor. The robin flew down from his tree-
top and hopped about or flew after her from
one bush to another. He chirped a good
deal and had a very busy air, as if he were
showing her things. Everything was strange
and silent and she seemed to be hundreds
of miles away from any one, but somehow
she did not feel lonely at all. All that troubled
her was her wish that she knew whether all
the roses were dead, or if perhaps some of
them had lived and might put out leaves and
buds as the weather got warmer. She did
not want it to be a quite dead garden. If it
were a quite alive garden, how wonderful it
would be, and what thousands of roses
would grow on every side!

Her skipping-rope had hung over her arm
when she came in and after she had walked
about for a while she thought she would skip
round the whole garden, stopping when she
wanted to look at things. There seemed to
have been grass paths here and there, and
in one or two corners there were alcoves of
evergreen with stone seats or tall moss-
covered flower urns in them.

As she came near the second of these
alcoves she stopped skipping. There had
once been a flowerbed in it, and she
thought she saw something sticking out of
the black earth -some sharp little pale green
points. She remembered what Ben
Weatherstaff had said and she knelt down to
look at them.

"Yes, they are tiny growing things and they

-37-

without knowing it she was smiling down on
to the grass and the pale green points all the
time.

The robin was tremendously busy. He was
very much pleased to see gardening begun
on his own estate. He had often wondered
at Ben Weatherstaff. Where gardening is
done all sorts of delightful things to eat are
turned up with the soil. Now here was this
new kind of creature who was not half
Ben's size and yet had had the sense to
come into his garden and begin at once.

Mistress Mary worked in her garden until it
was time to go to her midday dinner. In fact,
she was rather late in remembering, and
when she put on her coat and hat, and
picked up her skipping-rope, she could not
believe that she had been working two or
three hours. She had been actually happy all
the time; and dozens and dozens of the tiny,
pale green points were to be seen in
cleared places, looking twice as cheerful as
they had looked before when the grass and
weeds had been smothering them.

"I shall come back this afternoon," she said,
looking all round at her new kingdom, and
speaking to the trees and the rose-bushes
as if they heard her.

Then she ran lightly across the grass,
pushed open the slow old door and slipped
through it under the ivy. She had such red
cheeks and such bright eyes and ate such a
dinner that Martha was delighted.

"Two pieces o' meat an' two helps o' rice
puddin'!" she said. "Eh! mother will be
pleased when I tell her what th' skippin'-
rope's done for thee."

In the course of her digging with her pointed
stick Mistress Mary had found herself
digging up a sort of white root rather like an

-38-

"I wish—I wish I had a little spade," she said.
"Whatever does tha' want a spade for?"
asked Martha, laughing. "Art tha' goin' to
take to diggin'? I must tell mother that, too."

Mary looked at the fire and pondered a little.
She must be careful if she meant to keep
her secret kingdom. She wasn't doing any
harm, but if Mr. Craven found out about the
open door he would be fearfully angry and
get a new key and lock it up forevermore.
She really could not bear that.

"This is such a big lonely place," she said
slowly, as if she were turning matters over in
her mind. "The house is lonely, and the park
is lonely, and the gardens are lonely. So
many places seem shut up. I never did many
things in India, but there were more people
to look at—natives and soldiers marching
by—and sometimes bands playing, and my
Ayah told me stories. There is no one to talk
to here except you and Ben Weatherstaff.
And you have to do your work and Ben
Weatherstaff won't speak to me often. I
thought if I had a little spade I could dig
somewhere as he does, and I might make a
little garden if he would give me some
seeds."

Martha's face quite lighted up.

"There now!" she exclaimed, "if that wasn't
one of th' things mother said. She says,
'There's such a lot o' room in that big place,
why don't they give her a bit for herself,
even if she doesn't plant nothin' but parsley
an' radishes? She'd dig an' rake away an'
be right down happy over it.' Them was the
very words she said."

"Were they?" said Mary. "How many things
she knows, doesn't she?"

"Eh!" said Martha. "It's like she says: 'A
woman as brings up twelve children learns

-39-

"Our Dickon can only read printin'. If tha'
could print we could write a letter to him an'
ask him to go an' buy th' garden tools an' th'
seeds at th' same time."

"Oh! you're a good girl!" Mary cried. "You
are, really! I didn't know you were so nice. I
know I can print letters if I try. Let's ask Mrs.
Medlock for a pen and ink and some
paper."

"I've got some of my own," said Martha. "I
bought 'em so I could print a bit of a letter to
mother of a Sunday. I'll go and get it." She
ran out of the room, and Mary stood by the
fire and twisted her thin little hands together
with sheer pleasure.

"If I have a spade," she whispered, "I can
make the earth nice and soft and dig up
weeds. If I have seeds and can make
flowers grow the garden won't be dead at
all—it will come alive."

She did not go out again that afternoon
because when Martha returned with her pen
and ink and paper she was obliged to clear
the table and carry the plates and dishes
downstairs and when she got into the
kitchen Mrs. Medlock was there and told her
to do something, so Mary waited for what
seemed to her a long time before she came
back. Then it was a serious piece of work to
write to Dickon. Mary had been taught very
little because her governesses had disliked
her too much to stay with her. She could not
spell particularly well but she found that she
could print letters when she tried. This was
the letter Martha dictated to her: "My Dear
Dickon:

This comes hoping to find you well as it
leaves me at present. Miss Mary has plenty
of money and will you go to Thwaite and buy
her some flower seeds and a set of garden
tools to make a flower-bed. Pick the

-40-

It seemed as if all the interesting things
were happening in one day. To think of
going over the moor in the daylight and
when the sky was blue! To think of going
into the cottage which held twelve children!

"Does she think Mrs. Medlock would let me
go?" she asked, quite anxiously.

"Aye, she thinks she would. She knows
what a tidy woman mother is and how clean
she keeps the cottage."

"If I went I should see your mother as well as
Dickon," said Mary, thinking it over and
liking the idea very much. "She doesn't
seem to be like the mothers in India."

Her work in the garden and the excitement
of the afternoon ended by making her feel
quiet and thoughtful. Martha stayed with her
until tea-time, but they sat in comfortable
quiet and talked very little. But just before
Martha went downstairs for the tea-tray,
Mary asked a question.

"Martha," she said, "has the scullery-maid
had the toothache again today?"

Martha certainly started slightly.

"What makes thee ask that?" she said.

"Because when I waited so long for you to
come back I opened the door and walked
down the corridor to see if you were
coming. And I heard that far-off crying
again, just as we heard it the other night.
There isn't a wind today, so you see it
couldn't have been the wind."

"Eh!" said Martha restlessly. "Tha' mustn't
go walkin' about in corridors an' listenin'.
Mr. Craven would be that there angry
there's no knowin' what he'd do."

-41-

them at once, so they began to feel very
much alive.

