Music Welcome to snoozecast, the podcast designed to help you fall asleep. Find us on snoozecast.com and now also on the snoozecast YouTube channel where you can find playlists of different series, including this one. If you'd like to get an email once a week with upcoming sleep stories and other news, subscribe to this newsletter at snoozecast.com. This episode is brought to you by Arrani Day. Tonight, we'll read the next part, too, The Secret Garden, a novel by Francis Hodgson Burnett, and published in 1911. In the last episode, Dickin tends the vegetable garden he keeps at home in the evenings after working on the flowery secret garden in the daytime. Sometimes his mother, Mrs. Sourby, keeps him company.

Dickens shares the secret with her, and she bakes roles for the children to satiate their Various appetites while they are gardening.

Let's get cozy. Close your eyes. Relax your body into the softness of your Bad.

Now.

Take a few deep breaths. Mary and Colin were much alarmed at the thought of Dr. Craven writing to Colin's father and spoiling the surprise. This is where they started their plan of play actin. Colin made up his mind to eat less, but unfortunately it was not possible to carry out this brilliant idea when he wakened each morning with an amazing appetite and the table near his

soap. possible to carry out this brilliant idea when he wakened each morning with an amazing appetite, and the table near his sofa was set with a breakfast of homemade bread and fresh butter. Snow White Eggs, raspberry jam, and clotted cream. Mary always breakfasted with him, and when they found themselves at the table, particularly if there were delicate slices of sizzling ham, sending forth tempting odors from under a hot silver cover, they would look into each other's eyes in desperation. I think we shall have to eat it all this morning, Mary. Colin always ended up saying, we can send away some of the lunch and a great deal of the dinner. But they never found they could send away anything and the highly polished condition of the empty plates returned to the pantry awakened much comment. I do wish, Colin would say also, I do wish the slices of ham were thicker and one muffin each is not enough for anyone. It's enough for a person who is going to die, answered Mary when first she heard this, but it's not enough for a person who is going to live. I sometimes feel as if I could eat three when those nice fresh, heather and gorse smells from the more come pouring in at the open window. The morning that Dickin, after they had been enjoying themselves in the garden for about two hours, went behind a big rose bush and brought forth two tin pails and revealed that one was full of rich new milk with cream on the top of it and that the other held cottage made current Bons folded in a clean blue and white napkin.

Bons so carefully tucked in that they were still hot. There was a riot of surprise joyfulness. What a wonderful thing for Mrs. Sourby to think of. What a kind clever woman she must be. How good the buns were, and what delicious fresh milk." Magic is in her just as it is in Dickin," said Colin. It makes her think of ways to do things, nice things. She is a magic person. Tell her we are grateful, Dickin. Extremely grateful. He was given to using rather grown-up phrases at times. He enjoyed them. He liked this so much that that he improved upon it. Tell her she has been most bounteous

and our gratitude is extreme. And then forgetting his grandeur he fell too and stuffed himself with buns and drank milk out of the pale and copious drafts in the manner of any hungry little boy who had been taking unusual exercise and breathing in moreland air and whose breakfast was more than two hours behind him. This was the beginning of many agreeable incidents of the same kind. They actually awoke to the fact that as Mrs. Sourby had 14 people to provide food for, she might not have enough to satisfy two extra appetites every day. So they asked her to let them send some of their shillings to buy things.

Dick and maid, the stimulating discovery, that in the wood in the park outside the garden, where Mary had first found him piping to the wild creatures, there was a deep little hollow where you could build a sort of tiny oven with stones and roast potatoes and eggs in it. Roasted eggs were previously unknown luxury and very hot potatoes with salt and fresh butter in them were fit for a woodland king, besides being deliciously satisfying. You could buy both potatoes and eggs and eat as many as you liked without feeling as if you were taking food out of the mouths of 14 people. beautiful morning, the magic was worked by the mystic circle under the plum tree, which provided a canopy of thickening green leaves after its brief blossom time was ended. After the ceremony, Colin always took his walking exercise, and throughout the day he exercised his newly-found power at intervals. Each day he grew stronger and could walk more steadily and cover more ground. And each day his belief in the magic grew stronger, as well it might. He tried one experiment after another as he felt himself gaining strength, and it was Dickin who showed him the best things of all. Yesterday, he said one morning after an absence, I went to Thwait for Mother, and near the blue cow in I see Bob Howard. He's the strongest chap on the more. He's the champion wrestler, and he can jump higher than any other chap and throw the hammer farther. He's gone all the way to Scotland for the sport some years.

He's known me ever since I was a little in, and he's a friendly sort, and I asked him some questions. The gentry calls him an athlete, and I thought of thee, Mr. Colin, and I says, How did they make the muscles stick out that way, Bob?

