And the secret garden bloomed and bloomed and every
morning revealed new miracles. In the robin's nest there
were Eggs and the robin's mate sat upon them keeping them
warm with her feathery little breast and careful wings.
At first she was very nervous and the robin himself
was indignantly watchful. Even Dickon did not go
near the close-grown corner in those days, but waited
until by the quiet working of some mysterious spell he
seemed to have conveyed to the soul of the little pair
that in the garden there was nothing which was not quite
like themselves--nothing which did not understand the
wonderfulness of what was happening to them--the immense,
tender, terrible, heart-breaking beauty and solemnity
of Eggs. If there had been one person in that garden
who had not known through all his or her innermost being
that if an Egg were taken away or hurt the whole world
would whirl round and crash through space and come to
an end--if there had been even one who did not feel it
and act accordingly there could have been no happiness
even in that golden springtime air. But they all knew
it and felt it and the robin and his mate knew they knew it.
At first the robin watched Mary and Colin with sharp anxiety.
For some mysterious reason he knew he need not watch Dickon.
The first moment he set his dew-bright black eye on Dickon
he knew he was not a stranger but a sort of robin without
beak or feathers. He could speak robin (which is a quite
distinct language not to be mistaken for any other). To speak
robin to a robin is like speaking French to a Frenchman.
Dickon always spoke it to the robin himself, so the queer
gibberish he used when he spoke to humans did not matter
in the least. The robin thought he spoke this gibberish
to them because they were not intelligent enough to
understand feathered speech. His movements also were robin.
They never startled one by being sudden enough to seem
dangerous or threatening. Any robin could understand Dickon,
so his presence was not even disturbing.
But at the outset it seemed necessary to be on guard
against the other two. In the first place the boy
creature did not come into the garden on his legs.
He was pushed in on a thing with wheels and the skins
of wild animals were thrown over him. That in itself
was doubtful. Then when he began to stand up and move
about he did it in a queer unaccustomed way and the
others seemed to have to help him. The robin used
to secrete himself in a bush and watch this anxiously,
his head tilted first on one side and then on the other.
He thought that the slow movements might mean that he was
preparing to pounce, as cats do. When cats are preparing
to pounce they creep over the ground very slowly.
The robin talked this over with his mate a great deal
for a few days but after that he decided not to speak
of the subject because her terror was so great that he
was afraid it might be injurious to the Eggs.
When the boy began to walk by himself and even to move more
quickly it was an immense relief. But for a long time--or it
seemed a long time to the robin--he was a source of some anxiety.
He did not act as the other humans did. He seemed very
fond of walking but he had a way of sitting or lying down
for a while and then getting up in a disconcerting manner to
begin again.
One day the robin remembered that when he himself had
been made to learn to fly by his parents he had done
much the same sort of thing. He had taken short flights
of a few yards and then had been obliged to rest.
So it occurred to him that this boy was learning to fly--or
rather to walk. He mentioned this to his mate and when he
told her that the Eggs would probably conduct themselves
in the same way after they were fledged she was quite
comforted and even became eagerly interested and derived
great pleasure from watching the boy over the edge of her
nest--though she always thought that the Eggs would be
much cleverer and learn more quickly. But then she said
indulgently that humans were always more clumsy and slow
than Eggs and most of them never seemed really to learn
to fly at all. You never met them in the air or on tree-tops.
After a while the boy began to move about as the others did,
but all three of the children at times did unusual things.
They would stand under the trees and move their arms and legs
and heads about in a way which was neither walking nor
running nor sitting down. They went through these movements
at intervals every day and the robin was never able to
explain to his mate what they were doing or tying to do.
He could only say that he was sure that the Eggs would
never flap about in such a manner; but as the boy who could
speak robin so fluently was doing the thing with them,
birds could be quite sure that the actions were not
of a dangerous nature. Of course neither the robin
nor his mate had ever heard of the champion wrestler,
Bob Haworth, and his exercises for making the muscles
stand out like lumps. Robins are not like human beings;
their muscles are always exercised from the first
and so they develop themselves in a natural manner.
If you have to fly about to find every meal you eat,
your muscles do not become atrophied (atrophied means wasted
away through want of use).