Mary was an odd, determined little person,
and now she had something interesting to
be determined about, she was very much
absorbed, indeed. She worked and dug
and pulled up weeds steadily, only
becoming more pleased with her work
every hour instead of tiring of it. It seemed to
her like a fascinating sort of play. She found
many more of the sprouting pale green
points than she had ever hoped to find. They
seemed to be starting up everywhere and
each day she was sure she found tiny new
ones, some so tiny that they barely peeped
above the earth. There were so many that
she remembered what Martha had said
about the "snowdrops by the thousands,"
and about bulbs spreading and making new
ones. These had been left to themselves for
ten years and perhaps they had spread, like
the snowdrops, into thousands. She
wondered how long it would be before they
showed that they were flowers. Sometimes
she stopped digging to look at the garden
and try to imagine what it would be like
when it was covered with thousands of
lovely things in bloom. During that week of
sunshine, she became more intimate with
Ben Weatherstaff. She surprised him
several times by seeming to start up beside
him as if she sprang out of the earth. The
truth was that she was afraid that he would
pick up his tools and go away if he saw her
coming, so she always walked toward him
as silently as possible. But, in fact, he did
not object to her as strongly as he had at
first. Perhaps he was secretly rather
flattered by her evident desire for his elderly
company. Then, also, she was more civil
than she had been. He did not know that
when she first saw him she spoke to him as
she would have spoken to a native, and had
not known that a cross, sturdy old Yorkshire
man was not accustomed to salaam to his

-42-

There, indeed, was the robin, and she
thought he looked nicer than ever. His red
waistcoat was as glossy as satin and he
flirted his wings and tail and tilted his head
and hopped about with all sorts of lively
graces. He seemed determined to make
Ben Weatherstaff admire him. But Ben was
sarcastic.

"Aye, there tha' art!" he said. "Tha' can put
up with me for a bit sometimes when tha's
got no one better. Tha's been reddenin' up
thy waistcoat an' polishin' thy feathers this
two weeks. I know what tha's up to. Tha's
courtin' some bold young madam
somewhere tellin' thy lies to her about bein'
th' finest cock robin on Missel Moor an'
ready to fight all th' rest of 'em."

"Oh! look at him!" exclaimed Mary.

The robin was evidently in a fascinating,
bold mood. He hopped closer and closer
and looked at Ben Weatherstaff more and
more engagingly. He flew on to the nearest
currant bush and tilted his head and sang a
little song right at him.

"Tha' thinks tha'll get over me by doin' that,"
said Ben, wrinkling his face up in such a
way that Mary felt sure he was trying not to
look pleased. "Tha' thinks no one can stand
out against thee—that's what tha' thinks."

The robin spread his wings—Mary could
scarcely believe her eyes. He flew right up
to the handle of Ben Weatherstaff's spade
and alighted on the top of it. Then the old
man's face wrinkled itself slowly into a new
expression. He stood still as if he were
afraid to breathe—as if he would not have
stirred for the world, lest his robin should
start away. He spoke quite in a whisper.

"Well, I'm danged!" he said as softly as if he
were saying something quite different.

-43-

another weed and scowled at it. "That were
as much as ten year' ago."

"Where is she now?" asked Mary, much
interested.

"Heaven," he answered, and drove his
spade deep into the soil, "'cording to what
parson says."

"What happened to the roses?" Mary asked
again, more interested than ever.

"They was left to themselves."

Mary was becoming quite excited.

"Did they quite die? Do roses quite die
when they are left to themselves?" she
ventured.

"Well, I'd got to like 'em—an' I liked her—an'
she liked 'em," Ben Weatherstaff admitted
reluctantly. "Once or twice a year I'd go an'
work at 'em a bit—prune 'em an' dig about
th' roots. They run wild, but they was in rich
soil, so some of 'em lived."

"When they have no leaves and look gray
and brown and dry, how can you tell whether
they are dead or alive?" inquired Mary.

"Wait till th' spring gets at 'em—wait till th' sun
shines on th' rain and th' rain falls on th'
sunshine an' then tha'll find out."

"How—how?" cried Mary, forgetting to be
careful. "Look along th' twigs an' branches
an' if tha' see a bit of a brown lump swelling
here an' there, watch it after th' warm rain
an' see what happens." He stopped
suddenly and looked curiously at her eager
face. "Why does tha' care so much about
roses an' such, all of a sudden?" he
demanded.

-44-

And he said it so crossly that she knew there
was not the least use in staying another
minute. She went skipping slowly down the
outside walk, thinking him over and saying
to herself that, queer as it was, here was
another person whom she liked in spite of
his crossness. She liked old Ben
Weatherstaff. Yes, she did like him. She
always wanted to try to make him talk to her.
Also she began to believe that he knew
everything in the world about flowers.

There was a laurel-hedged walk which
curved round the secret garden and ended
at a gate which opened into a wood, in the
park. She thought she would slip round this
walk and look into the wood and see if there
were any rabbits hopping about. She
enjoyed the skipping very much and when
she reached the little gate she opened it and
went through because she heard a low,
peculiar whistling sound and wanted to find
out what it was.

It was a very strange thing indeed. She quite
caught her breath as she stopped to look at
it. A boy was sitting under a tree, with his
back against it, playing on a rough wooden
pipe. He was a funny looking boy about
twelve. He looked very clean and his nose
turned up and his cheeks were as red as
poppies and never had Mistress Mary seen
such round and such blue eyes in any boy's
face. And on the trunk of the tree he leaned
against, a brown squirrel was clinging and
watching him, and from behind a bush
nearby a cock pheasant was delicately
stretching his neck to peep out, and quite
near him were two rabbits sitting up and
sniffing with tremulous noses—and actually it
appeared as if they were all drawing near to
watch him and listen to the strange low little
call his pipe seemed to make.

When he saw Mary he held up his hand and
spoke to her in a voice almost as low as and

-45-

are good 'uns. There's a trowel, too. An' th'
woman in th' shop threw in a packet o'
white poppy an' one o' blue larkspur when I
bought th' other seeds."

"Will you show the seeds to me?" Mary said.

She wished she could talk as he did. His
speech was so quick and easy. It sounded
as if he liked her and was not the least
afraid she would not like him, though he
was only a common moor boy, in patched
clothes and with a funny face and a rough,
rusty-red head. As she came closer to him
she noticed that there was a clean fresh
scent of heather and grass and leaves
about him, almost as if he were made of
them. She liked it very much and when she
looked into his funny face with the red
cheeks and round blue eyes she forgot that
she had felt shy.

"Let us sit down on this log and look at
them," she said.

They sat down and he took a clumsy little
brown paper package out of his coat
pocket. He untied the string and inside there
were ever so many neater and smaller
packages with a picture of a flower on each
one.

