Of course Mary did not waken early the next morning.  She slept late
because she was tired, and when Martha brought her breakfast she told
her that though.  Colin was quite quiet he was ill and feverish as he
always was after he had worn himself out with a fit of crying.  Mary
ate her breakfast slowly as she listened.

"He says he wishes tha' would please go and see him as soon as tha'
can," Martha said.  "It's queer what a fancy he's took to thee.  Tha'
did give it him last night for sure--didn't tha? Nobody else would have
dared to do it.  Eh! poor lad! He's been spoiled till salt won't save
him.  Mother says as th' two worst things as can happen to a child is
never to have his own way--or always to have it.  She doesn't know
which is th' worst.  Tha' was in a fine temper tha'self, too.  But he
says to me when I went into his room, 'Please ask Miss Mary if she'll
please come an' talk to me?' Think o' him saying please! Will you go,
Miss?" "I'll run and see Dickon first," said Mary.  "No, I'll go and
see Colin first and tell him--I know what I'll tell him," with a sudden
inspiration.

She had her hat on when she appeared in Colin's room and for a second
he looked disappointed.  He was in bed.  His face was pitifully white
and there were dark circles round his eyes.

"I'm glad you came," he said.  "My head aches and I ache all over
because I'm so tired.  Are you going somewhere?"

Mary went and leaned against his bed.

"I won't be long," she said.  "I'm going to Dickon, but I'll come back.
Colin, it's--it's something about the garden."

His whole face brightened and a little color came into it.

"Oh! is it?" he cried out.  "I dreamed about it all night I heard you
say something about gray changing into green, and I dreamed I was
standing in a place all filled with trembling little green leaves--and
there were birds on nests everywhere and they looked so soft and still.
I'll lie and think about it until you come back."

In five minutes Mary was with Dickon in their garden.  The fox and the
crow were with him again and this time he had brought two tame
squirrels.  "I came over on the pony this mornin'," he said.  "Eh! he
is a good little chap--Jump is! I brought these two in my pockets.
This here one he's called Nut an' this here other one's called Shell."

When he said "Nut" one squirrel leaped on to his right shoulder and
when he said "Shell" the other one leaped on to his left shoulder.

When they sat down on the grass with Captain curled at their feet, Soot
solemnly listening on a tree and Nut and Shell nosing about close to
them, it seemed to Mary that it would be scarcely bearable to leave
such delightfulness, but when she began to tell her story somehow the
look in Dickon's funny face gradually changed her mind.  She could see
he felt sorrier for Colin than she did.  He looked up at the sky and
all about him.

"Just listen to them birds--th' world seems full of 'em--all whistlin'
an' pipin'," he said.  "Look at 'em dartin' about, an' hearken at 'em
callin' to each other.  Come springtime seems like as if all th'
world's callin'. The leaves is uncurlin' so you can see 'em--an', my
word, th' nice smells there is about!" sniffing with his happy
turned-up nose.  "An' that poor lad lyin' shut up an' seein' so little
that he gets to thinkin' o' things as sets him screamin'. Eh! my!  we
mun get him out here--we mun get him watchin' an listenin' an' sniffin'
up th' air an' get him just soaked through wi' sunshine.  An' we munnot
lose no time about it."

When he was very much interested he often spoke quite broad Yorkshire
though at other times he tried to modify his dialect so that Mary could
better understand.  But she loved his broad Yorkshire and had in fact
been trying to learn to speak it herself.  So she spoke a little now.

"Aye, that we mun," she said (which meant "Yes, indeed, we must").
"I'll tell thee what us'll do first," she proceeded, and Dickon
grinned, because when the little wench tried to twist her tongue into
speaking Yorkshire it amused him very much.  "He's took a graidely
fancy to thee.  He wants to see thee and he wants to see Soot an'
Captain.  When I go back to the house to talk to him I'll ax him if
tha' canna' come an' see him tomorrow mornin'--an'.  bring tha'
creatures wi' thee--an' then--in a bit, when there's more leaves out,
an' happen a bud or two, we'll get him to come out an' tha' shall push
him in his chair an' we'll bring him here an' show him everything."

When she stopped she was quite proud of herself.  She had never made a
long speech in Yorkshire before and she had remembered very well.

"Tha' mun talk a bit o' Yorkshire like that to Mester Colin," Dickon
chuckled.  "Tha'll make him laugh an' there's nowt as good for ill folk
as laughin' is.  Mother says she believes as half a hour's good laugh
every mornin' 'ud cure a chap as was makin' ready for typhus fever."

"I'm going to talk Yorkshire to him this very day," said Mary,
chuckling herself.

The garden had reached the time when every day and every night it
seemed as if Magicians were passing through it drawing loveliness out
of the earth and the boughs with wands.  It was hard to go away and
leave it all, particularly as Nut had actually crept on to her dress
and Shell had scrambled down the trunk of the apple-tree they sat under
and stayed there looking at her with inquiring eyes.  But she went back
to the house and when she sat down close to Colin's bed he began to
sniff as Dickon did though not in such an experienced way.

"You smell like flowers and--and fresh things," he cried out quite
joyously.  "What is it you smell of? It's cool and warm and sweet all
at the same time."

"It's th' wind from th' moor," said Mary.  "It comes o' sittin' on th'
grass under a tree wi' Dickon an' wi' Captain an' Soot an' Nut an'
Shell.  It's th' springtime an' out o' doors an' sunshine as smells so
graidely."

She said it as broadly as she could, and you do not know how broadly
Yorkshire sounds until you have heard some one speak it.  Colin began
to laugh.

"What are you doing?" he said.  "I never heard you talk like that
before.  How funny it sounds."

"I'm givin' thee a bit o' Yorkshire," answered Mary triumphantly.  "I
canna' talk as graidely as Dickon an' Martha can but tha' sees I can
shape a bit.  Doesn't tha' understand a bit o' Yorkshire when tha'
hears it? An' tha' a Yorkshire lad thysel' bred an' born! Eh! I wonder
tha'rt not ashamed o' thy face."

And then she began to laugh too and they both laughed until they could
not stop themselves and they laughed until the room echoed and Mrs.
Medlock opening the door to come in drew back into the corridor and
stood listening amazed.

"Well, upon my word!" she said, speaking rather broad Yorkshire herself
because there was no one to hear her and she was so astonished.
"Whoever heard th' like! Whoever on earth would ha' thought it!"

There was so much to talk about.  It seemed as if Colin could never
hear enough of Dickon and Captain and Soot and Nut and Shell and the
pony whose name was Jump.  Mary had run round into the wood with Dickon
to see Jump.  He was a tiny little shaggy moor pony with thick locks
hanging over his eyes and with a pretty face and a nuzzling velvet
nose.  He was rather thin with living on moor grass but he was as tough
and wiry as if the muscle in his little legs had been made of steel
springs.  He had lifted his head and whinnied softly the moment he saw
Dickon and he had trotted up to him and put his head across his
shoulder and then Dickon had talked into his ear and Jump had talked
back in odd little whinnies and puffs and snorts.  Dickon had made him
give Mary his small front hoof and kiss her on her cheek with his
velvet muzzle.

"Does he really understand everything Dickon says?" Colin asked.

"It seems as if he does," answered Mary.  "Dickon says anything will
understand if you're friends with it for sure, but you have to be
friends for sure."

Colin lay quiet a little while and his strange gray eyes seemed to be
staring at the wall, but Mary saw he was thinking.

"I wish I was friends with things," he said at last, "but I'm not.  I
never had anything to be friends with, and I can't bear people."

"Can't you bear me?" asked Mary.

"Yes, I can," he answered.  "It's funny but I even like you."

"Ben Weatherstaff said I was like him," said Mary.  "He said he'd
warrant we'd both got the same nasty tempers.  I think you are like him
too.  We are all three alike--you and I and Ben Weatherstaff.  He said
we were neither of us much to look at and we were as sour as we looked.
But I don't feel as sour as I used to before I knew the robin and
Dickon."

"Did you feel as if you hated people?"

"Yes," answered Mary without any affectation.  "I should have detested
you if I had seen you before I saw the robin and Dickon."

Colin put out his thin hand and touched her.

"Mary," he said, "I wish I hadn't said what I did about sending Dickon
away.  I hated you when you said he was like an angel and I laughed at
you but--but perhaps he is."

"Well, it was rather funny to say it," she admitted frankly, "because
his nose does turn up and he has a big mouth and his clothes have
patches all over them and he talks broad Yorkshire, but--but if an
angel did come to Yorkshire and live on the moor--if there was a
Yorkshire angel--I believe he'd understand the green things and know
how to make them grow and he would know how to talk to the wild
creatures as Dickon does and they'd know he was friends for sure."

"I shouldn't mind Dickon looking at me," said Colin; "I want to see
him."

"I'm glad you said that," answered Mary, "because--because--"

Quite suddenly it came into her mind that this was the minute to tell
him.  Colin knew something new was coming.

"Because what?" he cried eagerly.

Mary was so anxious that she got up from her stool and came to him and
caught hold of both his hands.

"Can I trust you? I trusted Dickon because birds trusted him.  Can I
trust you--for sure--for sure?" she implored.

Her face was so solemn that he almost whispered his answer.

"Yes--yes!"

"Well, Dickon will come to see you tomorrow morning, and he'll bring
his creatures with him."

"Oh! Oh!" Colin cried out in delight.

"But that's not all," Mary went on, almost pale with solemn excitement.
"The rest is better.  There is a door into the garden.  I found it.  It
is under the ivy on the wall."

If he had been a strong healthy boy Colin would probably have shouted
"Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!" but he was weak and rather hysterical; his
eyes grew bigger and bigger and he gasped for breath.

"Oh! Mary!" he cried out with a half sob.  "Shall I see it? Shall I get
into it? Shall I live to get into it?" and he clutched her hands and
dragged her toward him.

"Of course you'll see it!" snapped Mary indignantly.  "Of course you'll
live to get into it! Don't be silly!"

And she was so un-hysterical and natural and childish that she brought
him to his senses and he began to laugh at himself and a few minutes
afterward she was sitting on her stool again telling him not what she
imagined the secret garden to be like but what it really was, and
Colin's aches and tiredness were forgotten and he was listening
enraptured.

"It is just what you thought it would be," he said at last.  "It sounds
just as if you had really seen it.  You know I said that when you told
me first."

Mary hesitated about two minutes and then boldly spoke the truth.

"I had seen it--and I had been in," she said.  "I found the key and got
in weeks ago.  But I daren't tell you--I daren't because I was so
afraid I couldn't trust you--for sure!"

The next morning, Mary tells Colin that she's going to meet Dickon and that, "it's something about the garden" . Colin is so glad to hear it that he's willing to wait patiently until she comes back. Dickon brings his fox, his rook, and two new animal friends: tame squirrels named Nut and Shell. Back at the Manor, Mary tells Colin all about Dickon, his tame animals, and his moor horse named Jump. Colin tells Mary that he wants to see Dickon--a huge personal breakthrough, since, of course, Colin hates everybody. Mary promises Colin that Dickon will come the next day, with all his animals. And Mary finally brings Colin in on the secret: They have found the door to the walled garden and seen inside. Colin is overjoyed: He will live to see the inside of the Secret Garden.