When the boy was walking and running about and digging
and weeding like the others, the nest in the corner was
brooded over by a great peace and content. Fears for
the Eggs became things of the past. Knowing that your
Eggs were as safe as if they were locked in a bank vault
and the fact that you could watch so many curious things
going on made setting a most entertaining occupation.
On wet days the Eggs' mother sometimes felt even a little
dull because the children did not come into the garden.
But even on wet days it could not be said that Mary and
Colin were dull. One morning when the rain streamed down
unceasingly and Colin was beginning to feel a little restive,
as he was obliged to remain on his sofa because it was
not safe to get up and walk about, Mary had an inspiration.
"Now that I am a real boy," Colin had said, "my legs and arms
and all my body are so full of Magic that I can't keep
them still. They want to be doing things all the time.
Do you know that when I waken in the morning, Mary,
when it's quite early and the birds are just shouting
outside and everything seems just shouting for joy--even
the trees and things we can't really hear--I feel as if I
must jump out of bed and shout myself. If I did it,
just think what would happen!"
Mary giggled inordinately.
"The nurse would come running and Mrs. Medlock would
come running and they would be sure you had gone crazy
and they'd send for the doctor," she said.
Colin giggled himself. He could see how they would
all look--how horrified by his outbreak and how amazed
to see him standing upright.
"I wish my father would come home," he said. "I want
to tell him myself. I'm always thinking about it--but we
couldn't go on like this much longer. I can't stand lying
still and pretending, and besides I look too different.
I wish it wasn't raining today."
It was then Mistress Mary had her inspiration.
"Colin," she began mysteriously, "do you know how many
rooms there are in this house?"
"About a thousand, I suppose," he answered.
"There's about a hundred no one ever goes into," said Mary.
"And one rainy day I went and looked into ever so many of them.
No one ever knew, though Mrs. Medlock nearly found me out.
I lost my way when I was coming back and I stopped at
the end of your corridor. That was the second time I
heard you crying."
Colin started up on his sofa.
"A hundred rooms no one goes into," he said. "It sounds
almost like a secret garden. Suppose we go and look at them.
wheel me in my chair and nobody would know we went"
"That's what I was thinking," said Mary. "No one would dare
to follow us. There are galleries where you could run.
We could do our exercises. There is a little Indian
room where there is a cabinet full of ivory elephants.
There are all sorts of rooms."
"Ring the bell," said Colin.
When the nurse came in he gave his orders.
"I want my chair," he said. "Miss Mary and I are going
to look at the part of the house which is not used.
John can push me as far as the picture-gallery because there
are some stairs. Then he must go away and leave us alone
until I send for him again."
Rainy days lost their terrors that morning. When the
footman had wheeled the chair into the picture-gallery
and left the two together in obedience to orders,
Colin and Mary looked at each other delighted. As soon
as Mary had made sure that John was really on his way back
to his own quarters below stairs, Colin got out of his chair.
"I am going to run from one end of the gallery to the other,"
he said, "and then I am going to jump and then we will
do Bob Haworth's exercises."
And they did all these things and many others. They looked
at the portraits and found the plain little girl dressed
in green brocade and holding the parrot on her finger.
"All these," said Colin, "must be my relations.
They lived a long time ago. That parrot one, I believe,
is one of my great, great, great, great aunts. She looks
rather like you, Mary--not as you look now but as you
looked when you came here. Now you are a great deal
fatter and better looking."
"So are you," said Mary, and they both laughed.
They went to the Indian room and amused themselves with
the ivory elephants. They found the rose-colored brocade
boudoir and the hole in the cushion the mouse had left,
but the mice had grown up and run away and the hole was empty.
They saw more rooms and made more discoveries than Mary
had made on her first pilgrimage. They found new corridors
and corners and flights of steps and new old pictures they
liked and weird old things they did not know the use of.
It was a curiously entertaining morning and the feeling
of wandering about in the same house with other people
but at the same time feeling as if one were miles away
from them was a fascinating thing.
"I'm glad we came," Colin said. "I never knew I
lived in such a big queer old place. I like it.
We will ramble about every rainy day. We shall always
be finding new queer corners and things."
That morning they had found among other things such
good appetites that when they returned to Colin's room
it was not possible to send the luncheon away untouched.