"There's a lot o' mignonette an' poppies,"
he said. "Mignonette's th' sweetest smellin'
thing as grows, an' it'll grow wherever you
cast it, same as poppies will. Them as'll
come up an' bloom if you just whistle to
'em, them's th' nicest of all." He stopped
and turned his head quickly, his poppy-
cheeked face lighting up.

"Where's that robin as is callin' us?" he said.

The chirp came from a thick holly bush,
bright with scarlet berries, and Mary thought
she knew whose it was.

-46-

"I think I do, and they think I do," he said. "I've
lived on th' moor with 'em so long. I've
watched 'em break shell an' come out an'
fledge an' learn to fly an' begin to sing, till I
think I'm one of 'em. Sometimes I think
p'raps I'm a bird, or a fox, or a rabbit, or a
squirrel, or even a beetle, an' I don't know
it."

He laughed and came back to the log and
began to talk about the flower seeds again.
He told her what they looked like when they
were flowers; he told her how to plant them,
and watch them, and feed and water them.

"See here," he said suddenly, turning round
to look at her. "I'll plant them for thee myself.
Where is tha' garden?"

Mary's thin hands clutched each other as
they lay on her lap. She did not know what to
say, so for a whole minute she said nothing.
She had never thought of this. She felt
miserable. And she felt as if she went red
and then pale.

"Tha's got a bit o' garden, hasn't tha'?"
Dickon said.

It was true that she had turned red and then
pale. Dickon saw her do it, and as she still
said nothing, he began to be puzzled.

"Wouldn't they give thee a bit?" he asked.
"Hasn't tha' got any yet?"

She held her hands tighter and turned her
eyes toward him.

"I don't know anything about boys," she said
slowly. "Could you keep a secret, if I told you
one? It's a great secret. I don't know what I
should do if any one found it out. I believe I
should die!" She said the last sentence
quite fiercely.

-47-

"Come with me and I'll show you," she said.

She led him round the laurel path and to the
walk where the ivy grew so thickly. Dickon
followed her with a queer, almost pitying,
look on his face. He felt as if he were being
led to look at some strange bird's nest and
must move softly. When she stepped to the
wall and lifted the hanging ivy he started.
There was a door and Mary pushed it slowly
open and they passed in together, and then
Mary stood and waved her hand round
defiantly.

"It's this," she said. "It's a secret garden,
and I'm the only one in the world who wants
it to be alive."

Dickon looked round and round about it,
and round and round again.

"Eh!" he almost whispered, "it is a queer,
pretty place! It's like as if a body was in a
dream."

Chapter 11 THE NEST OF THE MISSEL
THRUSH

For two or three minutes he stood looking
round him, while Mary watched him, and
then he began to walk about softly, even
more lightly than Mary had walked the first
time she had found herself inside the four
walls. His eyes seemed to be taking in
everything—the gray trees with the gray
creepers climbing over them and hanging
from their branches, the tangle on the walls
and among the grass, the evergreen
alcoves with the stone seats and tall flower
urns standing in them.

"I never thought I'd see this place," he said
at last, in a whisper.

"Did you know about it?" asked Mary.

-48-

here's a new bit," and he touched a shoot
which looked brownish green instead of
hard, dry gray. Mary touched it herself in an
eager, reverent way.

"That one?" she said. "Is that one quite alive
quite?"

Dickon curved his wide smiling mouth.

"It's as wick as you or me," he said; and
Mary remembered that Martha had told her
that "wick" meant "alive" or "lively."

"I'm glad it's wick!" she cried out in her
whisper. "I want them all to be wick. Let us
go round the garden and count how many
wick ones there are."

She quite panted with eagerness, and
Dickon was as eager as she was. They
went from tree to tree and from bush to
bush. Dickon carried his knife in his hand
and showed her things which she thought
wonderful.

"They've run wild," he said, "but th'
strongest ones has fair thrived on it. The
delicatest ones has died out, but th' others
has growed an' growed, an' spread an'
spread, till they's a wonder. See here!" and
he pulled down a thick gray, dry-looking
branch. "A body might think this was dead
wood, but I don't believe it is—down to th'
root. I'll cut it low down an' see."

He knelt and with his knife cut the lifeless-
looking branch through, not far above the
earth.

"There!" he said exultantly. "I told thee so.
There's green in that wood yet. Look at it."

Mary was down on her knees before he
spoke, gazing with all her might.

-49-

breathe. So I made a place for them. I don't
even know what they are."

Dickon went and knelt down by them,
smiling his wide smile.

"Tha' was right," he said. "A gardener
couldn't have told thee better. They'll grow
now like Jack's bean-stalk. They're
crocuses an' snowdrops, an' these here is
narcissuses," turning to another patch, "an
here's daffydowndillys. Eh! they will be a
sight."

He ran from one clearing to another.

"Tha' has done a lot o' work for such a little
wench," he said, looking her over.

"I'm growing fatter," said Mary, "and I'm
growing stronger. I used always to be tired.
When I dig I'm not tired at all. I like to smell
the earth when it's turned up."

"It's rare good for thee," he said, nodding
his head wisely. "There's naught as nice as
th' smell o' good clean earth, except th'
smell o' fresh growin' things when th' rain
falls on 'em. I get out on th' moor many a day
when it's rainin' an' I lie under a bush an'
listen to th' soft swish o' drops on th'
heather an, I just sniff an, sniff. My nose end
fair quivers like a rabbit's, mother says."

"Do you never catch cold?" inquired Mary,
gazing at him wonderingly. She had never
seen such a funny boy, or such a nice one.

"Not me," he said, grinning. "I never ketched
cold since I was born. I wasn't brought up
nesh enough. I've chased about th' moor in
all weathers same as th' rabbits does.
Mother says I've sniffed up too much fresh
air for twelve year' to ever get to sniffin' with
cold. I'm as tough as a white-thorn
knobstick."

-50-

been in it since it was shut up ten year' ago."

"But the door was locked and the key was
buried," said Mary. "No one could get in."

"That's true," he answered. "It's a queer
place. Seems to me as if there'd been a bit
o' prunin' done here an' there, later than ten
year' ago."

"But how could it have been done?" said
Mary.

He was examining a branch of a standard
rose and he shook his head.

"Aye! how could it!" he murmured. "With th'
door locked an' th' key buried."

Mistress Mary always felt that however
many years she lived she should never
forget that first morning when her garden
began to grow. Of course, it did seem to
begin to grow for her that morning. When
Dickon began to clear places to plant
seeds, she remembered what Basil had
sung at her when he wanted to tease her.

"Are there any flowers that look like bells?"
she inquired.

"Lilies o' th' valley does," he answered,
digging away with the trowel, "an' there's
Canterbury bells, an' campanulas."

"Let's plant some," said Mary. "There's lilies
o' th, valley here already; I saw 'em. They'll
have growed too close an' we'll have to
separate 'em, but there's plenty. Th' other
ones takes two years to bloom from seed,
but I can bring you some bits o' plants from
our cottage garden. Why does tha' want
'em?"

