Таинственный сад / The secret garden

“Eh! I can see it’s different,” Martha answered almost sympathetically. “When I heard you were coming from India I thought you were black.”

Mary was furious.

“What!” she said. “What! You thought… You-you daughter of a pig!”

“Who are you talking about?” asked Martha. “You needn’t be so vexed.”

Mary did not even try to control her rage and humiliation.

“You thought I was a native! You dared! You don’t know anything about natives! They are not people-they’re just servants. You know nothing about India. You know nothing about anything!”

She was in such a rage and felt so helpless, that she threw herself face downward on the pillows and burst into passionate sobbing. Martha went to the bed and bent over her.

“Eh! You mustn’t cry like that!” she begged. “Yes, I don’t know anything about anything-just like you said. I beg your pardon, Miss. Do stop crying.”

There was something comforting and really friendly in her queer Yorkshire speech. Mary gradually ceased crying and became quiet. Martha looked relieved.

“It’s time for you to get up now,” she said. “Mrs. Medlock said to carry your breakfast and tea and dinner into the room next to this. I’ll help you with your clothes.”

When Mary at last decided to get up, the clothes Martha took from the wardrobe were not hers.

“Those are not mine,” she said. “Mine are black.”

She looked at the thick white wool coat and dress, and added with cool approval:

“Those are nicer than mine.”

“Mr. Craven ordered Mrs. Medlock to get in London for you,” Martha answered. “He said he did not like black clothes.”

“I hate black things, too,” said Mary.

Martha helped to dress her little sisters and brothers but she never saw a child who stood still and waited for another person to do things for her.

“Why don’t you put on your own shoes?” she said when Mary quietly held out her foot.

“My Ayah did it,” answered Mary, staring. “It was the custom.”

“Eh! You did not see my family,” Martha said. “We are twelve, and my father only gets sixteen shilling a week. My mother cooks porridge for them all. They tumble about on the moor and play there all day. Our Dickon is twelve years old and he’s got a young pony.”

“Where did he get it?” asked Mary.

“He found it on the moor and he began to make friends with it and give it bits of bread and some grass. And it follows him everywhere. Dickon is a kind lad, animals like him.”

Mary did not have an animal pet of her own. So she began to feel a slight interest in Dickon. When she went into the next room, she found that it was a grown-up person’s room, with gloomy old pictures on the walls and heavy old oak chairs. There was a good substantial breakfast on the table in the center. But she always had a very small appetite.

“I don’t want it,” Mary said.

“You don’t want your porridge!” Martha exclaimed incredulously.

“No.”

“You don’t know how good it is.”

“I don’t want it,” repeated Mary.

“Eh!” said Martha. “If our children were at this table!”

“Why?” said Mary coldly.

“Why!” echoed Martha. “Because they are hungry as young hawks and foxes.”

“I don’t know what it is to be hungry,” said Mary.

Martha looked indignant.

“Well, try it.”

“Why don’t you take that to your brothers?” suggested Mary.

“It’s not mine,” answered Martha stoutly.

Mary drank some tea and ate a little toast and some marmalade.

“Put on warm clothes and play outside,” said Martha. “It’ll do you good.”

Mary went to the window. There were gardens and paths and big trees, but everything looked dull and wintry.

“Who will go with me?” she inquired.

Martha stared.

“You’ll go alone,” she answered. “You’ll learn to play like other children do when they haven’t got sisters and brothers. Our Dickon goes off on the moor by himself and plays for hours. That’s how he made friends with the pony. He’s got sheep on the moor that knows him, and birds.”

Mary decided to go out.

“If you go round that way you’ll come to the gardens,” Martha said, pointing to a gate in a wall of shrubbery. “There are a lot of flowers in summer-time in that place. But one of the gardens is locked up. No one goes there.”

“Why?” asked Mary.

“Mr. Craven shut it when his wife died so suddenly. He didn’t let anyone go inside. It was her garden. He locked the door and dug a hole and buried the key. Oh! There’s Mrs. Medlock’s bell ringing-I must run.”

After she was gone Mary turned down the walk[13 - turned down the walk – побрела по тропинке] which led to the door in the shrubbery. She was thinking about the secret garden. She wondered what it looked like and whether there were any flowers still alive in it. When she passed through the shrubbery gate she found herself in great gardens, with wide lawns and winding walks with borders. There were trees, and flower-beds, and evergreens, and a large pool with an old gray fountain in its midst. But the flower-beds were bare and wintry and the fountain was not playing.

She went toward the wall and found that there was a green door in the ivy. This was not the closed garden, evidently. She went through the door and found that it was a garden with walls all round it and that it was only one of several walled gardens. She saw another open green door, revealing bushes and pathways. The place was bare and ugly enough, Mary thought.

Presently an old man with a spade over his shoulder walked through the door leading from the second garden. He saw Mary, and then touched his cap. He had a surly old face. She was displeased with his garden.

“What is this place?” she asked.