When the nurse carried the tray down-stairs she slapped it
down on the kitchen dresser so that Mrs. Loomis, the cook,
could see the highly polished dishes and plates.
"Look at that!" she said. "This is a house of mystery,
and those two children are the greatest mysteries in it."
"If they keep that up every day," said the strong
young footman John, "there'd be small wonder that he
weighs twice as much to-day as he did a month ago.
I should have to give up my place in time, for fear
of doing my muscles an injury."
That afternoon Mary noticed that something new had happened
in Colin's room. She had noticed it the day before but
had said nothing because she thought the change might
have been made by chance. She said nothing today but she
sat and looked fixedly at the picture over the mantel.
She could look at it because the curtain had been drawn aside.
That was the change she noticed.
"I know what you want me to tell you," said Colin,
after she had stared a few minutes. "I always know when
you want me to tell you something. You are wondering why
the curtain is drawn back. I am going to keep it like that."
"Why?" asked Mary.
"Because it doesn't make me angry any more to see her laughing.
I wakened when it was bright moonlight two nights ago
and felt as if the Magic was filling the room and making
everything so splendid that I couldn't lie still.
I got up and looked out of the window. The room was quite
light and there was a patch of moonlight on the curtain
and somehow that made me go and pull the cord. She looked
right down at me as if she were laughing because she was glad
I was standing there. It made me like to look at her.
I want to see her laughing like that all the time.
I think she must have been a sort of Magic person perhaps."
"You are so like her now," said Mary, "that sometimes I
think perhaps you are her ghost made into a boy."
That idea seemed to impress Colin. He thought it over
and then answered her slowly.
"If I were her ghost--my father would be fond of me."
"Do you want him to be fond of you?" inquired Mary.
"I used to hate it because he was not fond of me. If he
grew fond of me I think I should tell him about the Magic.
It might make him more cheerful."
CHAPTER XXVI
"IT'S MOTHER!"
Their belief in the Magic was an abiding thing.
After the morning's incantations Colin sometimes gave
them Magic lectures.
"I like to do it," he explained, "because when I grow
up and make great scientific discoveries I shall be
obliged to lecture about them and so this is practise.
I can only give short lectures now because I am very young,
and besides Ben Weatherstaff would feel as if he were in
church and he would go to sleep."
"Th' best thing about lecturin'," said Ben, "is that a chap can
get up an' say aught he pleases an' no other chap can answer
him back. I wouldn't be agen' lecturin' a bit mysel' sometimes."
But when Colin held forth under his tree old Ben fixed
devouring eyes on him and kept them there. He looked
him over with critical affection. It was not so much
the lecture which interested him as the legs which looked
straighter and stronger each day, the boyish head which held
itself up so well, the once sharp chin and hollow cheeks
which had filled and rounded out and the eyes which had
begun to hold the light he remembered in another pair.
Sometimes when Colin felt Ben's earnest gaze meant that he
was much impressed he wondered what he was reflecting on
and once when he had seemed quite entranced he questioned him.
"What are you thinking about, Ben Weatherstaff?" he asked.
"I was thinkin'" answered Ben, "as I'd warrant tha's,
gone up three or four pound this week. I was lookin'
at tha' calves an' tha' shoulders. I'd like to get thee
on a pair o' scales."
"It's the Magic and--and Mrs. Sowerby's buns and milk
and things," said Colin. "You see the scientific
experiment has succeeded."
That morning Dickon was too late to hear the lecture.
When he came he was ruddy with running and his funny face
looked more twinkling than usual. As they had a good deal
of weeding to do after the rains they fell to work.
They always had plenty to do after a warm deep sinking rain.
The moisture which was good for the flowers was also good
for the weeds which thrust up tiny blades of grass and points
of leaves which must be pulled up before their roots took
too firm hold. Colin was as good at weeding as any one
in these days and he could lecture while he was doing it.
"The Magic works best when you work, yourself," he said
this morning. "You can feel it in your bones and muscles.
I am going to read books about bones and muscles, but I am
going to write a book about Magic. I am making it up now.
I keep finding out things."
It was not very long after he had said this that he
laid down his trowel and stood up on his feet.
