The Secret Garden
just loved it, an’ they used to ’tend the flowers themselves. An’ none
o’ th’ gardeners was ever let to go in. Him an’ her used to go in an’
shut th’ door an’ stay there hours an’ hours, readin’ and talkin’. An’
she was just a bit of a girl an’ there was an old tree with a branch
bent like a seat on it. An’ she made roses grow over it an’ she used to
sit there. But one day when she was sittin’ there th’ branch broke an’
she fell on th’ ground an’ was hurt so bad that next day she died. Th’
doctors thought he’d go out o’ his mind an’ die, too. That’s why he
hates it. No one’s never gone in since, an’ he won’t let anyone talk
about it.”
Mary did not ask any more questions. She looked at the red fire and
listened to the wind “wutherin’.” It seemed to be “wutherin’” louder
than ever.
At that moment a very good thing was happening to her. Four good things
had happened to her, in fact, since she came to Misselthwaite Manor.
She had felt as if she had understood a robin and that he had
understood her; she had run in the wind until her blood had grown warm;
she had been healthily hungry for the first time in her life; and she
had found out what it was to be sorry for someone.
But as she was listening to the wind she began to listen to something
else. She did not know what it was, because at first she could scarcely
distinguish it from the wind itself. It was a curious sound—it seemed
almost as if a child were crying somewhere. Sometimes the wind sounded
rather like a child crying, but presently Mistress Mary felt quite sure
this sound was inside the house, not outside it. It was far away, but
it was inside. She turned round and looked at Martha.
“Do you hear anyone crying?” she said.
Martha suddenly looked confused.
“No,” she answered. “It’s th’ wind. Sometimes it sounds like as if
someone was lost on th’ moor an’ wailin’. It’s got all sorts o’
sounds.”
“But listen,” said Mary. “It’s in the house—down one of those long
corridors.”
And at that very moment a door must have been opened somewhere
downstairs; for a great rushing draft blew along the passage and the
door of the room they sat in was blown open with a crash, and as they
both jumped to their feet the light was blown out and the crying sound
was swept down the far corridor so that it was to be heard more plainly
than ever.
“There!” said Mary. “I told you so! It is someone crying—and it isn’t a
grown-up person.”
Martha ran and shut the door and turned the key, but before she did it
they both heard the sound of a door in some far passage shutting with a
bang, and then everything was quiet, for even the wind ceased
“wutherin’” for a few moments.
“It was th’ wind,” said Martha stubbornly. “An’ if it wasn’t, it was
little Betty Butterworth, th’ scullery-maid. She’s had th’ toothache
all day.”
But something troubled and awkward in her manner made Mistress Mary
stare very hard at her. She did not believe she was speaking the truth.
CHAPTER VI.
“THERE WAS SOMEONE CRYING—THERE WAS!”
The next day the rain poured down in torrents again, and when Mary
looked out of her window the moor was almost hidden by gray mist and
cloud. There could be no going out today.
“What do you do in your cottage when it rains like this?” she asked
Martha.
“Try to keep from under each other’s feet mostly,” Martha answered.
“Eh! there does seem a lot of us then. Mother’s a good-tempered woman
but she gets fair moithered. The biggest ones goes out in th’ cow-shed
and plays there. Dickon he doesn’t mind th’ wet. He goes out just th’
same as if th’ sun was shinin’. He says he sees things on rainy days as
doesn’t show when it’s fair weather. He once found a little fox cub
half drowned in its hole and he brought it home in th’ bosom of his
shirt to keep it warm. Its mother had been killed nearby an’ th’ hole
was swum out an’ th’ rest o’ th’ litter was dead. He’s got it at home
now. He found a half-drowned young crow another time an’ he brought it
home, too, an’ tamed it. It’s named Soot because it’s so black, an’ it
hops an’ flies about with him everywhere.”
The time had come when Mary had forgotten to resent Martha’s familiar
talk. She had even begun to find it interesting and to be sorry when
she stopped or went away. The stories she had been told by her Ayah
when she lived in India had been quite unlike those Martha had to tell
about the moorland cottage which held fourteen people who lived in four
little rooms and never had quite enough to eat. The children seemed to
tumble about and amuse themselves like a litter of rough, good-natured
collie puppies. Mary was most attracted by the mother and Dickon. When
Martha told stories of what “mother” said or did they always sounded
comfortable.
“If I had a raven or a fox cub I could play with it,” said Mary. “But I
have nothing.”
Martha looked perplexed.
“Can tha’ knit?” she asked.
“No,” answered Mary.
“Can tha’ sew?”
“No.”
“Can tha’ read?”
“Yes.”
“Then why doesn’t tha read somethin’, or learn a bit o’ spellin’?
Tha’st old enough to be learnin’ thy book a good bit now.”
“I haven’t any books,” said Mary. “Those I had were left in India.”
“That’s a pity,” said Martha. “If Mrs. Medlock’d let thee go into th’
library, there’s thousands o’ books there.”
Mary did not ask where the library was, because she was suddenly
inspired by a new idea. She made up her mind to go and find it herself.
