THE SECRET GARDEN

by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Contents

I. THERE IS NO ONE LEFT
II. MISTRESS MARY QUITE CONTRARY
III. ACROSS THE MOOR
IV. MARTHA
V. THE CRY IN THE CORRIDOR
VI. "THERE WAS SOMEONE CRYING—THERE WAS!"
VII. THE KEY TO THE GARDEN
VIII. THE ROBIN WHO SHOWED THE WAY
IX. THE STRANGEST HOUSE ANYONE EVER LIVED IN
X. DICKON
XI. THE NEST OF THE MISSEL THRUSH
XII. "MIGHT I HAVE A BIT OF EARTH?"
XIII. "I AM COLIN"
XIV. A YOUNG RAJAH
XV. NEST BUILDING
XVI. "I WON'T!" SAID MARY
XVII. A TANTRUM
XVIII. "THA' MUNNOT WASTE NO TIME"
XIX. "IT HAS COME!"
XX. "I SHALL LIVE FOREVER—AND EVER—AND EVER!"
XXI. BEN WEATHERSTAFF
XXII. WHEN THE SUN WENT DOWN
XXIII. MAGIC
XXIV. "LET THEM LAUGH"
XXV. THE CURTAIN
XXVI. "IT'S MOTHER!"
XXVII. IN THE GARDEN

CHAPTER I. THERE IS NO ONE LEFT

When Mary Lennox was sent to live with her uncle at Misselthwaite Manor, everyone said she was the most unpleasant-looking child they had ever seen. It was true. She had a thin little face, a thin little body, thin light hair, and a sour expression. Her hair and skin looked yellowish because she had been born in India and had been sickly for most of her life.

Mary's father worked for the English government there and was always busy or unwell himself. Her mother was a great beauty who only wanted to go to parties and have fun with fashionable people. She had never really wanted a daughter, so when Mary was born, she handed the baby over to an Ayah (a native nursemaid) and made it clear that the Ayah should keep the child out of sight as much as possible. That way, the mother—known as the "Mem Sahib," a respectful title for a European lady in India—would not be bothered.

Because of this, Mary grew up seeing almost no one except her Ayah and the other native servants. They always obeyed her and let her have her own way, since they knew the Mem Sahib would be angry if crying disturbed her. By the time Mary was six years old, she had become as bossy and selfish as a spoiled little pig. Later, a young English governess came to teach her to read and write, but she disliked Mary so much that she quit after three months. The governesses who came after her left even sooner. If Mary had not genuinely wanted to learn to read books, she might never have learned her letters at all.

One scorching morning, when Mary was about nine years old, she woke up feeling cranky. She became even crankier when she saw that the servant standing by her bed was not her Ayah.

"Why did you come?" she snapped at the strange woman. "I won't let you stay. Send my Ayah to me."

The woman looked frightened and only stammered that the Ayah could not come. When Mary threw a tantrum, kicking and hitting her, the woman looked even more frightened but still insisted the Ayah could not come to "Missie Sahib."

Something strange was happening that morning. Nothing followed its usual routine, several servants seemed to be missing, and the ones Mary did see rushed about with pale, frightened faces. No one would explain anything, and her Ayah never appeared. As the morning wore on, Mary found herself completely alone, so she wandered into the garden and played by herself under a tree near the veranda (a covered porch). She pretended to plant a flower bed, sticking big red hibiscus blossoms into little piles of dirt, all the while growing angrier and muttering the insults she planned to throw at her Ayah when the woman finally returned.

"Pig! Pig! Daughter of Pigs!" she said—since calling someone a pig was one of the worst insults she knew.

She was still grinding her teeth and repeating this when she heard her mother step onto the veranda with someone else. A fair-haired young man was with her, and they spoke together in low, strange voices. Mary recognized him—he was a young officer who had recently arrived from England, though he still looked like a boy. The child stared at him, but she stared even harder at her mother. She always did this whenever she got the chance, because the Mem Sahib was so tall, slim, and lovely, always dressed in beautiful clothes. Her hair was like curly silk, her nose looked delicately turned up as if disapproving of everything, and her eyes were large and usually full of laughter. Her clothing was thin and flowing, and Mary always said it was "full of lace." It looked especially lacy this morning—but her eyes were not laughing at all. They were wide with fear, and she looked pleadingly up at the young officer's face.

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

"Terribly bad," the young man answered, his voice shaking. "Terribly, Mrs. Lennox. You should have left for the hills two weeks ago."

The Mem Sahib wrung her hands. "Oh, I know I should have!" she cried. "I only stayed for that silly dinner party. What a fool I was!"

At that very moment, a loud wail rose from the servants' quarters. Mrs. Lennox grabbed the young man's arm, and Mary stood frozen, shivering from head to toe. The wailing grew louder and wilder.

"What is it? What is it?" Mrs. Lennox gasped.

"Someone has died," the young officer answered. "You didn't tell me it had already spread among your servants."