Of course Dr. Craven had been sent for the morning after Colin had had
his tantrum.  He was always sent for at once when such a thing occurred
and he always found, when he arrived, a white shaken boy lying on his
bed, sulky and still so hysterical that he was ready to break into
fresh sobbing at the least word.  In fact, Dr. Craven dreaded and
detested the difficulties of these visits.  On this occasion he was
away from Misselthwaite Manor until afternoon.

"How is he?" he asked Mrs. Medlock rather irritably when he arrived.
"He will break a blood-vessel in one of those fits some day.  The boy
is half insane with hysteria and self-indulgence."

"Well, sir," answered Mrs. Medlock, "you'll scarcely believe your eyes
when you see him.  That plain sour-faced child that's almost as bad as
himself has just bewitched him.  How she's done it there's no telling.
The Lord knows she's nothing to look at and you scarcely ever hear her
speak, but she did what none of us dare do.  She just flew at him like
a little cat last night, and stamped her feet and ordered him to stop
screaming, and somehow she startled him so that he actually did stop,
and this afternoon--well just come up and see, sir.  It's past
crediting."

The scene which Dr. Craven beheld when he entered his patient's room
was indeed rather astonishing to him.  As Mrs. Medlock opened the door
he heard laughing and chattering.  Colin was on his sofa in his
dressing-gown and he was sitting up quite straight looking at a picture
in one of the garden books and talking to the plain child who at that
moment could scarcely be called plain at all because her face was so
glowing with enjoyment.

"Those long spires of blue ones--we'll have a lot of those," Colin was
announcing.  "They're called Del-phin-iums."

"Dickon says they're larkspurs made big and grand," cried Mistress
Mary.  "There are clumps there already."

Then they saw Dr. Craven and stopped.  Mary became quite still and
Colin looked fretful.

"I am sorry to hear you were ill last night, my boy," Dr. Craven said a
trifle nervously.  He was rather a nervous man.

"I'm better now--much better," Colin answered, rather like a Rajah.
"I'm going out in my chair in a day or two if it is fine.  I want some
fresh air."

Dr. Craven sat down by him and felt his pulse and looked at him
curiously.

"It must be a very fine day," he said, "and you must be very careful
not to tire yourself."

"Fresh air won't tire me," said the young Rajah.

As there had been occasions when this same young gentleman had shrieked
aloud with rage and had insisted that fresh air would give him cold and
kill him, it is not to be wondered at that his doctor felt somewhat
startled.

"I thought you did not like fresh air," he said.

"I don't when I am by myself," replied the Rajah; "but my cousin is
going out with me."

"And the nurse, of course?" suggested Dr. Craven.

"No, I will not have the nurse," so magnificently that Mary could not
help remembering how the young native Prince had looked with his
diamonds and emeralds and pearls stuck all over him and the great
rubies on the small dark hand he had waved to command his servants to
approach with salaams and receive his orders.

"My cousin knows how to take care of me.  I am always better when she
is with me.  She made me better last night.  A very strong boy I know
will push my carriage."

Dr. Craven felt rather alarmed.  If this tiresome hysterical boy should
chance to get well he himself would lose all chance of inheriting
Misselthwaite; but he was not an unscrupulous man, though he was a weak
one, and he did not intend to let him run into actual danger.

"He must be a strong boy and a steady boy," he said.  "And I must know
something about him.  Who is he? What is his name?"

"It's Dickon," Mary spoke up suddenly.  She felt somehow that everybody
who knew the moor must know Dickon.  And she was right, too.  She saw
that in a moment Dr. Craven's serious face relaxed into a relieved
smile.

"Oh, Dickon," he said.  "If it is Dickon you will be safe enough.  He's
as strong as a moor pony, is Dickon."

"And he's trusty," said Mary.  "He's th' trustiest lad i' Yorkshire."
She had been talking Yorkshire to Colin and she forgot herself.

"Did Dickon teach you that?" asked Dr. Craven, laughing outright.

"I'm learning it as if it was French," said Mary rather coldly.  "It's
like a native dialect in India.  Very clever people try to learn them.
I like it and so does Colin." "Well, well," he said.  "If it amuses you
perhaps it won't do you any harm.  Did you take your bromide last
night, Colin?"

"No," Colin answered.  "I wouldn't take it at first and after Mary made
me quiet she talked me to sleep--in a low voice--about the spring
creeping into a garden."

"That sounds soothing," said Dr. Craven, more perplexed than ever and
glancing sideways at Mistress Mary sitting on her stool and looking
down silently at the carpet.  "You are evidently better, but you must
remember--"

"I don't want to remember," interrupted the Rajah, appearing again.
"When I lie by myself and remember I begin to have pains everywhere and
I think of things that make me begin to scream because I hate them so.
If there was a doctor anywhere who could make you forget you were ill
instead of remembering it I would have him brought here." And he waved
a thin hand which ought really to have been covered with royal signet
rings made of rubies.  "It is because my cousin makes me forget that
she makes me better."

Dr. Craven had never made such a short stay after a "tantrum"; usually
he was obliged to remain a very long time and do a great many things.
This afternoon he did not give any medicine or leave any new orders and
he was spared any disagreeable scenes.  When he went downstairs he
looked very thoughtful and when he talked to Mrs. Medlock in the
library she felt that he was a much puzzled man.

"Well, sir," she ventured, "could you have believed it?"

"It is certainly a new state of affairs," said the doctor.  "And
there's no denying it is better than the old one."

"I believe Susan Sowerby's right--I do that," said Mrs. Medlock.  "I
stopped in her cottage on my way to Thwaite yesterday and had a bit of
talk with her.  And she says to me, 'Well, Sarah Ann, she mayn't be a
good child, an' she mayn't be a pretty one, but she's a child, an'
children needs children.' We went to school together, Susan Sowerby and
me."

"She's the best sick nurse I know," said Dr. Craven.  "When I find her
in a cottage I know the chances are that I shall save my patient."

Mrs. Medlock smiled.  She was fond of Susan Sowerby.

"She's got a way with her, has Susan," she went on quite volubly.
"I've been thinking all morning of one thing she said yesterday.  She
says, 'Once when I was givin' th' children a bit of a preach after
they'd been fightin' I ses to 'em all, "When I was at school my
jography told as th' world was shaped like a orange an' I found out
before I was ten that th' whole orange doesn't belong to nobody.  No
one owns more than his bit of a quarter an' there's times it seems like
there's not enow quarters to go round.  But don't you--none o'
you--think as you own th' whole orange or you'll find out you're
mistaken, an' you won't find it out without hard knocks."  'What
children learns from children,' she says, 'is that there's no sense in
grabbin' at th' whole orange--peel an' all.  If you do you'll likely
not get even th' pips, an' them's too bitter to eat.'"

"She's a shrewd woman," said Dr. Craven, putting on his coat.

"Well, she's got a way of saying things," ended Mrs. Medlock, much
pleased.  "Sometimes I've said to her, 'Eh! Susan, if you was a
different woman an' didn't talk such broad Yorkshire I've seen the
times when I should have said you was clever.'"

That night Colin slept without once awakening and when he opened his
eyes in the morning he lay still and smiled without knowing it--smiled
because he felt so curiously comfortable.  It was actually nice to be
awake, and he turned over and stretched his limbs luxuriously.  He felt
as if tight strings which had held him had loosened themselves and let
him go.  He did not know that Dr. Craven would have said that his
nerves had relaxed and rested themselves.  Instead of lying and staring
at the wall and wishing he had not awakened, his mind was full of the
plans he and Mary had made yesterday, of pictures of the garden and of
Dickon and his wild creatures.  It was so nice to have things to think
about.  And he had not been awake more than ten minutes when he heard
feet running along the corridor and Mary was at the door.  The next
minute she was in the room and had run across to his bed, bringing with
her a waft of fresh air full of the scent of the morning.

"You've been out! You've been out! There's that nice smell of leaves!"
he cried.

She had been running and her hair was loose and blown and she was
bright with the air and pink-cheeked, though he could not see it.

"It's so beautiful!" she said, a little breathless with her speed.
"You never saw anything so beautiful!  It has come! I thought it had
come that other morning, but it was only coming.  It is here now! It
has come, the Spring! Dickon says so!"

"Has it?" cried Colin, and though he really knew nothing about it he
felt his heart beat.  He actually sat up in bed.

"Open the window!" he added, laughing half with joyful excitement and
half at his own fancy.  "Perhaps we may hear golden trumpets!"

And though he laughed, Mary was at the window in a moment and in a
moment more it was opened wide and freshness and softness and scents
and birds' songs were pouring through.

"That's fresh air," she said.  "Lie on your back and draw in long
breaths of it.  That's what Dickon does when he's lying on the moor.
He says he feels it in his veins and it makes him strong and he feels
as if he could live forever and ever.  Breathe it and breathe it."

She was only repeating what Dickon had told her, but she caught Colin's
fancy.

"'Forever and ever'! Does it make him feel like that?" he said, and he
did as she told him, drawing in long deep breaths over and over again
until he felt that something quite new and delightful was happening to
him.

Mary was at his bedside again.

"Things are crowding up out of the earth," she ran on in a hurry.  "And
there are flowers uncurling and buds on everything and the green veil
has covered nearly all the gray and the birds are in such a hurry about
their nests for fear they may be too late that some of them are even
fighting for places in the secret garden.  And the rose-bushes look as
wick as wick can be, and there are primroses in the lanes and woods,
and the seeds we planted are up, and Dickon has brought the fox and the
crow and the squirrels and a new-born lamb."

And then she paused for breath.  The new-born lamb Dickon had found
three days before lying by its dead mother among the gorse bushes on
the moor.  It was not the first motherless lamb he had found and he
knew what to do with it.  He had taken it to the cottage wrapped in his
jacket and he had let it lie near the fire and had fed it with warm
milk.  It was a soft thing with a darling silly baby face and legs
rather long for its body.  Dickon had carried it over the moor in his
arms and its feeding bottle was in his pocket with a squirrel, and when
Mary had sat under a tree with its limp warmness huddled on her lap she
had felt as if she were too full of strange joy to speak.  A lamb--a
lamb! A living lamb who lay on your lap like a baby!

She was describing it with great joy and Colin was listening and
drawing in long breaths of air when the nurse entered.  She started a
little at the sight of the open window.  She had sat stifling in the
room many a warm day because her patient was sure that open windows
gave people cold.

"Are you sure you are not chilly, Master Colin?" she inquired.

"No," was the answer.  "I am breathing long breaths of fresh air.  It
makes you strong.  I am going to get up to the sofa for breakfast.  My
cousin will have breakfast with me."

The nurse went away, concealing a smile, to give the order for two
breakfasts.  She found the servants' hall a more amusing place than the
invalid's chamber and just now everybody wanted to hear the news from
upstairs.  There was a great deal of joking about the unpopular young
recluse who, as the cook said, "had found his master, and good for
him." The servants' hall had been very tired of the tantrums, and the
butler, who was a man with a family, had more than once expressed his
opinion that the invalid would be all the better "for a good hiding."