Then Mary told him about Basil and his
brothers and sisters in India and of how she

-51-

"Only five folk as tha' likes?" he said. "Who is
th' other four?"

"Your mother and Martha," Mary checked
them off on her fingers, "and the robin and
Ben Weatherstaff."

Dickon laughed so that he was obliged to
stifle the sound by putting his arm over his
mouth.

"I know tha' thinks I'm a queer lad," he said,
"but I think tha' art th' queerest little lass I
ever saw."

Then Mary did a strange thing. She leaned
forward and asked him a question she had
never dreamed of asking any one before.
And she tried to ask it in Yorkshire because
that was his , and in India a native was
always pleased if you knew his speech.

"Does tha' like me?" she said.

"Eh!" he answered heartily, "that I does. I
likes thee wonderful, an' so does th' robin, I
do believe!"

"That's two, then," said Mary. "That's two
for me."

And then they began to work harder than
ever and more joyfully. Mary was startled
and sorry when she heard the big clock in
the courtyard strike the hour of her midday
dinner.

"I shall have to go," she said mournfully.
"And you will have to go too, won't you?"

Dickon grinned.

"My dinner's easy to carry about with me,"
he said. "Mother always lets me put a bit o'
somethin' in my pocket."

-52-

Chapter 12 "MIGHT I HAVE A BIT OF
EARTH?"

Mary ran so fast that she was rather out of
breath when she reached her room. Her hair
was ruffled on her forehead and her cheeks
were bright pink. Her dinner was waiting on
the table, and Martha was waiting near it.

"Tha's a bit late," she said. "Where has tha'
been?"

"I've seen Dickon!" said Mary. "I've seen
Dickon!"

"I knew he'd come," said Martha exultantly.
"How does tha' like him?"

"I think—I think he's beautiful!" said Mary in a
determined voice.

Martha looked rather taken aback but she
looked pleased, too.

"Well," she said, "he's th' best lad as ever
was born, but us never thought he was
handsome. His nose turns up too much."

"I like it to turn up," said Mary.

"An' his eyes is so round," said Martha, a
trifle doubtful. "Though they're a nice color."
"I like them round," said Mary. "And they are
exactly the color of the sky over the moor."

Martha beamed with satisfaction.

"Mother says he made 'em that color with
always lookin' up at th' birds an' th' clouds.
But he has got a big mouth, hasn't he,
now?"

"I love his big mouth," said Mary obstinately.
"I wish mine were just like it."

Martha chuckled delightedly.

-53-

"I've got somethin' to tell you," she said. "I
thought I'd let you eat your dinner first. Mr.
Craven came back this mornin' and I think
he wants to see you."

Mary turned quite pale.

"Oh!" she said. "Why! Why! He didn't want to
see me when I came. I heard Pitcher say he
didn't." "Well," explained Martha, "Mrs.
Medlock says it's because o' mother. She
was walkin' to Thwaite village an' she met
him. She'd never spoke to him before, but
Mrs. Craven had been to our cottage two or
three times. He'd forgot, but mother hadn't
an' she made bold to stop him. I don't know
what she said to him about you but she said
somethin' as put him in th' mind to see you
before he goes away again, tomorrow."

"Oh!" cried Mary, "is he going away
tomorrow? I am so glad!"

"He's goin' for a long time. He mayn't come
back till autumn or winter. He's goin' to
travel in foreign places. He's always doin'
it."

"Oh! I'm so glad—so glad!" said Mary
thankfully.

If he did not come back until winter, or even
autumn, there would be time to watch the
secret garden come alive. Even if he found
out then and took it away from her she
would have had that much at least.

"When do you think he will want to see—"

She did not finish the sentence, because
the door opened, and Mrs. Medlock walked
in. She had on her best black dress and
cap, and her collar was fastened with a
large brooch with a picture of a man's face
on it. It was a colored photograph of Mr.
Medlock who had died years ago, and she

-54-

"Come here!" he said.

Mary went to him.

He was not ugly. His face would have been
handsome if it had not been so miserable.
He looked as if the sight of her worried and
fretted him and as if he did not know what in
the world to do with her.

"Are you well?" he asked.

"Yes," answered Mary.

"Do they take good care of you?"

"Yes."

He rubbed his forehead fretfully as he
looked her over.

"You are very thin," he said.

"I am getting fatter," Mary answered in what
she knew was her stiffest way.

What an unhappy face he had! His black
eyes seemed as if they scarcely saw her,
as if they were seeing something else, and
he could hardly keep his thoughts upon her.

"I forgot you," he said. "How could I
remember you? I intended to send you a
governess or a nurse, or some one of that
sort, but I forgot."

"Please," began Mary. "Please—" and then
the lump in her throat choked her.

"What do you want to say?" he inquired.

"I am—I am too big for a nurse," said Mary.
"And please—please don't make me have a
governess yet."

He rubbed his forehead again and stared at

-55-

Mary put her hand up to her throat because
she was afraid he might see the excited
lump which she felt jump into it. She came a
step nearer to him.

"May I?" she said tremulously.

Her anxious little face seemed to worry him
more than ever.

"Don't look so frightened," he exclaimed.
"Of course you may. I am your guardian,
though I am a poor one for any child. I cannot
give you time or attention. I am too ill, and
wretched and distracted; but I wish you to
be happy and comfortable. I don't know
anything about children, but Mrs. Medlock is
to see that you have all you need. I sent for
you to-day because Mrs. Sowerby said I
ought to see you. Her daughter had talked
about you. She thought you needed fresh air
and freedom and running about."

"She knows all about children," Mary said
again in spite of herself.

"She ought to," said Mr. Craven. "I thought
her rather bold to stop me on the moor, but
she said—Mrs. Craven had been kind to her."
It seemed hard for him to speak his dead
wife's name. "She is a respectable woman.
Now I have seen you I think she said
sensible things. Play out of doors as much
as you like. It's a big place and you may go
where you like and amuse yourself as you
like. Is there anything you want?" as if a
sudden thought had struck him. "Do you
want toys, books, dolls?"

"Might I," quavered Mary, "might I have a bit
of earth?"

In her eagerness she did not realize how
queer the words would sound and that they
were not the ones she had meant to say. Mr.
Craven looked quite startled.

-56-

"now I have seen the child I understand what
Mrs. Sowerby meant. She must be less
delicate before she begins lessons. Give
her simple, healthy food. Let her run wild in
the garden. Don't look after her too much.
She needs liberty and fresh air and romping
about. Mrs. Sowerby is to come and see her
now and then and she may sometimes go to
the cottage."

Mrs. Medlock looked pleased. She was
relieved to hear that she need not "look
after" Mary too much. She had felt her a
tiresome charge and had indeed seen as
little of her as she dared. In addition to this
she was fond of Martha's mother.