"I didn't know!" the Mem Sahib cried. "Come with me! Come with me!" And she rushed into the house.

After that, terrible things happened quickly, and the mystery of the morning became clear: cholera, a deadly and fast-spreading disease, had broken out in its worst form, and people were dying rapidly. The Ayah had fallen ill during the night and had just died, which explained the wailing from the servants' huts. By the next day, three more servants had died, and others fled in terror. Panic spread everywhere, and people lay dying in house after house.

During the chaos and confusion of the second day, Mary hid herself in the nursery, and everyone forgot about her. No one thought of her or wanted her, and strange, frightening things happened that she knew nothing about. She spent the hours crying on and off, then falling asleep, only vaguely aware that people were sick and that mysterious, frightening sounds echoed through the house. At one point she crept into the dining room and found it empty, though a half-finished meal still sat on the table—chairs pushed back hastily, as if everyone had jumped up suddenly. Mary ate some fruit and biscuits, and since she was thirsty, she drank from a nearly full glass of wine on the table. It tasted sweet, and she had no idea how strong it was. Soon it made her extremely drowsy, so she went back to the nursery and shut herself in, frightened by the cries from the servants' huts and the sound of hurrying footsteps. The wine made her so sleepy that she could barely keep her eyes open, and she lay down and fell into a deep sleep for a long time.

Many things happened while she slept so heavily, but she never stirred, even through the wailing and the sounds of people carrying things in and out of the house.

When she finally woke up, she lay still and stared at the wall. The house was completely silent—more silent than she had ever known it to be. She heard no voices, no footsteps, and wondered if everyone had recovered from the cholera and the trouble was finally over. She also wondered who would take care of her now that her Ayah was dead. Surely there would be a new Ayah, maybe one who knew new stories, since Mary was tired of the old ones. She did not cry over her nurse's death—she was not an affectionate child and had never cared deeply for anyone. The chaos and wailing over the cholera had frightened her, and she had felt angry that no one seemed to remember she existed. But everyone had been too terrified to think of a little girl nobody was especially fond of. When people are struck by disease, it seems, they can only think of themselves. Still, she reasoned, if everyone had recovered, surely someone would remember her and come looking.

But no one came. As she lay there waiting, the house seemed to grow even more silent. Then she noticed something rustling on the floor mat—a small snake slithering along, watching her with eyes like tiny jewels. She wasn't afraid; it was a harmless little creature that seemed eager to escape the room, and she watched it slip under the door.

"How strange and quiet it is," she said aloud. "It sounds as if there's no one in the house but me and the snake."

Almost immediately, she heard footsteps outside—first in the courtyard, then on the veranda. They were men's footsteps, and the men entered the house, speaking in low voices. No one greeted them or spoke to them, and they seemed to be opening doors and peering into rooms.

"What devastation!" one voice said. "That poor, pretty woman! I suppose the child died too. I heard there was a child, though no one ever actually saw her."

Mary was standing in the middle of the nursery when the men opened her door a few minutes later. She looked like an ugly, cross little thing, frowning because she was starting to feel hungry and shamefully neglected. The first man to enter was a large officer she had once seen talking with her father. He looked exhausted and troubled, but the sight of her startled him so much he nearly jumped backward.

"Barney!" he shouted. "There's a child here! Alone! In a place like this! Heaven help us, who is she?"

"I am Mary Lennox," the little girl said, drawing herself up stiffly. She thought it was very rude of him to call her father's house "a place like this." "I fell asleep when everyone had the cholera, and I've only just woken up. Why does nobody come?"

"It's the child no one ever saw!" the man exclaimed, turning to the others with him. "She's actually been forgotten!"

"Why was I forgotten?" Mary demanded, stamping her foot. "Why does nobody come?"

The young man called Barney looked at her very sadly. Mary even thought she saw him blink hard, as if holding back tears.

"Poor little kid," he said. "There's nobody left to come."

That was the strange and sudden way Mary learned she had lost both her parents—they had died in the night and been carried away—and that the few remaining servants had fled the house as fast as they could, none of them even remembering there was a little girl left behind. That explained why everything was so quiet. There truly was no one in the house except herself and the small, rustling snake.

CHAPTER II. MISTRESS MARY QUITE CONTRARY

Mary had always enjoyed looking at her mother from a distance and thought she was very pretty, but since she barely knew her, it would have been hard for Mary to truly love her or miss her much now that she was gone. And in fact, Mary didn't miss her at all. Being a self-centered child, she gave her full attention to herself, just as she always had. If she had been older, she probably would have been terrified to find herself alone in the world—but she was still very young, and since she had always been looked after, she simply assumed she always would be. Her main concern was whether she would be sent to live with nice people who would be polite to her and let her have her own way, just as her Ayah and the other servants always had.

She knew right away that she would not be staying at the home of the English clergyman where she was first taken. She didn't want to stay there. The English cl—