Did they do anything extra to make thyself so strong? And he says, Well, yes, lad, I did. A strong man in a show that came to thwart once showed me how to exercise my arms and legs and every muscle in my body. And I says, could a delicate chap make himself stronger with him, Bob? And he laughed and says, heartthou the delicate chap? And I says, no. But I know is a young gentleman that's getting well of a long illness, and I wish I know some of them tricks to tell him about. I didn't say no names, and he didn't ask none. He's friendly same as I said, and he stood up and showed me good naturet like, and I imitated what he did till I noted my heart. Colin had been listening excitedly. Can you show me? He cried, will you? I, to be sure, Dick and answered, getting up. But he says the hum-un-do-um gentle at first, and be careful not to tire thyself. Rest in between times and take deep breaths and don't overdo. I'll be careful," said Colin, show me, show me. Dickin, you are the most magic boy in the world." taken, stood up on the grass and slowly went through a carefully practical but simple series of muscle exercises. Colin watched them with widening eyes. He could do a few while he was sitting down.

Presently, he did a few gently while he stood upon his already steady feet. Mary began to do them also. Soot, who was watching the performance, became much disturbed and left his branch and hopped about restlessly because he could not do them too. From that time the exercises were part of the day's duties as much as the magic was. It became possible for both Colin and Mary to do more of them each time they tried, and such appetites were the results that but for the basket Dick and put down behind the bush each morning when he arrived, they would have been lost. the little oven in the hollow and Mrs. Sourbees' bounties were so satisfying that Mrs. Medlock and the nurse and Dr. Craven became mystified again. You can trifle with your breakfast and seem to disdain your dinner if you are full to the brim with roasted eggs and potatoes and richly frothed new milk and oat cakes and buns and heather honey and clotted cream. They are eating next to nothing," said the nurse. They'll die of starvation if they can't be persuaded to take some nourishment. And yet see how they look. Look! exclaimed Mrs. Medlock indignantly. Ugh! I'm moithered to death with them. They're a pair of young sadans. Bursting their jackets one day, and the next turning up their noses at the best meal's cook contempt the with. Not a mouthful of that lovely young foul and bread-sauce did they set a fork into yesterday, and the poor woman fair invented a pudding for them, and back at scent. She almost cried. She is afraid she will be blamed

if they starve themselves into their graves. Dr. Craven came and looked at Colin long and carefully. He wore an extremely worried expression when the nurse talked with him and showed him the almost untouched tray of breakfast she had saved for him to look at. But it was even more worried when he sat down by Colin Sofa and examined him. He had been called to London on business and had not seen the boy for nearly two weeks. When young things began to gain health, they gained it rapidly. The wax and tinch had left Colin's skin and a warm rose showed through it. His beautiful eyes were clear, and the hollows under them, and in his cheeks and temples had filled out. His once dark, heavy locks had begun to look as if they sprang healthily from his forehead, and were soft and warm with life. His lips were fuller and of a normal color. In fact, as an imitation of a boy who was a confirmed invalid, he was a disgraceful sight. Dr. Craven held his chin in his hand and thought him over.

I am sorry to hear that you do not eat anything," he said. "'That will not do. You will lose all you have gained, and you have gained amazingly. You ate so well a short time ago.' I told you it was an unnatural appetite.

Answered Colin? You ate so well a short time ago." I told you it was an unnatural appetite," answered Colin. Mary was sitting on her stool nearby, and she suddenly made a very queer sound, which she tried so violently to repress that she ended by almost choking.

What is the matter?" said Dr. Craven, turning to look at her. Mary became quite severe in her manner. It was something between a sneeze and a cough. She replied with reproachful dignity. And it got into my throat. But she said afterward to Colin, I couldn't stop myself. It just burst out because all at once I couldn't help remembering that last big potato you ate, and the way your mouth stretched when you bit through that thick, lovely crust with jam and clotted cream on it. Is there any way in which those children can get food secretly? Dr. Craven inquired of Mrs. Medlock. There's no way unless they dig it out of the earth or pick it off the trees. Mrs. Medlock answered. They stay out in the grounds all day and see no one but each other. And if they want anything different to eat from what's sent up to them, they need only ask for it. Well, said Dr. Craven. So long as going without food agrees with them, we need not disturb ourselves. The boy is a new creature. So is the girl," said Mrs. Medlock. She's begun to be downright pretty since she's filled out and lost her ugly little sour look. Her hair's grown thick and healthy looking, and she's got a bright color. The glumist, ill-natured little thing she used to be, and now her and master Colin laughed together like a pair of crazy young ones. Perhaps they're growing fat on that. Perhaps they are," said Dr. Craven. Let him laugh. CHAPTER 25. The Curtain the secret garden bloomed and bloomed, and every morning revealed new miracles. In the robbins nest there were eggs, and the robbins mates sat upon them, keeping them warm with her feathery little breast and careful wings. At first she was very nervous, and the Robin himself was indignantly watchful. Even Dickon did not go near the close-grown corner in those days. But waited until by the quiet working of some mysterious spell he seemed to have conveyed to the soul of