"Thank you, sir," she said. "Susan Sowerby
and me went to school together and she's
as sensible and good-hearted a woman as
you'd find in a day's walk. I never had any
children myself and she's had twelve, and
there never was healthier or better ones.
Miss Mary can get no harm from them. I'd
always take Susan Sowerby's advice about
children myself. She's what you might call
healthy-minded—if you understand me."

"I understand," Mr. Craven answered. "Take
Miss Mary away now and send Pitcher to
me."

When Mrs. Medlock left her at the end of her
own corridor Mary flew back to her room.
She found Martha waiting there. Martha
had, in fact, hurried back after she had
removed the dinner service.

"I can have my garden!" cried Mary. "I may
have it where I like! I am not going to have a
governess for a long time! Your mother is
coming to see me and I may go to your
cottage! He says a little girl like me could not
do any harm and I may do what I
like—anywhere!"

-57-

knew our Dickon was as clever as that. That
there's a picture of a missel thrush on her
nest, as large as life an' twice as natural."

Then Mary knew Dickon had meant the
picture to be a message. He had meant that
she might be sure he would keep her secret.
Her garden was her nest and she was like a
missel thrush. Oh, how she did like that
queer, common boy!

She hoped he would come back the very
next day and she fell asleep looking forward
to the morning.

But you never know what the weather will do
in Yorkshire, particularly in the springtime.
She was awakened in the night by the
sound of rain beating with heavy drops
against her window. It was pouring down in
torrents and the wind was "wuthering" round
the corners and in the chimneys of the huge
old house. Mary sat up in bed and felt
miserable and angry.

"The rain is as contrary as I ever was," she
said. "It came because it knew I did not want
it."

She threw herself back on her pillow and
buried her face. She did not cry, but she lay
and hated the sound of the heavily beating
rain, she hated the wind and its "wuthering."
She could not go to sleep again. The
mournful sound kept her awake because
she felt mournful herself. If she had felt
happy it would probably have lulled her to
sleep. How it "wuthered" and how the big
raindrops poured down and beat against
the pane!

"It sounds just like a person lost on the moor
and wandering on and on crying," she said.

She had been lying awake turning from side
to side for about an hour, when suddenly

-58-

behind her, and she stood in the corridor
and could hear the crying quite plainly,
though it was not loud. It was on the other
side of the wall at her left and a few yards
farther on there was a door. She could see
a glimmer of light coming from beneath it.
The Someone was crying in that room, and
it was quite a young Someone.

So she walked to the door and pushed it
open, and there she was standing in the
room!

It was a big room with ancient, handsome
furniture in it. There was a low fire glowing
faintly on the hearth and a night light burning
by the side of a carved four-posted bed
hung with brocade, and on the bed was
lying a boy, crying fretfully.

Mary wondered if she was in a real place or
if she had fallen asleep again and was
dreaming without knowing it.

The boy had a sharp, delicate face the color
of ivory and he seemed to have eyes too big
for it. He had also a lot of hair which tumbled
over his forehead in heavy locks and made
his thin face seem smaller. He looked like a
boy who had been ill, but he was crying
more as if he were tired and cross than as if
he were in pain.

Mary stood near the door with her candle in
her hand, holding her breath. Then she crept
across the room, and, as she drew nearer,
the light attracted the boy's attention and he
turned his head on his pillow and stared at
her, his gray eyes opening so wide that they
seemed immense.

"Who are you?" he said at last in a half-
frightened whisper. "Are you a ghost?"

"No, I am not," Mary answered, her own
whisper sounding half frightened. "Are you

-59-

crying and wanted to find out who it was.
What were you crying for?"

"Because I couldn't go to sleep either and
my head ached. Tell me your name again."

"Mary Lennox. Did no one ever tell you I had
come to live here?"

He was still fingering the fold of her
wrapper, but he began to look a little more
as if he believed in her reality.

"No," he answered. "They daren't."

"Why?" asked Mary.

"Because I should have been afraid you
would see me. I won't let people see me
and talk me over."

"Why?" Mary asked again, feeling more
mystified every moment.

"Because I am like this always, ill and
having to lie down. My father won't let
people talk me over either. The servants are
not allowed to speak about me. If I live I may
be a hunchback, but I shan't live. My father
hates to think I may be like him."

"Oh, what a queer house this is!" Mary said.
"What a queer house! Everything is a kind of
secret. Rooms are locked up and gardens
are locked up—and you! Have you been
locked up?"

"No. I stay in this room because I don't want
to be moved out of it. It tires me too much."

"Does your father come and see you?" Mary
ventured.

"Sometimes. Generally when I am asleep.
He doesn't want to see me."

-60-

"If you don't like people to see you," she
began, "do you want me to go away?"

He still held the fold of her wrapper and he
gave it a little pull.

"No," he said. "I should be sure you were a
dream if you went. If you are real, sit down
on that big footstool and talk. I want to hear
about you."

Mary put down her candle on the table near
the bed and sat down on the cushioned
stool. She did not want to go away at all.
She wanted to stay in the mysterious
hidden-away room and talk to the
mysterious boy.

"What do you want me to tell you?" she said.

He wanted to know how long she had been
at Misselthwaite; he wanted to know which
corridor her room was on; he wanted to
know what she had been doing; if she
disliked the moor as he disliked it; where
she had lived before she came to Yorkshire.
She answered all these questions and
many more and he lay back on his pillow
and listened. He made her tell him a great
deal about India and about her voyage
across the ocean. She found out that
because he had been an invalid he had not
learned things as other children had. One of
his nurses had taught him to read when he
was quite little and he was always reading
and looking at pictures in splendid books.

Though his father rarely saw him when he
was awake, he was given all sorts of
wonderful things to amuse himself with. He
never seemed to have been amused,
however. He could have anything he asked
for and was never made to do anything he
did not like to do. "Everyone is obliged to do
what pleases me," he said indifferently. "It
makes me ill to be angry. No one believes I

-61-

she never asked the gardeners?

"They won't talk about it," said Mary. "I think
they have been told not to answer
questions."

"I would make them," said Colin.

"Could you?" Mary faltered, beginning to
feel frightened. If he could make people
answer questions, who knew what might
happen!

"Everyone is obliged to please me. I told you
that," he said. "If I were to live, this place
would sometime belong to me. They all
know that. I would make them tell me."

Mary had not known that she herself had
been spoiled, but she could see quite
plainly that this mysterious boy had been.
He thought that the whole world belonged to
him. How peculiar he was and how coolly he
spoke of not living.

"Do you think you won't live?" she asked,
partly because she was curious and partly in
hope of making him forget the garden.

"I don't suppose I shall," he answered as
indifferently as he had spoken before. "Ever
since I remember anything I have heard
people say I shan't. At first they thought I
was too little to understand and now they
think I don't hear. But I do. My doctor is my
father's cousin. He is quite poor and if I die
he will have all Misselthwaite when my
father is dead. I should think he wouldn't
want me to live."

