The Complete Works of Frances Hodgson Burnett. Frances Hodgson Burnett

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 rosebushes 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,”