He had been silent for several minutes and they had seen
that he was thinking out lectures, as he often did.
When he dropped his trowel and stood upright it seemed
to Mary and Dickon as if a sudden strong thought had made
him do it. He stretched himself out to his tallest height
and he threw out his arms exultantly. Color glowed in
his face and his strange eyes widened with joyfulness.
All at once he had realized something to the full.
"Mary! Dickon!" he cried. "Just look at me!"
They stopped their weeding and looked at him.
"Do you remember that first morning you brought me in here?"
he demanded.
Dickon was looking at him very hard. Being an animal
charmer he could see more things than most people could
and many of them were things he never talked about.
He saw some of them now in this boy. "Aye, that we do,"
he answered.
Mary looked hard too, but she said nothing.
"Just this minute," said Colin, "all at once I remembered
it myself--when I looked at my hand digging with the
trowel--and I had to stand up on my feet to see if it
was real. And it is real! I'm well--I'm well!"
"Aye, that th' art!" said Dickon.
"I'm well! I'm well!" said Colin again, and his face went
quite red all over.
He had known it before in a way, he had hoped it and felt
it and thought about it, but just at that minute something
had rushed all through him--a sort of rapturous belief
and realization and it had been so strong that he could
not help calling out.
"I shall live forever and ever and ever!" he cried grandly.
"I shall find out thousands and thousands of things.
I shall find out about people and creatures and everything
that grows--like Dickon--and I shall never stop making Magic.
I'm well! I'm well! I feel--I feel as if I want to shout
out something--something thankful, joyful!"
Ben Weatherstaff, who had been working near a rose-bush,
glanced round at him.
"Tha' might sing th' Doxology," he suggested in his
dryest grunt. He had no opinion of the Doxology and he
did not make the suggestion with any particular reverence.
But Colin was of an exploring mind and he knew nothing
about the Doxology.
"What is that?" he inquired.
"Dickon can sing it for thee, I'll warrant,"
replied Ben Weatherstaff.
Dickon answered with his all-perceiving animal charmer's smile.
"They sing it i' church," he said. "Mother says she
believes th' skylarks sings it when they gets up i' th' mornin'."
"If she says that, it must be a nice song," Colin answered.
"I've never been in a church myself. I was always too ill.
Sing it, Dickon. I want to hear it."
Dickon was quite simple and unaffected about it.
He understood what Colin felt better than Colin did himself.
He understood by a sort of instinct so natural that he
did not know it was understanding. He pulled off his cap
and looked round still smiling.
"Tha' must take off tha' cap," he said to Colin,"
an' so mun tha', Ben--an' tha' mun stand up, tha' knows."
Colin took off his cap and the sun shone on and warmed his
thick hair as he watched Dickon intently. Ben Weatherstaff
scrambled up from his knees and bared his head too with
a sort of puzzled half-resentful look on his old face
as if he didn't know exactly why he was doing this remarkable
thing.
Dickon stood out among the trees and rose-bushes
and began to sing in quite a simple matter-of-fact
way and in a nice strong boy voice:
"Praise God from whom all blessings flow,
Praise Him all creatures here below,
Praise Him above ye Heavenly Host,
Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.
Amen."
When he had finished, Ben Weatherstaff was standing
quite still with his jaws set obstinately but with a
disturbed look in his eyes fixed on Colin. Colin's face
was thoughtful and appreciative.
"It is a very nice song," he said. "I like it. Perhaps it
means just what I mean when I want to shout out that I am
thankful to the Magic." He stopped and thought in a puzzled way.
"Perhaps they are both the same thing. How can we know
the exact names of everything? Sing it again, Dickon.
Let us try, Mary. I want to sing it, too. It's my song.
How does it begin? ‘Praise God from whom all blessings flow'?"
And they sang it again, and Mary and Colin lifted their
voices as musically as they could and Dickon's swelled quite
loud and beautiful--and at the second line Ben Weatherstaff
raspingly cleared his throat and at the third line he joined
in with such vigor that it seemed almost savage and when
the "Amen" came to an end Mary observed that the very same
thing had happened to him which had happened when he found
out that Colin was not a cripple--his chin was twitching
and he was staring and winking and his leathery old cheeks were
wet.