When Colin was on his sofa and the breakfast for two was put upon the
table he made an announcement to the nurse in his most Rajah-like
manner.

"A boy, and a fox, and a crow, and two squirrels, and a new-born lamb,
are coming to see me this morning.  I want them brought upstairs as
soon as they come," he said.  "You are not to begin playing with the
animals in the servants' hall and keep them there.  I want them here."
The nurse gave a slight gasp and tried to conceal it with a cough.

"Yes, sir," she answered.

"I'll tell you what you can do," added Colin, waving his hand.  "You
can tell Martha to bring them here.  The boy is Martha's brother.  His
name is Dickon and he is an animal charmer."

"I hope the animals won't bite, Master Colin," said the nurse.

"I told you he was a charmer," said Colin austerely.  "Charmers'
animals never bite."

"There are snake-charmers in India," said Mary.  "And they can put
their snakes' heads in their mouths."

"Goodness!" shuddered the nurse.

They ate their breakfast with the morning air pouring in upon them.
Colin's breakfast was a very good one and Mary watched him with serious
interest.

"You will begin to get fatter just as I did," she said.  "I never
wanted my breakfast when I was in India and now I always want it."

"I wanted mine this morning," said Colin.  "Perhaps it was the fresh
air.  When do you think Dickon will come?"

He was not long in coming.  In about ten minutes Mary held up her hand.

"Listen!" she said.  "Did you hear a caw?"

Colin listened and heard it, the oddest sound in the world to hear
inside a house, a hoarse "caw-caw."

"Yes," he answered.

"That's Soot," said Mary.  "Listen again.  Do you hear a bleat--a tiny
one?"

"Oh, yes!" cried Colin, quite flushing.

"That's the new-born lamb," said Mary.  "He's coming."

Dickon's moorland boots were thick and clumsy and though he tried to
walk quietly they made a clumping sound as he walked through the long
corridors.  Mary and Colin heard him marching--marching, until he
passed through the tapestry door on to the soft carpet of Colin's own
passage.

"If you please, sir," announced Martha, opening the door, "if you
please, sir, here's Dickon an' his creatures."

Dickon came in smiling his nicest wide smile.  The new-born lamb was in
his arms and the little red fox trotted by his side.  Nut sat on his
left shoulder and Soot on his right and Shell's head and paws peeped
out of his coat pocket.

Colin slowly sat up and stared and stared--as he had stared when he
first saw Mary; but this was a stare of wonder and delight.  The truth
was that in spite of all he had heard he had not in the least
understood what this boy would be like and that his fox and his crow
and his squirrels and his lamb were so near to him and his friendliness
that they seemed almost to be part of himself.  Colin had never talked
to a boy in his life and he was so overwhelmed by his own pleasure and
curiosity that he did not even think of speaking.

But Dickon did not feel the least shy or awkward.  He had not felt
embarrassed because the crow had not known his language and had only
stared and had not spoken to him the first time they met.  Creatures
were always like that until they found out about you.  He walked over
to Colin's sofa and put the new-born lamb quietly on his lap, and
immediately the little creature turned to the warm velvet dressing-gown
and began to nuzzle and nuzzle into its folds and butt its tight-curled
head with soft impatience against his side.  Of course no boy could
have helped speaking then.

"What is it doing?" cried Colin.  "What does it want?"

"It wants its mother," said Dickon, smiling more and more.  "I brought
it to thee a bit hungry because I knowed tha'd like to see it feed."

He knelt down by the sofa and took a feeding-bottle from his pocket.

"Come on, little 'un," he said, turning the small woolly white head
with a gentle brown hand.  "This is what tha's after.  Tha'll get more
out o' this than tha' will out o' silk velvet coats.  There now," and
he pushed the rubber tip of the bottle into the nuzzling mouth and the
lamb began to suck it with ravenous ecstasy.

After that there was no wondering what to say.  By the time the lamb
fell asleep questions poured forth and Dickon answered them all.  He
told them how he had found the lamb just as the sun was rising three
mornings ago.  He had been standing on the moor listening to a skylark
and watching him swing higher and higher into the sky until he was only
a speck in the heights of blue.

"I'd almost lost him but for his song an' I was wonderin' how a chap
could hear it when it seemed as if he'd get out o' th' world in a
minute--an' just then I heard somethin' else far off among th' gorse
bushes.  It was a weak bleatin' an' I knowed it was a new lamb as was
hungry an' I knowed it wouldn't be hungry if it hadn't lost its mother
somehow, so I set off searchin'.  Eh! I did have a look for it.  I went
in an' out among th' gorse bushes an' round an' round an' I always
seemed to take th' wrong turnin'. But at last I seed a bit o' white by
a rock on top o' th' moor an' I climbed up an' found th' little 'un
half dead wi' cold an' clemmin'." While he talked, Soot flew solemnly
in and out of the open window and cawed remarks about the scenery while
Nut and Shell made excursions into the big trees outside and ran up and
down trunks and explored branches.  Captain curled up near Dickon, who
sat on the hearth-rug from preference.

They looked at the pictures in the gardening books and Dickon knew all
the flowers by their country names and knew exactly which ones were
already growing in the secret garden.

"I couldna' say that there name," he said, pointing to one under which
was written "Aquilegia," "but us calls that a columbine, an' that there
one it's a snapdragon and they both grow wild in hedges, but these is
garden ones an' they're bigger an' grander.  There's some big clumps o'
columbine in th' garden.  They'll look like a bed o' blue an' white
butterflies flutterin' when they're out."

"I'm going to see them," cried Colin.  "I am going to see them!"

"Aye, that tha' mun," said Mary quite seriously.  "An' tha' munnot lose
no time about it."

Dr. Craven arrives the morning after Colin's tantrum to check in on him--to make sure that he hasn't simply exploded in rage during the night, we guess. Mrs. Medlock tells Dr. Craven he won't believe it: That unpleasant little girl has shaken Colin right out of his tantrum. He's fine now. When Dr. Craven gets to Colin's room, he sees Colin happily chatting with Mary about flowers for the garden. Remember how we said that Dr. Craven is Mr. Craven's cousin? He's actually a little disappointed to hear that Colin's health is better, since he is next in line to inherit Misselthwaite Manor if Colin dies. Still, Dr. Craven isn't a bad guy, and he doesn't want to hurt Colin actively . He's impressed that Colin hasn't needed any medicine that day. The next morning, Mary comes running in to Colin's room to say that spring has officially sprung. And Dickon's on his way, with his squirrels and his rook and his fox and a newborn lamb he's raising since its mother died. Dickon shows Colin how he feeds his baby lamb out of a bottle. Colin is thrilled that he is going to see the Secret Garden in person at last.


But they were obliged to wait more than a week because first there came
some very windy days and then Colin was threatened with a cold, which
two things happening one after the other would no doubt have thrown him
into a rage but that there was so much careful and mysterious planning
to do and almost every day Dickon came in, if only for a few minutes,
to talk about what was happening on the moor and in the lanes and
hedges and on the borders of streams.  The things he had to tell about
otters' and badgers' and water-rats' houses, not to mention birds'
nests and field-mice and their burrows, were enough to make you almost
tremble with excitement when you heard all the intimate details from an
animal charmer and realized with what thrilling eagerness and anxiety
the whole busy underworld was working.

"They're same as us," said Dickon, "only they have to build their homes
every year.  An' it keeps 'em so busy they fair scuffle to get 'em
done."

The most absorbing thing, however, was the preparations to be made
before Colin could be transported with sufficient secrecy to the
garden.  No one must see the chair-carriage and Dickon and Mary after
they turned a certain corner of the shrubbery and entered upon the walk
outside the ivied walls.  As each day passed, Colin had become more and
more fixed in his feeling that the mystery surrounding the garden was
one of its greatest charms.  Nothing must spoil that.  No one must ever
suspect that they had a secret.  People must think that he was simply
going out with Mary and Dickon because he liked them and did not object
to their looking at him.  They had long and quite delightful talks
about their route.  They would go up this path and down that one and
cross the other and go round among the fountain flower-beds as if they
were looking at the "bedding-out plants" the head gardener, Mr. Roach,
had been having arranged.  That would seem such a rational thing to do
that no one would think it at all mysterious.  They would turn into the
shrubbery walks and lose themselves until they came to the long walls.
It was almost as serious and elaborately thought out as the plans of
march made by great generals in time of war.

Rumors of the new and curious things which were occurring in the
invalid's apartments had of course filtered through the servants' hall
into the stable yards and out among the gardeners, but notwithstanding
this, Mr. Roach was startled one day when he received orders from
Master Colin's room to the effect that he must report himself in the
apartment no outsider had ever seen, as the invalid himself desired to
speak to him.

"Well, well," he said to himself as he hurriedly changed his coat,
"what's to do now? His Royal Highness that wasn't to be looked at
calling up a man he's never set eyes on."

Mr. Roach was not without curiosity.  He had never caught even a
glimpse of the boy and had heard a dozen exaggerated stories about his
uncanny looks and ways and his insane tempers.  The thing he had heard
oftenest was that he might die at any moment and there had been
numerous fanciful descriptions of a humped back and helpless limbs,
given by people who had never seen him.

"Things are changing in this house, Mr. Roach," said Mrs. Medlock, as
she led him up the back staircase to the corridor on to which opened
the hitherto mysterious chamber.

"Let's hope they're changing for the better, Mrs. Medlock," he answered.

"They couldn't well change for the worse," she continued; "and queer as
it all is there's them as finds their duties made a lot easier to stand
up under.  Don't you be surprised, Mr. Roach, if you find yourself in
the middle of a menagerie and Martha Sowerby's Dickon more at home than
you or me could ever be."

There really was a sort of Magic about Dickon, as Mary always privately
believed.  When Mr. Roach heard his name he smiled quite leniently.

"He'd be at home in Buckingham Palace or at the bottom of a coal mine,"
he said.  "And yet it's not impudence, either.  He's just fine, is that
lad."

It was perhaps well he had been prepared or he might have been
startled.  When the bedroom door was opened a large crow, which seemed
quite at home perched on the high back of a carven chair, announced the
entrance of a visitor by saying "Caw--Caw" quite loudly.  In spite of
Mrs. Medlock's warning, Mr. Roach only just escaped being sufficiently
undignified to jump backward.

The young Rajah was neither in bed nor on his sofa.  He was sitting in
an armchair and a young lamb was standing by him shaking its tail in
feeding-lamb fashion as Dickon knelt giving it milk from its bottle.  A
squirrel was perched on Dickon's bent back attentively nibbling a nut.
The little girl from India was sitting on a big footstool looking on.

"Here is Mr. Roach, Master Colin," said Mrs. Medlock.

The young Rajah turned and looked his servitor over--at least that was
what the head gardener felt happened.

"Oh, you are Roach, are you?" he said.  "I sent for you to give you
some very important orders."

"Very good, sir," answered Roach, wondering if he was to receive
instructions to fell all the oaks in the park or to transform the
orchards into water-gardens.

