the world of
difference there is between the busy life of a schoolboy and the infinite
leisure of a child. Anyhow, this second time I didn't for a moment think
of going in straight away. You see----. For one thing, my mind was full of
the idea of getting to school in time--set on not breaking my record for
punctuality. I must surely have felt _some_ little desire at least to
try the door--yes. I must have felt that... But I seem to remember the
attraction of the door mainly as another obstacle to my overmastering
determination to get to school. I was immensely interested by this
discovery I had made, of course--I went on with my mind full of it--but I
went on. It didn't check me. I ran past, tugging out my watch, found I had
ten minutes still to spare, and then I was going downhill into familiar
surroundings. I got to school, breathless, it is true, and wet with
perspiration, but in time. I can remember hanging up my coat and hat...
Went right by it and left it behind me. Odd, eh?"

He looked at me thoughtfully, "Of course I didn't know then that it
wouldn't always be there. Schoolboys have limited imaginations. I suppose
I thought it was an awfully jolly thing to have it there, to know my way
back to it, but there was the school tugging at me. I expect I was a good
deal distraught and inattentive that morning, recalling what I could of
the beautiful strange people I should presently see again. Oddly enough I
had no doubt in my mind that they would be glad to see me... Yes, I must
have thought of the garden that morning just as a jolly sort of place to
which one might resort in the interludes of a strenuous scholastic career.

"I didn't go that day at all. The next day was a half holiday, and that
may have weighed with me. Perhaps, too, my state of inattention brought
down impositions upon me, and docked the margin of time necessary for the
_detour_. I don't know. What I do know is that in the meantime the
enchanted garden was so much upon my mind that I could not keep it to
myself.

"I told. What was his name?--a ferrety-looking youngster we used to call
Squiff."

"Young Hopkins," said I.

"Hopkins it was. I did not like telling him. I had a feeling that in some
way it was against the rules to tell him, but I did. He was walking part
of the way home with me; he was talkative, and if we had not talked about
the enchanted garden we should have talked of something else, and it was
intolerable to me to think about an