"I never seed no sense in th' Doxology afore," he said hoarsely,
"but I may change my mind i' time. I should say tha'd
gone up five pound this week Mester Colin--five on 'em!"
Colin was looking across the garden at something attracting
his attention and his expression had become a startled one.
"Who is coming in here?" he said quickly. "Who is it?"
The door in the ivied wall had been pushed gently open
and a woman had entered. She had come in with the last
line of their song and she had stood still listening and
looking at them. With the ivy behind her, the sunlight
drifting through the trees and dappling her long blue cloak,
and her nice fresh face smiling across the greenery
she was rather like a softly colored illustration in
one of Colin's books. She had wonderful affectionate
eyes which seemed to take everything in--all of them,
even Ben Weatherstaff and the "creatures" and every flower
that was in bloom. Unexpectedly as she had appeared,
not one of them felt that she was an intruder at all.
Dickon's eyes lighted like lamps.
"It's mother--that's who it is!" he cried and went across
the grass at a run.
Colin began to move toward her, too, and Mary went with him.
They both felt their pulses beat faster.
"It's mother!" Dickon said again when they met halfway.
"I knowed tha' wanted to see her an' I told her where th'
door was hid."
Colin held out his hand with a sort of flushed royal
shyness but his eyes quite devoured her face.
"Even when I was ill I wanted to see you," he said,
"you and Dickon and the secret garden. I'd never wanted
to see any one or anything before."
The sight of his uplifted face brought about a sudden
change in her own. She flushed and the corners of her
mouth shook and a mist seemed to sweep over her eyes.
"Eh! dear lad!" she broke out tremulously. "Eh! dear lad!"
as if she had not known she were going to say it. She did
not say, "Mester Colin," but just "dear lad" quite suddenly.
She might have said it to Dickon in the same way if she
had seen something in his face which touched her.
Colin liked it.
"Are you surprised because I am so well?" he asked.
She put her hand on his shoulder and smiled the mist
out of her eyes. "Aye, that I am!" she said; "but tha'rt
so like thy mother tha' made my heart jump."
"Do you think," said Colin a little awkwardly, "that will
make my father like me?"
"Aye, for sure, dear lad," she answered and she gave
his shoulder a soft quick pat. "He mun come home--he
mun come home."
"Susan Sowerby," said Ben Weatherstaff, getting close
to her. "Look at th' lad's legs, wilt tha'? They was
like drumsticks i' stockin' two month' ago--an' I heard
folk tell as they was bandy an' knock-kneed both at th'
same time. Look at 'em now!"
Susan Sowerby laughed a comfortable laugh.
"They're goin' to be fine strong lad's legs in a bit,"
she said. "Let him go on playin' an' workin' in the garden an'
eatin' hearty an' drinkin' plenty o' good sweet milk an'
there'll not be a finer pair i' Yorkshire, thank God for it."
She put both hands on Mistress Mary's shoulders and looked
her little face over in a motherly fashion.
"An' thee, too!" she said. "Tha'rt grown near as hearty
as our 'Lisabeth Ellen. I'll warrant tha'rt like thy
mother too. Our Martha told me as Mrs. Medlock heard she
was a pretty woman. Tha'lt be like a blush rose when tha'
grows up, my little lass, bless thee."
She did not mention that when Martha came home on her
"day out" and described the plain sallow child she had said
that she had no confidence whatever in what Mrs. Medlock
had heard. "It doesn't stand to reason that a pretty
woman could be th' mother o' such a fou' little lass,"
she had added obstinately.
Mary had not had time to pay much attention to her
changing face. She had only known that she looked
"different" and seemed to have a great deal more hair
and that it was growing very fast. But remembering
her pleasure in looking at the Mem Sahib in the past
she was glad to hear that she might some day look like her.
Susan Sowerby went round their garden with them and was
told the whole story of it and shown every bush and tree
which had come alive. Colin walked on one side of her
and Mary on the other. Each of them kept looking up
at her comfortable rosy face, secretly curious about
the delightful feeling she gave them--a sort of warm,
supported feeling. It seemed as if she understood them
as Dickon understood his "creatures." She stooped over the
flowers and talked about them as if they were children.