"I am going out in my chair this afternoon," said Colin.  "If the fresh
air agrees with me I may go out every day.  When I go, none of the
gardeners are to be anywhere near the Long Walk by the garden walls.
No one is to be there.  I shall go out about two o'clock and everyone
must keep away until I send word that they may go back to their work."

"Very good, sir," replied Mr. Roach, much relieved to hear that the
oaks might remain and that the orchards were safe.  "Mary," said Colin,
turning to her, "what is that thing you say in India when you have
finished talking and want people to go?"

"You say, 'You have my permission to go,'" answered Mary.

The Rajah waved his hand.

"You have my permission to go, Roach," he said.  "But, remember, this
is very important."

"Caw--Caw!" remarked the crow hoarsely but not impolitely.

"Very good, sir.  Thank you, sir," said Mr. Roach, and Mrs. Medlock
took him out of the room.

Outside in the corridor, being a rather good-natured man, he smiled
until he almost laughed.

"My word!" he said, "he's got a fine lordly way with him, hasn't he?
You'd think he was a whole Royal Family rolled into one--Prince Consort
and all.".

"Eh!" protested Mrs. Medlock, "we've had to let him trample all over
every one of us ever since he had feet and he thinks that's what folks
was born for."

"Perhaps he'll grow out of it, if he lives," suggested Mr. Roach.

"Well, there's one thing pretty sure," said Mrs. Medlock.  "If he does
live and that Indian child stays here I'll warrant she teaches him that
the whole orange does not belong to him, as Susan Sowerby says.  And
he'll be likely to find out the size of his own quarter."

Inside the room Colin was leaning back on his cushions.

"It's all safe now," he said.  "And this afternoon I shall see it--this
afternoon I shall be in it!"

Dickon went back to the garden with his creatures and Mary stayed with
Colin.  She did not think he looked tired but he was very quiet before
their lunch came and he was quiet while they were eating it.  She
wondered why and asked him about it.

"What big eyes you've got, Colin," she said.  "When you are thinking
they get as big as saucers.  What are you thinking about now?"

"I can't help thinking about what it will look like," he answered.

"The garden?" asked Mary.

"The springtime," he said.  "I was thinking that I've really never seen
it before.  I scarcely ever went out and when I did go I never looked
at it.  I didn't even think about it."

"I never saw it in India because there wasn't any," said Mary.

Shut in and morbid as his life had been, Colin had more imagination
than she had and at least he had spent a good deal of time looking at
wonderful books and pictures.

"That morning when you ran in and said 'It's come! It's come!', you made
me feel quite queer.  It sounded as if things were coming with a great
procession and big bursts and wafts of music.  I've a picture like it
in one of my books--crowds of lovely people and children with garlands
and branches with blossoms on them, everyone laughing and dancing and
crowding and playing on pipes.  That was why I said, 'Perhaps we shall
hear golden trumpets' and told you to throw open the window."

"How funny!" said Mary.  "That's really just what it feels like.  And
if all the flowers and leaves and green things and birds and wild
creatures danced past at once, what a crowd it would be! I'm sure
they'd dance and sing and flute and that would be the wafts of music."

They both laughed but it was not because the idea was laughable but
because they both so liked it.

A little later the nurse made Colin ready.  She noticed that instead of
lying like a log while his clothes were put on he sat up and made some
efforts to help himself, and he talked and laughed with Mary all the
time.

"This is one of his good days, sir," she said to Dr. Craven, who
dropped in to inspect him.  "He's in such good spirits that it makes
him stronger."

"I'll call in again later in the afternoon, after he has come in," said
Dr. Craven.  "I must see how the going out agrees with him.  I wish,"
in a very low voice, "that he would let you go with him."

"I'd rather give up the case this moment, sir, than even stay here
while it's suggested," answered the nurse.  With sudden firmness.

"I hadn't really decided to suggest it," said the doctor, with his
slight nervousness.  "We'll try the experiment.  Dickon's a lad I'd
trust with a new-born child."

The strongest footman in the house carried Colin down stairs and put
him in his wheeled chair near which Dickon waited outside.  After the
manservant had arranged his rugs and cushions the Rajah waved his hand
to him and to the nurse.

"You have my permission to go," he said, and they both disappeared
quickly and it must be confessed giggled when they were safely inside
the house.

Dickon began to push the wheeled chair slowly and steadily.  Mistress
Mary walked beside it and Colin leaned back and lifted his face to the
sky.  The arch of it looked very high and the small snowy clouds seemed
like white birds floating on outspread wings below its crystal
blueness.  The wind swept in soft big breaths down from the moor and
was strange with a wild clear scented sweetness.  Colin kept lifting
his thin chest to draw it in, and his big eyes looked as if it were
they which were listening--listening, instead of his ears.

"There are so many sounds of singing and humming and calling out," he
said.  "What is that scent the puffs of wind bring?"

"It's gorse on th' moor that's openin' out," answered Dickon.  "Eh! th'
bees are at it wonderful today."

Not a human creature was to be caught sight of in the paths they took.
In fact every gardener or gardener's lad had been witched away.  But
they wound in and out among the shrubbery and out and round the
fountain beds, following their carefully planned route for the mere
mysterious pleasure of it.  But when at last they turned into the Long
Walk by the ivied walls the excited sense of an approaching thrill made
them, for some curious reason they could not have explained, begin to
speak in whispers.

"This is it," breathed Mary.  "This is where I used to walk up and down
and wonder and wonder." "Is it?" cried Colin, and his eyes began to
search the ivy with eager curiousness.  "But I can see nothing," he
whispered.  "There is no door."

"That's what I thought," said Mary.

Then there was a lovely breathless silence and the chair wheeled on.

"That is the garden where Ben Weatherstaff works," said Mary.

"Is it?" said Colin.

A few yards more and Mary whispered again.

"This is where the robin flew over the wall," she said.

"Is it?" cried Colin.  "Oh! I wish he'd come again!"

"And that," said Mary with solemn delight, pointing under a big lilac
bush, "is where he perched on the little heap of earth and showed me
the key."

Then Colin sat up.

"Where? Where? There?" he cried, and his eyes were as big as the wolf's
in Red Riding-Hood, when Red Riding-Hood felt called upon to remark on
them.  Dickon stood still and the wheeled chair stopped.

"And this," said Mary, stepping on to the bed close to the ivy, "is
where I went to talk to him when he chirped at me from the top of the
wall.  And this is the ivy the wind blew back," and she took hold of
the hanging green curtain.

"Oh! is it--is it!" gasped Colin.

"And here is the handle, and here is the door.  Dickon push him
in--push him in quickly!"

And Dickon did it with one strong, steady, splendid push.

But Colin had actually dropped back against his cushions, even though
he gasped with delight, and he had covered his eyes with his hands and
held them there shutting out everything until they were inside and the
chair stopped as if by magic and the door was closed.  Not till then
did he take them away and look round and round and round as Dickon and
Mary had done.  And over walls and earth and trees and swinging sprays
and tendrils the fair green veil of tender little leaves had crept, and
in the grass under the trees and the gray urns in the alcoves and here
and there everywhere were touches or splashes of gold and purple and
white and the trees were showing pink and snow above his head and there
were fluttering of wings and faint sweet pipes and humming and scents
and scents.  And the sun fell warm upon his face like a hand with a
lovely touch.  And in wonder Mary and Dickon stood and stared at him.
He looked so strange and different because a pink glow of color had
actually crept all over him--ivory face and neck and hands and all.

"I shall get well! I shall get well!" he cried out.  "Mary! Dickon! I
shall get well! And I shall live forever and ever and ever!"

Colin, Dickon, and Mary can't just go to the Secret Garden without any preparation--first, the weather's too cold, and then they need to prepare a wheelchair for Colin. During this delay, Colin gets really into the idea of keeping the Secret Garden, well, secret. Clearly, the mystery is part of the garden's fascination for him. So Colin demands that the head gardener, Mr. Roach, come to his rooms. Mr. Roach has never actually met Colin, but he's surprised to find "the young Rajah" --in other words, the holy terror who has been bossing around the household since birth--sitting feeding a baby lamb with a bottle. Colin orders Mr. Roach to keep the gardeners away from the Long Walk by the garden walls when Colin is out there in his wheelchair. As Colin waits for afternoon to come, he realizes that he has never been outside to see springtime before. The nurse gets Colin ready to go outside, and he seems eager and happy--another big change from his earlier habits. Outside, Dickon pushes Colin's wheelchair as he takes breaths of fresh air and stares out at the moor. Mary tells the step-by-step story of how the robin showed her the key and the hidden door to the garden. Dickon pushes Colin into the Secret Garden and he sees its green beauty. And Colin exclaims: "I shall get well! I shall get well!"


One of the strange things about living in the world is that it is only
now and then one is quite sure one is going to live forever and ever
and ever.  One knows it sometimes when one gets up at the tender solemn
dawn-time and goes out and stands alone and throws one's head far back
and looks up and up and watches the pale sky slowly changing and
flushing and marvelous unknown things happening until the East almost
makes one cry out and one's heart stands still at the strange
unchanging majesty of the rising of the sun--which has been happening
every morning for thousands and thousands and thousands of years.  One
knows it then for a moment or so.  And one knows it sometimes when one
stands by oneself in a wood at sunset and the mysterious deep gold
stillness slanting through and under the branches seems to be saying
slowly again and again something one cannot quite hear, however much
one tries.  Then sometimes the immense quiet of the dark blue at night
with millions of stars waiting and watching makes one sure; and
sometimes a sound of far-off music makes it true; and sometimes a look
in some one's eyes.

And it was like that with Colin when he first saw and heard and felt
the Springtime inside the four high walls of a hidden garden.  That
afternoon the whole world seemed to devote itself to being perfect and
radiantly beautiful and kind to one boy.  Perhaps out of pure heavenly
goodness the spring came and crowned everything it possibly could into
that one place.  More than once Dickon paused in what he was doing and
stood still with a sort of growing wonder in his eyes, shaking his head
softly.

"Eh! it is graidely," he said.  "I'm twelve goin' on thirteen an'
there's a lot o' afternoons in thirteen years, but seems to me like I
never seed one as graidely as this 'ere."

"Aye, it is a graidely one," said Mary, and she sighed for mere joy.
"I'll warrant it's the graidelest one as ever was in this world."

"Does tha' think," said Colin with dreamy carefulness, "as happen it
was made loike this 'ere all o' purpose for me?"

"My word!" cried Mary admiringly, "that there is a bit o' good
Yorkshire.  Tha'rt shapin' first-rate--that tha' art."

And delight reigned.  They drew the chair under the plum-tree, which
was snow-white with blossoms and musical with bees.  It was like a
king's canopy, a fairy king's. There were flowering cherry-trees near
and apple-trees whose buds were pink and white, and here and there one
had burst open wide.  Between the blossoming branches of the canopy
bits of blue sky looked down like wonderful eyes.