"Do you want to live?" inquired Mary.

"No," he answered, in a cross, tired fashion.
"But I don't want to die. When I feel ill I lie
here and think about it until I cry and cry."

-62-

He leaned still farther forward.

"A secret," he said. "What do you mean? Tell
me."

Mary's words almost tumbled over one
another.

"You see—you see," she panted, "if no one
knows but ourselves—if there was a door,
hidden somewhere under the ivy—if there
was—and we could find it; and if we could
slip through it together and shut it behind us,
and no one knew any one was inside and
we called it our garden and pretended
that—that we were missel thrushes and it
was our nest, and if we played there almost
every day and dug and planted seeds and
made it all come alive—"

"Is it dead?" he interrupted her.

"It soon will be if no one cares for it," she
went on. "The bulbs will live but the roses—"

He stopped her again as excited as she
was herself.

"What are bulbs?" he put in quickly.

"They are daffodils and lilies and
snowdrops. They are working in the earth
now—pushing up pale green points because
the spring is coming."

"Is the spring coming?" he said. "What is it
like? You don't see it in rooms if you are ill."

"It is the sun shining on the rain and the rain
falling on the sunshine, and things pushing
up and working under the earth," said Mary.
"If the garden was a secret and we could get
into it we could watch the things grow
bigger every day, and see how many roses
are alive. Don't you. see? Oh, don't you see
how much nicer it would be if it was a

-63-

so much to tell about the robin and it was so
easy and safe to talk about it that she
ceased to be afraid. The robin pleased him
so much that he smiled until he looked
almost beautiful, and at first Mary had
thought that he was even plainer than
herself, with his big eyes and heavy locks of
hair.

"I did not know birds could be like that," he
said. "But if you stay in a room you never
see things. What a lot of things you know. I
feel as if you had been inside that garden."

She did not know what to say, so she did
not say anything. He evidently did not expect
an answer and the next moment he gave her
a surprise.

"I am going to let you look at something," he
said. "Do you see that rose-colored silk
curtain hanging on the wall over the mantel-
piece?"

Mary had not noticed it before, but she
looked up and saw it. It was a curtain of soft
silk hanging over what seemed to be some
picture.

"Yes," she answered.

"There is a cord hanging from it," said Colin.
"Go and pull it."

Mary got up, much mystified, and found the
cord. When she pulled it the silk curtain ran
back on rings and when it ran back it
uncovered a picture. It was the picture of a
girl with a laughing face. She had bright hair
tied up with a blue ribbon and her gay, lovely
eyes were exactly like Colin's unhappy
ones, agate gray and looking twice as big
as they really were because of the black
lashes all round them.

"She is my mother," said Colin

-64-

done before, and then he spoke again.

"I think you shall be a secret, too," he said. "I
will not tell them until they find out. I can
always send the nurse out of the room and
say that I want to be by myself. Do you know
Martha?"

"Yes, I know her very well," said Mary. "She
waits on me."

He nodded his head toward the outer
corridor.

"She is the one who is asleep in the other
room. The nurse went away yesterday to
stay all night with her sister and she always
makes Martha attend to me when she wants
to go out. Martha shall tell you when to come
here."

Then Mary understood Martha's troubled
look when she had asked questions about
the crying.

"Martha knew about you all the time?" she
said.

"Yes; she often attends to me. The nurse
likes to get away from me and then Martha
comes."

"I have been here a long time," said Mary.
"Shall I go away now? Your eyes look
sleepy."

"I wish I could go to sleep before you leave
me," he said rather shyly.

"Shut your eyes," said Mary, drawing her
footstool closer, "and I will do what my Ayah
used to do in India. I will pat your hand and
stroke it and sing something quite low."

"I should like that perhaps," he said
drowsily.

-65-

shouldn't have done it—tha' shouldn't! Tha'll
get me in trouble. I never told thee nothin'
about him—but tha'll get me in trouble. I shall
lose my place and what'll mother do!"

"You won't lose your place," said Mary. "He
was glad I came. We talked and talked and
he said he was glad I came."

"Was he?" cried Martha. "Art tha' sure? Tha'
doesn't know what he's like when anything
vexes him. He's a big lad to cry like a baby,
but when he's in a passion he'll fair scream
just to frighten us. He knows us daren't call
our souls our own."

"He wasn't vexed," said Mary. "I asked him
if I should go away and he made me stay.
He asked me questions and I sat on a big
footstool and talked to him about India and
about the robin and gardens. He wouldn't let
me go. He let me see his mother's picture.
Before I left him I sang him to sleep."

Martha fairly gasped with amazement.

"I can scarcely believe thee!" she protested.
"It's as if tha'd walked straight into a lion's
den. If he'd been like he is most times he'd
have throwed himself into one of his
tantrums and roused th' house. He won't let
strangers look at him."

"He let me look at him. I looked at him all the
time and he looked at me. We stared!" said
Mary.

"I don't know what to do!" cried agitated
Martha. "If Mrs. Medlock finds out, she'll
think I broke orders and told thee and I shall
be packed back to mother."

"He is not going to tell Mrs. Medlock
anything about it yet. It's to be a sort of
secret just at first," said Mary firmly. "And he
says everybody is obliged to do as he

-66-

Mrs. Craven died like I told you. He wouldn't
set eyes on th' baby. He just raved and said
it'd be another hunchback like him and it'd
better die."

"Is Colin a hunchback?" Mary asked. "He
didn't look like one."

"He isn't yet," said Martha. "But he began all
wrong. Mother said that there was enough
trouble and raging in th' house to set any
child wrong. They was afraid his back was
weak an' they've always been takin' care of
it—keepin' him lyin' down and not lettin' him
walk. Once they made him wear a brace but
he fretted so he was downright ill. Then a
big doctor came to see him an' made them
take it off. He talked to th' other doctor quite
rough—in a polite way. He said there'd been
too much medicine and too much lettin' him
have his own way."

"I think he's a very spoiled boy," said Mary.

"He's th' worst young nowt as ever was!"
said Martha. "I won't say as he hasn't been
ill a good bit. He's had coughs an' colds
that's nearly killed him two or three times.
Once he had rheumatic fever an' once he
had typhoid. Eh! Mrs. Medlock did get a
fright then. He'd been out of his head an'
she was talkin' to th' nurse, thinkin' he didn't
know nothin', an' she said, 'He'll die this
time sure enough, an' best thing for him an'
for everybody.' An' she looked at him an'
there he was with his big eyes open, starin'
at her as sensible as she was herself. She
didn't know wha'd happen but he just
stared at her an' says, 'You give me some
water an' stop talkin'.'"

"Do you think he will die?" asked Mary.