She was not troubled about Mrs. Medlock. Mrs. Medlock seemed always to
be in her comfortable housekeeper’s sitting-room downstairs. In this
queer place one scarcely ever saw anyone at all. In fact, there was no
one to see but the servants, and when their master was away they lived
a luxurious life below stairs, where there was a huge kitchen hung
about with shining brass and pewter, and a large servants’ hall where
there were four or five abundant meals eaten every day, and where a
great deal of lively romping went on when Mrs. Medlock was out of the
way.
Mary’s meals were served regularly, and Martha waited on her, but no
one troubled themselves about her in the least. Mrs. Medlock came and
looked at her every day or two, but no one inquired what she did or
told her what to do. She supposed that perhaps this was the English way
of treating children. In India she had always been attended by her
Ayah, who had followed her about and waited on her, hand and foot. She
had often been tired of her company. Now she was followed by nobody and
was learning to dress herself because Martha looked as though she
thought she was silly and stupid when she wanted to have things handed
to her and put on.
“Hasn’t tha’ got good sense?” she said once, when Mary had stood
waiting for her to put on her gloves for her. “Our Susan Ann is twice
as sharp as thee an’ she’s only four year’ old. Sometimes tha’ looks
fair soft in th’ head.”
Mary had worn her contrary scowl for an hour after that, but it made
her think several entirely new things.
She stood at the window for about ten minutes this morning after Martha
had swept up the hearth for the last time and gone downstairs. She was
thinking over the new idea which had come to her when she heard of the
library. She did not care very much about the library itself, because
she had read very few books; but to hear of it brought back to her mind
the hundred rooms with closed doors. She wondered if they were all
really locked and what she would find if she could get into any of
them. Were there a hundred really? Why shouldn’t she go and see how
many doors she could count? It would be something to do on this morning
when she could not go out. She had never been taught to ask permission
to do things, and she knew nothing at all about authority, so she would
not have thought it necessary to ask Mrs. Medlock if she might walk
about the house, even if she had seen her.
She opened the door of the room and went into the corridor, and then
she began her wanderings. It was a long corridor and it branched into
other corridors and it led her up short flights of steps which mounted
to others again. There were doors and doors, and there were pictures on
the walls. Sometimes they were pictures of dark, curious landscapes,
but oftenest they were portraits of men and women in queer, grand
costumes made of satin and velvet. She found herself in one long
gallery whose walls were covered with these portraits. She had never
thought there could be so many in any house. She walked slowly down
this place and stared at the faces which also seemed to stare at her.
She felt as if they were wondering what a little girl from India was
doing in their house. Some were pictures of children—little girls in
thick satin frocks which reached to their feet and stood out about
them, and boys with puffed sleeves and lace collars and long hair, or
with big ruffs around their necks. She always stopped to look at the
children, and wonder what their names were, and where they had gone,
and why they wore such odd clothes. There was a stiff, plain little
girl rather like herself. She wore a green brocade dress and held a
green parrot on her finger. Her eyes had a sharp, curious look.
“Where do you live now?” said Mary aloud to her. “I wish you were
here.”
Surely no other little girl ever spent such a queer morning. It seemed
as if there was no one in all the huge rambling house but her own small
self, wandering about upstairs and down, through narrow passages and
wide ones, where it seemed to her that no one but herself had ever
walked. Since so many rooms had been built, people must have lived in
them, but it all seemed so empty that she could not quite believe it
true.
It was not until she climbed to the second floor that she thought of
turning the handle of a door. All the doors were shut, as Mrs. Medlock
had said they were, but at last she put her hand on the handle of one
of them and turned it. She was almost frightened for a moment when she
felt that it turned without difficulty and that when she pushed upon
the door itself it slowly and heavily opened. It was a massive door and
opened into a big bedroom. There were embroidered hangings on the wall,
and inlaid furniture such as she had seen in India stood about the
room. A broad window with leaded panes looked out upon the moor; and
over the mantel was another portrait of the stiff, plain little girl
who seemed to stare at her more curiously than ever.
“Perhaps she slept here once,” said Mary. “She stares at me so that she
makes me feel queer.”
After that she opened more doors and more. She saw so many rooms that
she became quite tired and began to think that there must be a hundred,
though she had not counted them. In all of them there were old pictures
or old tapestries with strange scenes worked on them. There were
curious pieces of furniture and curious ornaments in nearly all of
them.
In one room, which looked like a lady’s sitting-room, the hangings were
all embroidered velvet, and in a cabinet were about a hundred little
elephants made of ivory. They were of different sizes, and some had
their mahouts or palanquins on their backs. Some were much bigger than
the others and some were so tiny that they seemed only babies. Mary had
seen carved ivory in India and she knew all about elephants. She opened
the door of the cabinet and stood on a footstool and played with these
for quite a long time. When she got tired she set the elephants in
order and shut the door of the cabinet.
In all her wanderings through the long corridors and the empty rooms,
she had seen nothing alive; but in this room she saw something. Just
after she had closed the cabinet door she heard a tiny rustling sound.
It made her jump and look around at the sofa by the fireplace, from
which it seemed to come. In the corner of the sofa there was a cushion,