Mary and Dickon worked a little here and there and Colin watched them.
They brought him things to look at--buds which were opening, buds which
were tight closed, bits of twig whose leaves were just showing green,
the feather of a woodpecker which had dropped on the grass, the empty
shell of some bird early hatched.  Dickon pushed the chair slowly round
and round the garden, stopping every other moment to let him look at
wonders springing out of the earth or trailing down from trees.  It was
like being taken in state round the country of a magic king and queen
and shown all the mysterious riches it contained.

"I wonder if we shall see the robin?" said Colin.

"Tha'll see him often enow after a bit," answered Dickon.  "When th'
eggs hatches out th' little chap he'll be kep' so busy it'll make his
head swim.  Tha'll see him flyin' backward an' for'ard carryin' worms
nigh as big as himsel' an' that much noise goin' on in th' nest when he
gets there as fair flusters him so as he scarce knows which big mouth
to drop th' first piece in.  An' gapin' beaks an' squawks on every
side.  Mother says as when she sees th' work a robin has to keep them
gapin' beaks filled, she feels like she was a lady with nothin' to do.
She says she's seen th' little chaps when it seemed like th' sweat must
be droppin' off 'em, though folk can't see it."

This made them giggle so delightedly that they were obliged to cover
their mouths with their hands, remembering that they must not be heard.
Colin had been instructed as to the law of whispers and low voices
several days before.  He liked the mysteriousness of it and did his
best, but in the midst of excited enjoyment it is rather difficult
never to laugh above a whisper.

Every moment of the afternoon was full of new things and every hour the
sunshine grew more golden.  The wheeled chair had been drawn back under
the canopy and Dickon had sat down on the grass and had just drawn out
his pipe when Colin saw something he had not had time to notice before.

"That's a very old tree over there, isn't it?" he said.  Dickon looked
across the grass at the tree and Mary looked and there was a brief
moment of stillness.

"Yes," answered Dickon, after it, and his low voice had a very gentle
sound.

Mary gazed at the tree and thought.

"The branches are quite gray and there's not a single leaf anywhere,"
Colin went on.  "It's quite dead, isn't it?"

"Aye," admitted Dickon.  "But them roses as has climbed all over it
will near hide every bit o' th' dead wood when they're full o' leaves
an' flowers.  It won't look dead then.  It'll be th' prettiest of all."

Mary still gazed at the tree and thought.

"It looks as if a big branch had been broken off," said Colin.  "I
wonder how it was done."

"It's been done many a year," answered Dickon.  "Eh!" with a sudden
relieved start and laying his hand on Colin.  "Look at that robin!
There he is! He's been foragin' for his mate."

Colin was almost too late but he just caught sight of him, the flash of
red-breasted bird with something in his beak.  He darted through the
greenness and into the close-grown corner and was out of sight.  Colin
leaned back on his cushion again, laughing a little.  "He's taking her
tea to her.  Perhaps it's five o'clock. I think I'd like some tea
myself."

And so they were safe.

"It was Magic which sent the robin," said Mary secretly to Dickon
afterward.  "I know it was Magic." For both she and Dickon had been
afraid Colin might ask something about the tree whose branch had broken
off ten years ago and they had talked it over together and Dickon had
stood and rubbed his head in a troubled way.

"We mun look as if it wasn't no different from th' other trees," he had
said.  "We couldn't never tell him how it broke, poor lad.  If he says
anything about it we mun--we mun try to look cheerful."

"Aye, that we mun," had answered Mary.

But she had not felt as if she looked cheerful when she gazed at the
tree.  She wondered and wondered in those few moments if there was any
reality in that other thing Dickon had said.  He had gone on rubbing
his rust-red hair in a puzzled way, but a nice comforted look had begun
to grow in his blue eyes.

"Mrs. Craven was a very lovely young lady," he had gone on rather
hesitatingly.  "An' mother she thinks maybe she's about Misselthwaite
many a time lookin' after Mester Colin, same as all mothers do when
they're took out o' th' world.  They have to come back, tha' sees.
Happen she's been in the garden an' happen it was her set us to work,
an' told us to bring him here."

Mary had thought he meant something about Magic.  She was a great
believer in Magic.  Secretly she quite believed that Dickon worked
Magic, of course good Magic, on everything near him and that was why
people liked him so much and wild creatures knew he was their friend.
She wondered, indeed, if it were not possible that his gift had brought
the robin just at the right moment when Colin asked that dangerous
question.  She felt that his Magic was working all the afternoon and
making Colin look like an entirely different boy.  It did not seem
possible that he could be the crazy creature who had screamed and
beaten and bitten his pillow.  Even his ivory whiteness seemed to
change.  The faint glow of color which had shown on his face and neck
and hands when he first got inside the garden really never quite died
away.  He looked as if he were made of flesh instead of ivory or wax.

They saw the robin carry food to his mate two or three times, and it
was so suggestive of afternoon tea that Colin felt they must have some.

"Go and make one of the men servants bring some in a basket to the
rhododendron walk," he said.  "And then you and Dickon can bring it
here."

It was an agreeable idea, easily carried out, and when the white cloth
was spread upon the grass, with hot tea and buttered toast and
crumpets, a delightfully hungry meal was eaten, and several birds on
domestic errands paused to inquire what was going on and were led into
investigating crumbs with great activity.  Nut and Shell whisked up
trees with pieces of cake and Soot took the entire half of a buttered
crumpet into a corner and pecked at and examined and turned it over and
made hoarse remarks about it until he decided to swallow it all
joyfully in one gulp.

The afternoon was dragging towards its mellow hour.  The sun was
deepening the gold of its lances, the bees were going home and the
birds were flying past less often.  Dickon and Mary were sitting on the
grass, the tea-basket was repacked ready to be taken back to the house,
and Colin was lying against his cushions with his heavy locks pushed
back from his forehead and his face looking quite a natural color.

"I don't want this afternoon to go," he said; "but I shall come back
tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after, and the day after."

"You'll get plenty of fresh air, won't you?" said Mary.  "I'm going to
get nothing else," he answered.  "I've seen the spring now and I'm
going to see the summer.  I'm going to see everything grow here.  I'm
going to grow here myself."

"That tha' will," said Dickon.  "Us'll have thee walkin' about here an'
diggin' same as other folk afore long."

Colin flushed tremendously.

"Walk!" he said.  "Dig! Shall I?"

Dickon's glance at him was delicately cautious.  Neither he nor Mary
had ever asked if anything was the matter with his legs.

"For sure tha' will," he said stoutly.  "Tha--tha's got legs o' thine
own, same as other folks!"

Mary was rather frightened until she heard Colin's answer.

"Nothing really ails them," he said, "but they are so thin and weak.
They shake so that I'm afraid to try to stand on them."

Both Mary and Dickon drew a relieved breath.

"When tha' stops bein' afraid tha'lt stand on 'em," Dickon said with
renewed cheer.  "An' tha'lt stop bein' afraid in a bit."

"I shall?" said Colin, and he lay still as if he were wondering about
things.

They were really very quiet for a little while.  The sun was dropping
lower.  It was that hour when everything stills itself, and they really
had had a busy and exciting afternoon.  Colin looked as if he were
resting luxuriously.  Even the creatures had ceased moving about and
had drawn together and were resting near them.  Soot had perched on a
low branch and drawn up one leg and dropped the gray film drowsily over
his eyes.  Mary privately thought he looked as if he might snore in a
minute.

In the midst of this stillness it was rather startling when Colin half
lifted his head and exclaimed in a loud suddenly alarmed whisper:

"Who is that man?" Dickon and Mary scrambled to their feet.

"Man!" they both cried in low quick voices.

Colin pointed to the high wall.  "Look!" he whispered excitedly.  "Just
look!"

Mary and Dickon wheeled about and looked.  There was Ben Weatherstaff's
indignant face glaring at them over the wall from the top of a ladder!
He actually shook his fist at Mary.

"If I wasn't a bachelder, an' tha' was a wench o' mine," he cried, "I'd
give thee a hidin'!"

He mounted another step threateningly as if it were his energetic
intention to jump down and deal with her; but as she came toward him he
evidently thought better of it and stood on the top step of his ladder
shaking his fist down at her.

"I never thowt much o' thee!" he harangued.  "I couldna' abide thee th'
first time I set eyes on thee.  A scrawny buttermilk-faced young besom,
allus askin' questions an' pokin' tha' nose where it wasna, wanted.  I
never knowed how tha' got so thick wi' me.  If it hadna' been for th'
robin--  Drat him--"

"Ben Weatherstaff," called out Mary, finding her breath.  She stood
below him and called up to him with a sort of gasp.  "Ben Weatherstaff,
it was the robin who showed me the way!"

Then it did seem as if Ben really would scramble down on her side of
the wall, he was so outraged.

"Tha' young bad 'un!" he called down at her.  "Layin' tha' badness on a
robin--not but what he's impidint enow for anythin'. Him showin' thee
th' way! Him! Eh! tha' young nowt"--she could see his next words burst
out because he was overpowered by curiosity--"however i' this world did
tha' get in?"

"It was the robin who showed me the way," she protested obstinately.
"He didn't know he was doing it but he did.  And I can't tell you from
here while you're shaking your fist at me."

He stopped shaking his fist very suddenly at that very moment and his
jaw actually dropped as he stared over her head at something he saw
coming over the grass toward him.

At the first sound of his torrent of words Colin had been so surprised
that he had only sat up and listened as if he were spellbound.  But in
the midst of it he had recovered himself and beckoned imperiously to
Dickon.

"Wheel me over there!" he commanded.  "Wheel me quite close and stop
right in front of him!"

And this, if you please, this is what Ben Weatherstaff beheld and which
made his jaw drop.  A wheeled chair with luxurious cushions and robes
which came toward him looking rather like some sort of State Coach
because a young Rajah leaned back in it with royal command in his great
black-rimmed eyes and a thin white hand extended haughtily toward him.
And it stopped right under Ben Weatherstaff's nose.  It was really no
wonder his mouth dropped open.

"Do you know who I am?" demanded the Rajah.

How Ben Weatherstaff stared! His red old eyes fixed themselves on what
was before him as if he were seeing a ghost.  He gazed and gazed and
gulped a lump down his throat and did not say a word.  "Do you know who
I am?" demanded Colin still more imperiously.  "Answer!"

Ben Weatherstaff put his gnarled hand up and passed it over his eyes
and over his forehead and then he did answer in a queer shaky voice.

"Who tha' art?" he said.  "Aye, that I do--wi' tha' mother's eyes
starin' at me out o' tha' face.  Lord knows how tha' come here.  But
tha'rt th' poor cripple."

Colin forgot that he had ever had a back.  His face flushed scarlet and
he sat bolt upright.

"I'm not a cripple!" he cried out furiously.  "I'm not!"

"He's not!" cried Mary, almost shouting up the wall in her fierce
indignation.  "He's not got a lump as big as a pin! I looked and there
was none there--not one!"

Ben Weatherstaff passed his hand over his forehead again and gazed as
if he could never gaze enough.  His hand shook and his mouth shook and
his voice shook.  He was an ignorant old man and a tactless old man and
he could only remember the things he had heard.

