ened up a new subject.

"How old are you?" he asked.

"I am ten," answered Mary, forgetting herself for the moment, "and so
are you."

"How do you know that?" he demanded in a surprised voice.

"Because when you were born the garden door was locked and the key was
buried. And it has been locked for ten years."

Colin half sat up, turning toward her, leaning on his elbows.

"What garden door was locked? Who did it? Where was the key buried?" he
exclaimed as if he were suddenly very much interested.

"It--it was the garden Mr. Craven hates," said Mary nervously. "He
locked the door. No one--no one knew where he buried the key." "What
sort of a garden is it?" Colin persisted eagerly.

"No one has been allowed to go into it for ten years," was Mary's
careful answer.

But it was too late to be careful. He was too much like herself. He
too had had nothing to think about and the idea of a hidden garden
attracted him as it had attracted her. He asked question after
question. Where was it? Had she never looked for the door? Had she
never asked the gardeners?

"They won't talk about it," said Mary. "I think they have been told
not to answer questions."

"I would make them," said Colin.

"Could you?" Mary faltered, beginning to feel frightened. If he could
make people answer questions, who knew what might happen!

"Everyone is obliged to please me. I told you that," he said. "If I
were to live, this place would sometime belong to me. They all know
that. I would make them tell me."

Mary had not known that she herself had been spoiled, but she could see
quite plainly that this mysterious boy had been. He thought that the
whole world belonged to him. How peculiar he was and how coolly he
spoke of not living.

"Do you think you won't live?" she asked, partly because she was
curious and partly in hope of making him forget the garden.

"I don't suppose I shall," he answered as indifferently as he had
spoken before. "Ever since I remember anything I have heard people say
I shan't. At first they thought I was too little to understand and now
they think I don't hear. But I do. My doctor is my father's cousin.
He is quite poor and if I die he will have all Misselthwaite when my
father is dead. I should think he wouldn't want me to live."

"Do you want to live?" inquired Mary.

"No," he answered, in a cross, tired fashion. "But I don't want to
die. When I feel ill I lie here and think about it unt