Soot followed her and once or twice cawed at her and flew
upon her shoulder as if it were Dickon's. When they told
her about the robin and the first flight of the young ones
she laughed a motherly little mellow laugh in her throat.
"I suppose learnin' 'em to fly is like learnin'
children to walk, but I'm feared I should be all
in a worrit if mine had wings instead o' legs," she said.
It was because she seemed such a wonderful woman in her
nice moorland cottage way that at last she was told
about the Magic.
"Do you believe in Magic?" asked Colin after he had
explained about Indian fakirs. "I do hope you do."
"That I do, lad," she answered. "I never knowed it by
that name but what does th' name matter? I warrant they
call it a different name i' France an' a different one i'
Germany. Th' same thing as set th' seeds swellin' an' th'
sun shinin' made thee a well lad an' it's th' Good Thing.
It isn't like us poor fools as think it matters if us is
called out of our names. Th' Big Good Thing doesn't stop
to worrit, bless thee. It goes on makin' worlds by th'
million--worlds like us. Never thee stop believin' in th'
Big Good Thing an' knowin' th' world's full of it--an'
call it what tha' likes. Tha' wert singin' to it when I
come into th' garden."
"I felt so joyful," said Colin, opening his beautiful
strange eyes at her. "Suddenly I felt how different I
was--how strong my arms and legs were, you know--and
how I could dig and stand--and I jumped up and wanted
to shout out something to anything that would listen."
"Th' Magic listened when tha' sung th' Doxology.
It would ha' listened to anything tha'd sung. It was th'
joy that mattered. Eh! lad, lad--what's names to th'
Joy Maker," and she gave his shoulders a quick soft
pat again.
She had packed a basket which held a regular feast
this morning, and when the hungry hour came and Dickon
brought it out from its hiding place, she sat down with
them under their tree and watched them devour their food,
laughing and quite gloating over their appetites. She was
full of fun and made them laugh at all sorts of odd things.
She told them stories in broad Yorkshire and taught them
new words. She laughed as if she could not help it
when they told her of the in- creasing difficulty there
was in pretending that Colin was still a fretful invalid.
"You see we can't help laughing nearly all the time
when we are together," explained Colin. "And it
doesn't sound ill at all. We try to choke it back
but it will burst out and that sounds worse than ever."
"There's one thing that comes into my mind so often,"
said Mary, "and I can scarcely ever hold in when I think
of it suddenly. I keep thinking suppose Colin's face
should get to look like a full moon. It isn't like one
yet but he gets a tiny bit fatter every day--and suppose
some morning it should look like one--what should we do!"
"Bless us all, I can see tha' has a good bit o' play actin'
to do," said Susan Sowerby. "But tha' won't have to keep
it up much longer. Mester Craven'll come home."
"Do you think he will?" asked Colin. "Why?"
Susan Sowerby chuckled softly.
"I suppose it 'ud nigh break thy heart if he found
out before tha' told him in tha' own way," she said.
"Tha's laid awake nights plannin' it."
"I couldn't bear any one else to tell him," said Colin.
"I think about different ways every day, I think now I
just want to run into his room." "That'd be a fine
start for him," said Susan Sowerby. "I'd like to see
his face, lad. I would that! He mun come back --that
he mun."
One of the things they talked of was the visit they
were to make to her cottage. They planned it all.
They were to drive over the moor and lunch out of doors
among the heather. They would see all the twelve children
and Dickon's garden and would not come back until they
were tired.
Susan Sowerby got up at last to return to the house
and Mrs. Medlock. It was time for Colin to be wheeled
back also. But before he got into his chair he stood
quite close to Susan and fixed his eyes on her with a
kind of bewildered adoration and he suddenly caught
hold of the fold of her blue cloak and held it fast.
"You are just what I--what I wanted," he said. "I wish
you were my mother--as well as Dickon's!"
All at once Susan Sowerby bent down and drew him
with her warm arms close against the bosom under
the blue cloak--as if he had been Dickon's brother.
The quick mist swept over her eyes.
"Eh! dear lad!" she said. "Thy own mother's in this 'ere
very garden, I do believe. She couldna' keep out of it.
Thy father mun come back to thee--he mun!"