"Tha'--tha' hasn't got a crooked back?" he said hoarsely.

"No!" shouted Colin.

"Tha'--tha' hasn't got crooked legs?" quavered Ben more hoarsely yet.
It was too much.  The strength which Colin usually threw into his
tantrums rushed through him now in a new way.  Never yet had he been
accused of crooked legs--even in whispers--and the perfectly simple
belief in their existence which was revealed by Ben Weatherstaff's
voice was more than Rajah flesh and blood could endure.  His anger and
insulted pride made him forget everything but this one moment and
filled him with a power he had never known before, an almost unnatural
strength.

"Come here!" he shouted to Dickon, and he actually began to tear the
coverings off his lower limbs and disentangle himself.  "Come here!
Come here! This minute!"

Dickon was by his side in a second.  Mary caught her breath in a short
gasp and felt herself turn pale.

"He can do it! He can do it! He can do it! He can!" she gabbled over to
herself under her breath as fast as ever she could.

There was a brief fierce scramble, the rugs were tossed on the ground,
Dickon held Colin's arm, the thin legs were out, the thin feet were on
the grass.  Colin was standing upright--upright--as straight as an
arrow and looking strangely tall--his head thrown back and his strange
eyes flashing lightning.  "Look at me!" he flung up at Ben
Weatherstaff.  "Just look at me--you!  Just look at me!"

"He's as straight as I am!" cried Dickon.  "He's as straight as any lad
i' Yorkshire!"

What Ben Weatherstaff did Mary thought queer beyond measure.  He choked
and gulped and suddenly tears ran down his weather-wrinkled cheeks as
he struck his old hands together.

"Eh!" he burst forth, "th' lies folk tells! Tha'rt as thin as a lath
an' as white as a wraith, but there's not a knob on thee.  Tha'lt make
a mon yet.  God bless thee!"

Dickon held Colin's arm strongly but the boy had not begun to falter.
He stood straighter and straighter and looked Ben Weatherstaff in the
face.

"I'm your master," he said, "when my father is away.  And you are to
obey me.  This is my garden.  Don't dare to say a word about it! You
get down from that ladder and go out to the Long Walk and Miss Mary
will meet you and bring you here.  I want to talk to you.  We did not
want you, but now you will have to be in the secret.  Be quick!"

Ben Weatherstaff's crabbed old face was still wet with that one queer
rush of tears.  It seemed as if he could not take his eyes from thin
straight Colin standing on his feet with his head thrown back.

"Eh! lad," he almost whispered.  "Eh! my lad!" And then remembering
himself he suddenly touched his hat gardener fashion and said, "Yes,
sir! Yes, sir!" and obediently disappeared as he descended the ladder.

That afternoon, the weather is so perfect and Colin is so happy that he feels as though everything in the world was just made for him. The sky is blue, the fruit trees are flowering--basically, everything is beautiful and amazing in the Secret Garden. Colin notices a very old tree with a broken branch in one corner; he wonders aloud how the branch might have broken. The robin appears and starts singing, distracting Colin from this line of questioning just in time. Needless to say, Mary and Dickon are relieved not to have to explain. As the sun is getting lower, Colin suddenly looks up and asks, "Who is that man?" . Mary and Dickon look up to see Ben Weatherstaff on top of a ladder, looking over the garden wall. Ben shakes his fist at Mary and yells at her, saying that she has no business being in there. Dickon wheels Colin's chair over to Ben so Colin can have his say. Colin asks if Ben realizes who he is. Ben sees Colin's resemblance to his tragically deceased mom, but he calls Colin "th'poor cripple" . Colin is so offended at Ben's assumption that his back and legs are crooked that he finally stands up on his own. Colin's legs are thin and weak because he has never used them, but there is nothing really wrong with him except fear. Now Colin has the confidence to tell Ben to leave them alone with their Secret Garden. For his part, Ben is quite overcome with emotion by the sight of Colin standing tall on his own.


When his head was out of sight Colin turned to Mary.

"Go and meet him," he said; and Mary flew across the grass to the door
under the ivy.

Dickon was watching him with sharp eyes.  There were scarlet spots on
his cheeks and he looked amazing, but he showed no signs of falling.

"I can stand," he said, and his head was still held up and he said it
quite grandly.

"I told thee tha' could as soon as tha' stopped bein' afraid," answered
Dickon.  "An' tha's stopped."

"Yes, I've stopped," said Colin.

Then suddenly he remembered something Mary had said.

"Are you making Magic?" he asked sharply.

Dickon's curly mouth spread in a cheerful grin.

"Tha's doin' Magic thysel'," he said.  "It's same Magic as made these
'ere work out o' th' earth," and he touched with his thick boot a clump
of crocuses in the grass.  Colin looked down at them.

"Aye," he said slowly, "there couldna' be bigger Magic than that
there--there couldna' be."

He drew himself up straighter than ever.

"I'm going to walk to that tree," he said, pointing to one a few feet
away from him.  "I'm going to be standing when Weatherstaff comes here.
I can rest against the tree if I like.  When I want to sit down I will
sit down, but not before.  Bring a rug from the chair."

He walked to the tree and though Dickon held his arm he was wonderfully
steady.  When he stood against the tree trunk it was not too plain that
he supported himself against it, and he still held himself so straight
that he looked tall.

When Ben Weatherstaff came through the door in the wall he saw him
standing there and he heard Mary muttering something under her breath.

"What art sayin'?" he asked rather testily because he did not want his
attention distracted from the long thin straight boy figure and proud
face.

But she did not tell him.  What she was saying was this:

"You can do it! You can do it! I told you you could!  You can do it!
You can do it! You can!" She was saying it to Colin because she wanted
to make Magic and keep him on his feet looking like that.  She could
not bear that he should give in before Ben Weatherstaff.  He did not
give in.  She was uplifted by a sudden feeling that he looked quite
beautiful in spite of his thinness.  He fixed his eyes on Ben
Weatherstaff in his funny imperious way.

"Look at me!" he commanded.  "Look at me all over! Am I a hunchback?
Have I got crooked legs?"

Ben Weatherstaff had not quite got over his emotion, but he had
recovered a little and answered almost in his usual way.

"Not tha'," he said.  "Nowt o' th' sort.  What's tha' been doin' with
thysel'--hidin' out o' sight an' lettin' folk think tha' was cripple
an' half-witted?"

"Half-witted!" said Colin angrily.  "Who thought that?"

"Lots o' fools," said Ben.  "Th' world's full o' jackasses brayin' an'
they never bray nowt but lies.  What did tha' shut thysel' up for?"

"Everyone thought I was going to die," said Colin shortly.  "I'm not!"

And he said it with such decision Ben Weatherstaff looked him over, up
and down, down and up.

"Tha' die!" he said with dry exultation.  "Nowt o' th' sort! Tha's got
too much pluck in thee.  When I seed thee put tha' legs on th' ground
in such a hurry I knowed tha' was all right.  Sit thee down on th' rug
a bit young Mester an' give me thy orders."

There was a queer mixture of crabbed tenderness and shrewd
understanding in his manner.  Mary had poured out speech as rapidly as
she could as they had come down the Long Walk.  The chief thing to be
remembered, she had told him, was that Colin was getting well--getting
well.  The garden was doing it.  No one must let him remember about
having humps and dying.

The Rajah condescended to seat himself on a rug under the tree.

"What work do you do in the gardens, Weatherstaff?" he inquired.

"Anythin' I'm told to do," answered old Ben.  "I'm kep' on by
favor--because she liked me."

"She?" said Colin.

"Tha' mother," answered Ben Weatherstaff.

"My mother?" said Colin, and he looked about him quietly.  "This was
her garden, wasn't it?"

"Aye, it was that!" and Ben Weatherstaff looked about him too.  "She
were main fond of it."

"It is my garden now.  I am fond of it.  I shall come here every day,"
announced Colin.  "But it is to be a secret.  My orders are that no one
is to know that we come here.  Dickon and my cousin have worked and
made it come alive.  I shall send for you sometimes to help--but you
must come when no one can see you."

Ben Weatherstaff's face twisted itself in a dry old smile.

"I've come here before when no one saw me," he said.

"What!" exclaimed Colin.

"When?"

"Th' last time I was here," rubbing his chin and looking round, "was
about two year' ago."

"But no one has been in it for ten years!" cried Colin.

"There was no door!"

"I'm no one," said old Ben dryly.  "An' I didn't come through th' door.
I come over th' wall.  Th' rheumatics held me back th' last two year'."

"Tha' come an' did a bit o' prunin'!" cried Dickon.  "I couldn't make
out how it had been done."

"She was so fond of it--she was!" said Ben Weatherstaff slowly.  "An'
she was such a pretty young thing.  She says to me once, 'Ben,' says
she laughin', 'if ever I'm ill or if I go away you must take care of my
roses.' When she did go away th' orders was no one was ever to come
nigh.  But I come," with grumpy obstinacy.  "Over th' wall I
come--until th' rheumatics stopped me--an' I did a bit o' work once a
year.  She'd gave her order first."

"It wouldn't have been as wick as it is if tha' hadn't done it," said
Dickon.  "I did wonder."

"I'm glad you did it, Weatherstaff," said Colin.  "You'll know how to
keep the secret."

"Aye, I'll know, sir," answered Ben.  "An' it'll be easier for a man
wi' rheumatics to come in at th' door."

On the grass near the tree Mary had dropped her trowel.  Colin
stretched out his hand and took it up.  An odd expression came into his
face and he began to scratch at the earth.  His thin hand was weak
enough but presently as they watched him--Mary with quite breathless
interest--he drove the end of the trowel into the soil and turned some
over.

"You can do it! You can do it!" said Mary to herself.  "I tell you, you
can!"

Dickon's round eyes were full of eager curiousness but he said not a
word.  Ben Weatherstaff looked on with interested face.

Colin persevered.  After he had turned a few trowelfuls of soil he
spoke exultantly to Dickon in his best Yorkshire.

"Tha' said as tha'd have me walkin' about here same as other folk--an'
tha' said tha'd have me diggin'. I thowt tha' was just leein' to please
me.  This is only th' first day an' I've walked--an' here I am diggin'."

Ben Weatherstaff's mouth fell open again when he heard him, but he
ended by chuckling.

"Eh!" he said, "that sounds as if tha'd got wits enow.  Tha'rt a
Yorkshire lad for sure.  An' tha'rt diggin', too.  How'd tha' like to
plant a bit o' somethin'? I can get thee a rose in a pot."

"Go and get it!" said Colin, digging excitedly.  "Quick! Quick!"

It was done quickly enough indeed.  Ben Weatherstaff went his way
forgetting rheumatics.  Dickon took his spade and dug the hole deeper
and wider than a new digger with thin white hands could make it.  Mary
slipped out to run and bring back a watering-can. When Dickon had
deepened the hole Colin went on turning the soft earth over and over.
He looked up at the sky, flushed and glowing with the strangely new
exercise, slight as it was.

"I want to do it before the sun goes quite--quite down," he said.