"Mother says there's no reason why any
child should live that gets no fresh air an'
doesn't do nothin' but lie on his back an'

-67-

an' says, 'I want Mary Lennox to come and
talk to me, and remember you're not to tell
any one.' You'd better go as quick as you
can."

Mary was quite willing to go quickly. She did
not want to see Colin as much as she
wanted to see Dickon; but she wanted to
see him very much.

There was a bright fire on the hearth when
she entered his room, and in the daylight
she saw it was a very beautiful room
indeed. There were rich colors in the rugs
and hangings and pictures and books on
the walls which made it look glowing and
comfortable even in spite of the gray sky
and falling rain. Colin looked rather like a
picture himself. He was wrapped in a velvet
dressing-gown and sat against a big
brocaded cushion. He had a red spot on
each cheek.

"Come in," he said. "I've been thinking
about you all morning."

"I've been thinking about you, too,"
answered Mary. "You don't know how
frightened Martha is. She says Mrs.
Medlock will think she told me about you
and then she will be sent away."

He frowned.

"Go and tell her to come here," he said. "She
is in the next room."

Mary went and brought her back. Poor
Martha was shaking in her shoes. Colin was
still frowning.

"Have you to do what I please or have you
not?" he demanded.

"I have to do what you please, sir," Martha
faltered, turning quite red.

-68-

"I was thinking," said Mary, "how different
you are from Dickon."

"Who is Dickon?" he said. "What a queer
name!"

She might as well tell him, she thought she
could talk about Dickon without mentioning
the secret garden. She had liked to hear
Martha talk about him. Besides, she longed
to talk about him. It would seem to bring him
nearer.

"He is Martha's brother. He is twelve years
old," she explained. "He is not like any one
else in the world. He can charm foxes and
squirrels and birds just as the natives in
India charm snakes. He plays a very soft
tune on a pipe and they come and listen."

There were some big books on a table at
his side and he dragged one suddenly
toward him. "There is a picture of a snake-
charmer in this," he exclaimed. "Come and
look at it"

The book was a beautiful one with superb
colored illustrations and he turned to one of
them.

"Can he do that?" he asked eagerly.

"He played on his pipe and they listened,"
Mary explained. "But he doesn't call it
Magic. He says it's because he lives on the
moor so much and he knows their ways. He
says he feels sometimes as if he was a bird
or a rabbit himself, he likes them so. I think
he asked the robin questions. It seemed as
if they talked to each other in soft chirps."

Colin lay back on his cushion and his eyes
grew larger and larger and the spots on his
cheeks burned.

"Tell me some more about him," he said.

-69-

"You might—sometime."

He moved as if he were startled.

"Go on the moor! How could I? I am going to
die." "How do you know?" said Mary
unsympathetically. She didn't like the way
he had of talking about dying. She did not
feel very sympathetic. She felt rather as if he
almost boasted about it.

"Oh, I've heard it ever since I remember," he
answered crossly. "They are always
whispering about it and thinking I don't
notice. They wish I would, too."

Mistress Mary felt quite contrary. She
pinched her lips together.

"If they wished I would," she said, "I
wouldn't. Who wishes you would?"

"The servants—and of course Dr. Craven
because he would get Misselthwaite and be
rich instead of poor. He daren't say so, but
he always looks cheerful when I am worse.
When I had typhoid fever his face got quite
fat. I think my father wishes it, too."

"I don't believe he does," said Mary quite
obstinately.

That made Colin turn and look at her again.

"Don't you?" he said.

And then he lay back on his cushion and
was still, as if he were thinking. And there
was quite a long silence. Perhaps they were
both of them thinking strange things children
do not usually think. "I like the grand doctor
from London, because he made them take
the iron thing off," said Mary at last "Did he
say you were going to die?"

"No.".

-70-

as children will when they are happy
together. And they laughed so that in the end
they were making as much noise as if they
had been two ordinary healthy natural ten-
year-old creatures—instead of a hard, little,
unloving girl and a sickly boy who believed
that he was going to die.

They enjoyed themselves so much that they
forgot the pictures and they forgot about the
time. They had been laughing quite loudly
over Ben Weatherstaff and his robin, and
Colin was actually sitting up as if he had
forgotten about his weak back, when he
suddenly remembered something. "Do you
know there is one thing we have never once
thought of," he said. "We are cousins."

It seemed so queer that they had talked so
much and never remembered this simple
thing that they laughed more than ever,
because they had got into the humor to
laugh at anything. And in the midst of the fun
the door opened and in walked Dr. Craven
and Mrs. Medlock.

Dr. Craven started in actual alarm and Mrs.
Medlock almost fell back because he had
accidentally bumped against her.

"Good Lord!" exclaimed poor Mrs. Medlock
with her eyes almost starting out of her
head. "Good Lord!"

"What is this?" said Dr. Craven, coming
forward. "What does it mean?"

Then Mary was reminded of the boy Rajah
again. Colin answered as if neither the
doctor's alarm nor Mrs. Medlock's terror
were of the slightest consequence. He was
as little disturbed or frightened as if an
elderly cat and dog had walked into the
room.

"This is my cousin, Mary Lennox," he said. "I

-71-

to the nurse for a few minutes when she
came into the room and said a few words of
warning to Colin. He must not talk too much;
he must not forget that he was ill; he must
not forget that he was very easily tired. Mary
thought that there seemed to be a number of
uncomfortable things he was not to forget.

Colin looked fretful and kept his strange
black-lashed eyes fixed on Dr. Craven's
face.

"I want to forget it," he said at last. "She
makes me forget it. That is why I want her."

Dr. Craven did not look happy when he left
the room. He gave a puzzled glance at the
little girl sitting on the large stool. She had
become a stiff, silent child again as soon as
he entered and he could not see what the
attraction was. The boy actually did look
brighter, however—and he sighed rather
heavily as he went down the corridor.

"They are always wanting me to eat things
when I don't want to," said Colin, as the
nurse brought in the tea and put it on the
table by the sofa. "Now, if you'll eat I will.
Those muffins look so nice and hot. Tell me
about Rajahs."

Chapter 15 NEST BUILDING

After another week of rain the high arch of
blue sky appeared again and the sun which
poured down was quite hot. Though there
had been no chance to see either the secret
garden or Dickon, Mistress Mary had
enjoyed herself very much. The week had
not seemed long. She had spent hours of
every day with Colin in his room, talking
about Rajahs or gardens or Dickon and the
cottage on the moor. They had looked at the
splendid books and pictures and
sometimes Mary had read things to Colin,
and sometimes he had read a little to her.

-72-

change in her.

"Th' air from th' moor has done thee good
already," she had said. "Tha'rt not nigh so
yeller and tha'rt not nigh so scrawny. Even
tha' hair doesn't slamp down on tha' head
so flat. It's got some life in it so as it sticks
out a bit."

"It's like me," said Mary. "It's growing
stronger and fatter. I'm sure there's more of
it."