the little pair that in the garden there was nothing which was not quite like themselves. Nothing which did not understand the wonderfulness of what was happening to them. The immense, tender, terrible, heart-breaking beauty and solemnity of eggs. If there had been one person in that garden who had not known through all his or her innermost being that if an egg were taken, or hurt, the whole world would whirl around and crash through space and come to an end. If there had been even one who did not feel it and act accordingly, there could have been no happiness even in that golden springtime air. But they all knew it, and felt it, and the Robin and his mate knew they knew it. At first the Robin watched Mary and Colin with sharp anxiety. For some mysterious reason he knew he need not watch Dickin. The first moment he set his doobright black eye on Dickin, he knew he was not a stranger, but a sort of robin without beaker feathers. He could speak robin, which is a quite distinct language not to be mistaken for any other. To speak Robin to a Robin is like speaking French to a Frenchman. Dickin always spoke it to the Robin himself, so the queer gibberish he used when he spoke to humans did not matter in the least. The Robin thought he spoke this gibberish to them because they were not intelligent enough to understand feathered speech. His movements also were Robin. They never startled one by being sudden enough to seem dangerous or threatening. Any Robin could understand Dickin, so his presence was not even disturbing. But at the outset it seemed necessary to be on guard against the other two. In the first place, the boy creature did not come into the garden on his legs. He was pushed in on a thing with wheels, and the skins of wild animals were thrown over him. That in itself was doubtful. Then, when he began to stand up and move about, he did it in a queer, unacustomed way and the others seem to have to help him.

The Robin used to secrete himself in a bush and watch this anxiously. His head tilted first on one side, and then on the other. He thought that the slow movements might mean that he was preparing to pounce, as cats do. When cats are preparing to pounce, they creep over the ground very slowly. The Robin talked the sober with his mate a great deal for a few days. But after that, he decided not to speak on the subject because her terror was so great that he was afraid it might be injurious to the ex. When the boy began to walk by himself and even to move more quickly, it was in immense relief. But for a long time, or it seemed a long time to the Robin, he was a source of some anxiety. He did not act as the other humans did. He seemed very fond of walking, but he had a way of sitting or lying down for a while, and then getting up in a disconcerting manner to begin again. One day the Robin remembered that when he himself had been made to learn to fly by his parents, he had done

much the same sort of thing. He had taken short flights of a few yards and then had been obliged to rest. So it occurred to him that this boy was learning to fly or rather to walk. He mentioned this to his mate, and when he told her that the eggs would probably conduct themselves in the same way after they were fledged, she was quite comforted, and even became eagerly interested and derived great pleasure from watching the boy over the edge of her nest. Though she always thought that the eggs would be much cleverer and learn more quickly. But then she said indulgently that humans were always more clumsy and slow than eggs, and most of them never seemed really to learn to fly at all. You never met them in the air or on treetops. After a while, the boy began to move about as the others did, but all three of the children at times did unusual things. They would stand under the trees and move their arms and legs and heads about in a way which was neither walking nor running nor sitting down. They went through these movements at intervals every day and the robin was never able to explain to his mate what they were doing, or trying to do. He could only say that he was sure that the eggs would never flap about in such a manner. But as the boy who could speak Robin so fluently was doing the thing with them, birds could be quite sure that the actions were not of a dangerous nature. Of course, neither the Robin nor his mate had ever heard of the champion wrestler, Bob Howarth, and his exercises for making the muscles stand out like lumps. Robbins are not like human beings. Their muscles are always exercised from the first, and so they develop themselves in a natural manner. If you have to fly about to find every meal you eat, your muscles do not become atrophied. Atrophied means wasted away through one to use. When the boy was walking and running about and digging and weeding like the others, nest in the corner was brooded over by a great peace and content. Knowing that your eggs were as safe as if they were locked in a bank vault, and the fact that you could watch so many curious things going on, made setting a most entertaining occupation. On wet days, the eggs' mother sometimes felt even a little dull because the children did not come into the garden. But even on wet days, it could not be said that Mary and Colin were dull. One morning, when the rain streamed down unceasingly, and Colin was beginning to feel a little restive as he was obliged to remain on his sofa because it was not safe to get up and walk about. Mary had an inspiration. Now that I'm a real boy, Colin had said, my legs and arms and all my body are so full of magic that I can't keep them still. They want to be doing things all the time. Do you know that when I awaken in the morning, Mary, when it's quite early and the birds are just shouting outside, and everything seems just shouting for joy? Even the trees and things we can't really hear, I feel as if I must jump out of bed and shout myself. If I did it, just think what would happen. Mary giggled in ordinantly. The nurse would come running, and Mrs. Medlock would come running, and they would be sure you had gone crazy, and they'd send for the doctor. She said. Colin giggled himself. He could see how they would all look, how horrified by his outbreak and how amazed to see him standing upright. "'I wish my father would come home,' he said. "'I want to tell him myself. I'm always thinking about it, but we couldn't go on like this much longer. I can't stand lying still in pretending, and besides, I look too different. I wish it wasn't raining today.

It was then Mistress Mary had her inspiration.

Colin, she began mysteriously.

Do you know how many rooms there are in this house?

...