Mary thought that perhaps the sun held back a few minutes just on
purpose.  Ben Weatherstaff brought the rose in its pot from the
greenhouse.  He hobbled over the grass as fast as he could.  He had
begun to be excited, too.  He knelt down by the hole and broke the pot
from the mould.

"Here, lad," he said, handing the plant to Colin.  "Set it in the earth
thysel' same as th' king does when he goes to a new place."

The thin white hands shook a little and Colin's flush grew deeper as he
set the rose in the mould and held it while old Ben made firm the
earth.  It was filled in and pressed down and made steady.  Mary was
leaning forward on her hands and knees.  Soot had flown down and
marched forward to see what was being done.  Nut and Shell chattered
about it from a cherry-tree.

"It's planted!" said Colin at last.  "And the sun is only slipping over
the edge.  Help me up, Dickon.  I want to be standing when it goes.
That's part of the Magic."

And Dickon helped him, and the Magic--or whatever it was--so gave him
strength that when the sun did slip over the edge and end the strange
lovely afternoon for them there he actually stood on his two
feet--laughing.

As Mary goes off to bring Ben into the garden, Colin practices walking. Colin meets Ben standing on his own two feet. Ben admits that there doesn't seem to be anything wrong with Colin--he's certainly not at death's door. Ben seems fond of Colin when he asks what Colin's orders are. In fact, Ben has also been taking care of the Secret Garden. Sure, Mr. Craven may have ordered the garden sealed off, but even so, Ben had been fond of Mrs. Craven, and she made him promise to take care of her roses if ever she couldn't. So he's been using his trusty ladder to climb over the wall a couple of times a year to do a bit of pruning . Colin is glad that Ben has been helping--and that he can keep a secret, since Colin still wants to guard this as the Secret Garden. Colin is feeling so strong and garden-happy that he decides to plant a rose before the sun goes down. Ben and Dickon help Colin to dig a hole, and Colin stands and puts the rose in its new home just as the sun sets. Obviously, all of this is having a big psychological healing effect on young Colin.


Dr. Craven had been waiting some time at the house when they returned
to it.  He had indeed begun to wonder if it might not be wise to send
some one out to explore the garden paths.  When Colin was brought back
to his room the poor man looked him over seriously.

"You should not have stayed so long," he said.  "You must not overexert
yourself."

"I am not tired at all," said Colin.  "It has made me well.  Tomorrow I
am going out in the morning as well as in the afternoon."

"I am not sure that I can allow it," answered Dr. Craven.  "I am afraid
it would not be wise."

"It would not be wise to try to stop me," said Colin quite seriously.
"I am going."

Even Mary had found out that one of Colin's chief peculiarities was
that he did not know in the least what a rude little brute he was with
his way of ordering people about.  He had lived on a sort of desert
island all his life and as he had been the king of it he had made his
own manners and had had no one to compare himself with.  Mary had
indeed been rather like him herself and since she had been at
Misselthwaite had gradually discovered that her own manners had not
been of the kind which is usual or popular.  Having made this discovery
she naturally thought it of enough interest to communicate to Colin.
So she sat and looked at him curiously for a few minutes after Dr.
Craven had gone.  She wanted to make him ask her why she was doing it
and of course she did.

"What are you looking at me for?" he said.

"I'm thinking that I am rather sorry for Dr. Craven."

"So am I," said Colin calmly, but not without an air of some
satisfaction.  "He won't get Misselthwaite at all now I'm not going to
die."

"I'm sorry for him because of that, of course," said Mary, "but I was
thinking just then that it must have been very horrid to have had to be
polite for ten years to a boy who was always rude.  I would never have
done it."

"Am I rude?" Colin inquired undisturbedly.

"If you had been his own boy and he had been a slapping sort of man,"
said Mary, "he would have slapped you."

"But he daren't," said Colin.

"No, he daren't," answered Mistress Mary, thinking the thing out quite
without prejudice.  "Nobody ever dared to do anything you didn't
like--because you were going to die and things like that.  You were
such a poor thing."

"But," announced Colin stubbornly, "I am not going to be a poor thing.
I won't let people think I'm one.  I stood on my feet this afternoon."

"It is always having your own way that has made you so queer," Mary
went on, thinking aloud.

Colin turned his head, frowning.

"Am I queer?" he demanded.

"Yes," answered Mary, "very. But you needn't be cross," she added
impartially, "because so am I queer--and so is Ben Weatherstaff.  But I
am not as queer as I was before I began to like people and before I
found the garden."

"I don't want to be queer," said Colin.  "I am not going to be," and he
frowned again with determination.

He was a very proud boy.  He lay thinking for a while and then Mary saw
his beautiful smile begin and gradually change his whole face.

"I shall stop being queer," he said, "if I go every day to the garden.
There is Magic in there--good Magic, you know, Mary.  I am sure there
is." "So am I," said Mary.

"Even if it isn't real Magic," Colin said, "we can pretend it is.
Something is there--something!"

"It's Magic," said Mary, "but not black.  It's as white as snow."

They always called it Magic and indeed it seemed like it in the months
that followed--the wonderful months--the radiant months--the amazing
ones.  Oh! the things which happened in that garden! If you have never
had a garden you cannot understand, and if you have had a garden you
will know that it would take a whole book to describe all that came to
pass there.  At first it seemed that green things would never cease
pushing their way through the earth, in the grass, in the beds, even in
the crevices of the walls.  Then the green things began to show buds
and the buds began to unfurl and show color, every shade of blue, every
shade of purple, every tint and hue of crimson.  In its happy days
flowers had been tucked away into every inch and hole and corner.  Ben
Weatherstaff had seen it done and had himself scraped out mortar from
between the bricks of the wall and made pockets of earth for lovely
clinging things to grow on.  Iris and white lilies rose out of the
grass in sheaves, and the green alcoves filled themselves with amazing
armies of the blue and white flower lances of tall delphiniums or
columbines or campanulas.

"She was main fond o' them--she was," Ben Weatherstaff said.  "She
liked them things as was allus pointin' up to th' blue sky, she used to
tell.  Not as she was one o' them as looked down on th' earth--not her.
She just loved it but she said as th' blue sky allus looked so joyful."

The seeds Dickon and Mary had planted grew as if fairies had tended
them.  Satiny poppies of all tints danced in the breeze by the score,
gaily defying flowers which had lived in the garden for years and which
it might be confessed seemed rather to wonder how such new people had
got there.  And the roses--the roses! Rising out of the grass, tangled
round the sun-dial, wreathing the tree trunks and hanging from their
branches, climbing up the walls and spreading over them with long
garlands falling in cascades--they came alive day by day, hour by hour.
Fair fresh leaves, and buds--and buds--tiny at first but swelling and
working Magic until they burst and uncurled into cups of scent
delicately spilling themselves over their brims and filling the garden
air.

Colin saw it all, watching each change as it took place.  Every morning
he was brought out and every hour of each day when it didn't rain he
spent in the garden.  Even gray days pleased him.  He would lie on the
grass "watching things growing," he said.  If you watched long enough,
he declared, you could see buds unsheath themselves.  Also you could
make the acquaintance of strange busy insect things running about on
various unknown but evidently serious errands, sometimes carrying tiny
scraps of straw or feather or food, or climbing blades of grass as if
they were trees from whose tops one could look out to explore the
country.  A mole throwing up its mound at the end of its burrow and
making its way out at last with the long-nailed paws which looked so
like elfish hands, had absorbed him one whole morning.  Ants' ways,
beetles' ways, bees' ways, frogs' ways, birds' ways, plants' ways, gave
him a new world to explore and when Dickon revealed them all and added
foxes' ways, otters' ways, ferrets' ways, squirrels' ways, and trout'
and water-rats' and badgers' ways, there was no end to the things to
talk about and think over.

And this was not the half of the Magic.  The fact that he had really
once stood on his feet had set Colin thinking tremendously and when
Mary told him of the spell she had worked he was excited and approved
of it greatly.  He talked of it constantly.

"Of course there must be lots of Magic in the world," he said wisely
one day, "but people don't know what it is like or how to make it.
Perhaps the beginning is just to say nice things are going to happen
until you make them happen.  I am going to try and experiment."

The next morning when they went to the secret garden he sent at once
for Ben Weatherstaff.  Ben came as quickly as he could and found the
Rajah standing on his feet under a tree and looking very grand but also
very beautifully smiling.

"Good morning, Ben Weatherstaff," he said.  "I want you and Dickon and
Miss Mary to stand in a row and listen to me because I am going to tell
you something very important."

"Aye, aye, sir!" answered Ben Weatherstaff, touching his forehead.
(One of the long concealed charms of Ben Weatherstaff was that in his
boyhood he had once run away to sea and had made voyages.  So he could
reply like a sailor.)

"I am going to try a scientific experiment," explained the Rajah.
"When I grow up I am going to make great scientific discoveries and I
am going to begin now with this experiment."

"Aye, aye, sir!" said Ben Weatherstaff promptly, though this was the
first time he had heard of great scientific discoveries.

It was the first time Mary had heard of them, either, but even at this
stage she had begun to realize that, queer as he was, Colin had read
about a great many singular things and was somehow a very convincing
sort of boy.  When he held up his head and fixed his strange eyes on
you it seemed as if you believed him almost in spite of yourself though
he was only ten years old--going on eleven.  At this moment he was
especially convincing because he suddenly felt the fascination of
actually making a sort of speech like a grown-up person.

"The great scientific discoveries I am going to make," he went on,
"will be about Magic.  Magic is a great thing and scarcely any one
knows anything about it except a few people in old books--and Mary a
little, because she was born in India where there are fakirs.  I
believe Dickon knows some Magic, but perhaps he doesn't know he knows
it.  He charms animals and people.  I would never have let him come to
see me if he had not been an animal charmer--which is a boy charmer,
too, because a boy is an animal.  I am sure there is Magic in
everything, only we have not sense enough to get hold of it and make it
do things for us--like electricity and horses and steam."

This sounded so imposing that Ben Weatherstaff became quite excited and
really could not keep still.  "Aye, aye, sir," he said and he began to
stand up quite straight.

"When Mary found this garden it looked quite dead," the orator
proceeded.  "Then something began pushing things up out of the soil and
making things out of nothing.  One day things weren't there and another
they were.  I had never watched things before and it made me feel very
curious.  Scientific people are always curious and I am going to be
scientific.  I keep saying to myself, 'What is it? What is it?' It's
something.  It can't be nothing! I don't know its name so I call it
Magic.  I have never seen the sun rise but Mary and Dickon have and
from what they tell me I am sure that is Magic too.  Something pushes
it up and draws it.  Sometimes since I've been in the garden I've
looked up through the trees at the sky and I have had a strange feeling
of being happy as if something were pushing and drawing in my chest and
making me breathe fast.  Magic is always pushing and drawing and making
things out of nothing.  Everything is made out of Magic, leaves and
trees, flowers and birds, badgers and foxes and squirrels and people.
So it must be all around us.  In this garden--in all the places.  The
Magic in this garden has made me stand up and know I am going to live
to be a man.  I am going to make the scientific experiment of trying to
get some and put it in myself and make it push and draw me and make me
strong.  I don't know how to do it but I think that if you keep
thinking about it and calling it perhaps it will come.  Perhaps that is
the first baby way to get it.  When I was going to try to stand that
first time Mary kept saying to herself as fast as she could, 'You can
do it! You can do it!' and I did.  I had to try myself at the same
time, of course, but her Magic helped me--and so did Dickon's. Every
morning and evening and as often in the daytime as I can remember I am
going to say, 'Magic is in me! Magic is making me well! I am going to
be as strong as Dickon, as strong as Dickon!' And you must all do it,
too.  That is my experiment Will you help, Ben Weatherstaff?"