"It looks it, for sure," said Martha, ruffling it
up a little round her face. "Tha'rt not half so
ugly when it's that way an' there's a bit o'
red in tha' cheeks."

If gardens and fresh air had been good for
her perhaps they would be good for Colin.
But then, if he hated people to look at him,
perhaps he would not like to see Dickon.

"Why does it make you angry when you are
looked at?" she inquired one day.

"I always hated it," he answered, "even
when I was very little. Then when they took
me to the seaside and I used to lie in my
carriage everybody used to stare and ladies
would stop and talk to my nurse and then
they would begin to whisper and I knew then
they were saying I shouldn't live to grow up.
Then sometimes the ladies would pat my
cheeks and say 'Poor child!' Once when a
lady did that I screamed out loud and bit her
hand. She was so frightened she ran away."

"She thought you had gone mad like a dog,"
said Mary, not at all admiringly.

"I don't care what she thought," said Colin,
frowning.

"I wonder why you didn't scream and bite
me when I came into your room?" said Mary.

-73-

beginning to tune up for a concert. Mary put
her hand out of the window and held it in the
sun.

"It's warm—warm!" she said. "It will make the
green points push up and up and up, and it
will make the bulbs and roots work and
struggle with all their might under the earth."

She kneeled down and leaned out of the
window as far as she could, breathing big
breaths and sniffing the air until she laughed
because she remembered what Dickon's
mother had said about the end of his nose
quivering like a rabbit's. "It must be very
early," she said. "The little clouds are all pink
and I've never seen the sky look like this. No
one is up. I don't even hear the stable boys."

A sudden thought made her scramble to her
feet.

"I can't wait! I am going to see the garden!"

She had learned to dress herself by this
time and she put on her clothes in five
minutes. She knew a small side door which
she could unbolt herself and she flew
downstairs in her stocking feet and put on
her shoes in the hall. She unchained and
unbolted and unlocked and when the door
was open she sprang across the step with
one bound, and there she was standing on
the grass, which seemed to have turned
green, and with the sun pouring down on her
and warm sweet wafts about her and the
fluting and twittering and singing coming
from every bush and tree. She clasped her
hands for pure joy and looked up in the sky
and it was so blue and pink and pearly and
white and flooded with springtime light that
she felt as if she must flute and sing aloud
herself and knew that thrushes and robins
and skylarks could not possibly help it. She
ran around the shrubs and paths towards
the secret garden.

-74-

and tousled; his eyes like a bit of the sky.

"Eh!" he said. "I was up long before him.
How could I have stayed abed! Th' world's
all fair begun again this mornin', it has. An'
it's workin' an' hummin' an' scratchin' an'
pipin' an' nest-buildin' an' breathin' out
scents, till you've got to be out on it 'stead o'
lyin' on your back. When th' sun did jump up,
th' moor went mad for joy, an' I was in the
midst of th' heather, an' I run like mad
myself, shoutin' an' singin'. An' I come
straight here. I couldn't have stayed away.
Why, th' garden was lyin' here waitin'!"

Mary put her hands on her chest, panting, as
if she had been running herself.

"Oh, Dickon! Dickon!" she said. "I'm so
happy I can scarcely breathe!"

Seeing him talking to a stranger, the little
bushy-tailed animal rose from its place
under the tree and came to him, and the
rook, cawing once, flew down from its
branch and settled quietly on his shoulder.

"This is th' little fox cub," he said, rubbing
the little reddish animal's head. "It's named
Captain. An' this here's Soot. Soot he flew
across th' moor with me an' Captain he run
same as if th' hounds had been after him.
They both felt same as I did."

Neither of the creatures looked as if he
were the least afraid of Mary. When Dickon
began to walk about, Soot stayed on his
shoulder and Captain trotted quietly close to
his side.

"See here!" said Dickon. "See how these
has pushed up, an' these an' these! An' Eh!
Look at these here!"

He threw himself upon his knees and Mary
went down beside him. They had come

-75-

fight him." They settled down softly upon the
grass and sat there without moving.

"Us mustn't seem as if us was watchin' him
too close," said Dickon. "He'd be out with
us for good if he got th' notion us was
interferin' now. He'll be a good bit different
till all this is over. He's settin' up
housekeepin'. He'll be shyer an' readier to
take things ill. He's got no time for visitin'
an' gossipin'. Us must keep still a bit an' try
to look as if us was grass an' trees an'
bushes. Then when he's got used to seein'
us I'll chirp a bit an' he'll know us'll not be in
his way."

Mistress Mary was not at all sure that she
knew, as Dickon seemed to, how to try to
look like grass and trees and bushes. But he
had said the queer thing as if it were the
simplest and most natural thing in the world,
and she felt it must be quite easy to him, and
indeed she watched him for a few minutes
carefully, wondering if it was possible for
him to quietly turn green and put out
branches and leaves. But he only sat
wonderfully still, and when he spoke
dropped his voice to such a softness that it
was curious that she could hear him, but she
could.

"It's part o' th' springtime, this nest-buildin'
is," he said. "I warrant it's been goin' on in
th' same way every year since th' world was
begun. They've got their way o' thinkin' and
doin' things an' a body had better not
meddle. You can lose a friend in springtime
easier than any other season if you're too
curious."

"If we talk about him I can't help looking at
him," Mary said as softly as possible. "We
must talk of something else. There is
something I want to tell you."

"He'll like it better if us talks o' somethin'

-76-

"How did you know about Colin?" asked
Mary.

"Everybody as knowed about Mester
Craven knowed there was a little lad as was
like to be a cripple, an' they knowed Mester
Craven didn't like him to be talked about.
Folks is sorry for Mester Craven because
Mrs. Craven was such a pretty young lady
an' they was so fond of each other. Mrs.
Medlock stops in our cottage whenever she
goes to Thwaite an' she doesn't mind
talkin' to mother before us children,
because she knows us has been brought up
to be trusty. How did tha' find out about
him? Martha was in fine trouble th' last time
she came home. She said tha'd heard him
frettin' an' tha' was askin' questions an'
she didn't know what to say."

Mary told him her story about the midnight
wuthering of the wind which had wakened
her and about the faint far-off sounds of the
complaining voice which had led her down
the dark corridors with her candle and had
ended with her opening of the door of the
dimly lighted room with the carven four-
posted bed in the corner. When she
described the small ivory-white face and
the strange black-rimmed eyes Dickon
shook his head.

"Them's just like his mother's eyes, only
hers was always laughin', they say," he
said. "They say as Mr. Craven can't bear to
see him when he's awake an' it's because
his eyes is so like his mother's an' yet looks
so different in his miserable bit of a face."

"Do you think he wants to die?" whispered
Mary.

"No, but he wishes he'd never been born.
Mother she says that's th' worst thing on
earth for a child. Them as is not wanted
scarce ever thrives. Mester Craven he'd buy