"Aye, aye, sir!" said Ben Weatherstaff.  "Aye, aye!"

"If you keep doing it every day as regularly as soldiers go through
drill we shall see what will happen and find out if the experiment
succeeds.  You learn things by saying them over and over and thinking
about them until they stay in your mind forever and I think it will be
the same with Magic.  If you keep calling it to come to you and help
you it will get to be part of you and it will stay and do things." "I
once heard an officer in India tell my mother that there were fakirs
who said words over and over thousands of times," said Mary.

"I've heard Jem Fettleworth's wife say th' same thing over thousands o'
times--callin' Jem a drunken brute," said Ben Weatherstaff dryly.
"Summat allus come o' that, sure enough.  He gave her a good hidin' an'
went to th' Blue Lion an' got as drunk as a lord."

Colin drew his brows together and thought a few minutes.  Then he
cheered up.

"Well," he said, "you see something did come of it.  She used the wrong
Magic until she made him beat her.  If she'd used the right Magic and
had said something nice perhaps he wouldn't have got as drunk as a lord
and perhaps--perhaps he might have bought her a new bonnet."

Ben Weatherstaff chuckled and there was shrewd admiration in his little
old eyes.

"Tha'rt a clever lad as well as a straight-legged one, Mester Colin,"
he said.  "Next time I see Bess Fettleworth I'll give her a bit of a
hint o' what Magic will do for her.  She'd be rare an' pleased if th'
sinetifik 'speriment worked--an' so 'ud Jem."

Dickon had stood listening to the lecture, his round eyes shining with
curious delight.  Nut and Shell were on his shoulders and he held a
long-eared white rabbit in his arm and stroked and stroked it softly
while it laid its ears along its back and enjoyed itself.

"Do you think the experiment will work?" Colin asked him, wondering
what he was thinking.  He so often wondered what Dickon was thinking
when he saw him looking at him or at one of his "creatures" with his
happy wide smile.

He smiled now and his smile was wider than usual.

"Aye," he answered, "that I do.  It'll work same as th' seeds do when
th' sun shines on 'em. It'll work for sure.  Shall us begin it now?"

Colin was delighted and so was Mary.  Fired by recollections of fakirs
and devotees in illustrations Colin suggested that they should all sit
cross-legged under the tree which made a canopy.

"It will be like sitting in a sort of temple," said Colin.  "I'm rather
tired and I want to sit down."

"Eh!" said Dickon, "tha' mustn't begin by sayin' tha'rt tired.  Tha'
might spoil th' Magic."

Colin turned and looked at him--into his innocent round eyes.

"That's true," he said slowly.  "I must only think of the Magic." It
all seemed most majestic and mysterious when they sat down in their
circle.  Ben Weatherstaff felt as if he had somehow been led into
appearing at a prayer-meeting. Ordinarily he was very fixed in being
what he called "agen' prayer-meetin's" but this being the Rajah's
affair he did not resent it and was indeed inclined to be gratified at
being called upon to assist.  Mistress Mary felt solemnly enraptured.
Dickon held his rabbit in his arm, and perhaps he made some charmer's
signal no one heard, for when he sat down, cross-legged like the rest,
the crow, the fox, the squirrels and the lamb slowly drew near and made
part of the circle, settling each into a place of rest as if of their
own desire.

"The 'creatures' have come," said Colin gravely.  "They want to help
us."

Colin really looked quite beautiful, Mary thought.  He held his head
high as if he felt like a sort of priest and his strange eyes had a
wonderful look in them.  The light shone on him through the tree canopy.

"Now we will begin," he said.  "Shall we sway backward and forward,
Mary, as if we were dervishes?"

"I canna' do no swayin' back'ard and for'ard," said Ben Weatherstaff.
"I've got th' rheumatics."

"The Magic will take them away," said Colin in a High Priest tone, "but
we won't sway until it has done it.  We will only chant."

"I canna' do no chantin'" said Ben Weatherstaff a trifle testily.
"They turned me out o' th' church choir th' only time I ever tried it."

No one smiled.  They were all too much in earnest.  Colin's face was
not even crossed by a shadow.  He was thinking only of the Magic.

"Then I will chant," he said.  And he began, looking like a strange boy
spirit.  "The sun is shining--the sun is shining.  That is the Magic.
The flowers are growing--the roots are stirring.  That is the Magic.
Being alive is the Magic--being strong is the Magic.  The Magic is in
me--the Magic is in me.  It is in me--it is in me.  It's in every one
of us.  It's in Ben Weatherstaff's back.  Magic! Magic! Come and help!"

He said it a great many times--not a thousand times but quite a goodly
number.  Mary listened entranced.  She felt as if it were at once queer
and beautiful and she wanted him to go on and on.  Ben Weatherstaff
began to feel soothed into a sort of dream which was quite agreeable.
The humming of the bees in the blossoms mingled with the chanting voice
and drowsily melted into a doze.  Dickon sat cross-legged with his
rabbit asleep on his arm and a hand resting on the lamb's back.  Soot
had pushed away a squirrel and huddled close to him on his shoulder,
the gray film dropped over his eyes.  At last Colin stopped.

"Now I am going to walk round the garden," he announced.

Ben Weatherstaff's head had just dropped forward and he lifted it with
a jerk.

"You have been asleep," said Colin.

"Nowt o' th' sort," mumbled Ben.  "Th' sermon was good enow--but I'm
bound to get out afore th' collection."

He was not quite awake yet.

"You're not in church," said Colin.

"Not me," said Ben, straightening himself.  "Who said I were? I heard
every bit of it.  You said th' Magic was in my back.  Th' doctor calls
it rheumatics."

The Rajah waved his hand.

"That was the wrong Magic," he said.  "You will get better.  You have
my permission to go to your work.  But come back tomorrow."

"I'd like to see thee walk round the garden," grunted Ben.

It was not an unfriendly grunt, but it was a grunt.  In fact, being a
stubborn old party and not having entire faith in Magic he had made up
his mind that if he were sent away he would climb his ladder and look
over the wall so that he might be ready to hobble back if there were
any stumbling.

The Rajah did not object to his staying and so the procession was
formed.  It really did look like a procession.  Colin was at its head
with Dickon on one side and Mary on the other.  Ben Weatherstaff walked
behind, and the "creatures" trailed after them, the lamb and the fox
cub keeping close to Dickon, the white rabbit hopping along or stopping
to nibble and Soot following with the solemnity of a person who felt
himself in charge.

It was a procession which moved slowly but with dignity.  Every few
yards it stopped to rest.  Colin leaned on Dickon's arm and privately
Ben Weatherstaff kept a sharp lookout, but now and then Colin took his
hand from its support and walked a few steps alone.  His head was held
up all the time and he looked very grand.

"The Magic is in me!" he kept saying.  "The Magic is making me strong!
I can feel it! I can feel it!"

It seemed very certain that something was upholding and uplifting him.
He sat on the seats in the alcoves, and once or twice he sat down on
the grass and several times he paused in the path and leaned on Dickon,
but he would not give up until he had gone all round the garden.  When
he returned to the canopy tree his cheeks were flushed and he looked
triumphant.

"I did it! The Magic worked!" he cried.  "That is my first scientific
discovery.".

"What will Dr. Craven say?" broke out Mary.

"He won't say anything," Colin answered, "because he will not be told.
This is to be the biggest secret of all.  No one is to know anything
about it until I have grown so strong that I can walk and run like any
other boy.  I shall come here every day in my chair and I shall be
taken back in it.  I won't have people whispering and asking questions
and I won't let my father hear about it until the experiment has quite
succeeded.  Then sometime when he comes back to Misselthwaite I shall
just walk into his study and say 'Here I am; I am like any other boy.
I am quite well and I shall live to be a man.  It has been done by a
scientific experiment.'"

"He will think he is in a dream," cried Mary.  "He won't believe his
eyes."

Colin flushed triumphantly.  He had made himself believe that he was
going to get well, which was really more than half the battle, if he
had been aware of it.  And the thought which stimulated him more than
any other was this imagining what his father would look like when he
saw that he had a son who was as straight and strong as other fathers'
sons.  One of his darkest miseries in the unhealthy morbid past days
had been his hatred of being a sickly weak-backed boy whose father was
afraid to look at him.

"He'll be obliged to believe them," he said.

"One of the things I am going to do, after the Magic works and before I
begin to make scientific discoveries, is to be an athlete."

"We shall have thee takin' to boxin' in a week or so," said Ben
Weatherstaff.  "Tha'lt end wi' winnin' th' Belt an' bein' champion
prize-fighter of all England."

Colin fixed his eyes on him sternly.

"Weatherstaff," he said, "that is disrespectful.  You must not take
liberties because you are in the secret.  However much the Magic works
I shall not be a prize-fighter.  I shall be a Scientific Discoverer."

"Ax pardon--ax pardon, sir" answered Ben, touching his forehead in
salute.  "I ought to have seed it wasn't a jokin' matter," but his eyes
twinkled and secretly he was immensely pleased.  He really did not mind
being snubbed since the snubbing meant that the lad was gaining
strength and spirit.

Dr. Craven tells Colin he's pushing himself too hard, and Colin basically tells him to back off. Mary points out that Colin is a rude little brat, which people have put up with up until now because they thought he was dying. Colin seems to take this criticism to heart, but we think he keeps on being pretty rude and high-handed--we guess it's hard to get over the habits of a lifetime ... Over the months of the spring and summer, the garden really comes into its own. Ben starts telling more stories about Colin's mother. Colin decides that all of this--the quick growth of the garden, Dickon's ability with animals, Colin's own physical improvement--must be proof of Magic. He wants to do scientific experiments in Magic, and he wants Mary, Dickon, and Ben to help him. The Magic Colin describes is a kind of life force that makes everything happen: It makes the sun rise, the flowers bloom, all of that. When Colin began to walk, it was thanks to the Magic of Mary and Dickon insisting, "You can do it! You can do it!" . So now Colin wants to do his own Magic--if he thinks as often as possible, "Magic is making me well! I am going to be as strong as Dickon!" , it will come true--and Colin wants Ben, Mary, and Dickon to repeat these positive thoughts as well. They sit in a circle and Colin calls on the Magic, recognizing it in the world around them and calling on it for help. After this ritual, Colin walks around the garden confidently. But he decides to keep his recovery a secret from Dr. Craven. He wants to keep using his wheelchair up until the moment that he can cramatically reveal his new health. Most of all, Colin wants to impress his father.