t, Mary had an
inspiration.

"Now that I am 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 waken 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. And if I did it, just think what would happen!"

Mary giggled inordinately.

"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 and pretending, and besides I look too
different. I wish it wasn't raining to-day."

It was then Mistress Mary had her inspiration.

"Colin," she began mysteriously, "do you know how many rooms there are
in this house?"

"About a thousand, I suppose," he answered.

"There's about a hundred no one ever goes into," said Mary. "And one
rainy day I went and looked into ever so many of them. No one ever
knew, though Mrs. Medlock nearly found me out. I lost my way when I was
coming back and I stopped at the end of your corridor. That was the
second time I heard you crying."

Colin started up on his sofa.

"A hundred rooms no one goes into," he said. "It sounds almost like a
secret garden. Suppose we go and look at them. You could wheel me in my
chair and nobody would know where we went."

"That's what I was thinking," said Mary. "No one would dare to follow
us. There are galleries where you could run. We could do our exercises.
There is a little Indian room where there is a cabinet full of ivory
elephants. There are all sorts of rooms."

"Ring the bell," said Colin.

When the nurse came in he gave his orders.

"I want my chair," he said. "Miss Mary and I are going to look at the
part of the house which is not used. John can push me as far as the
picture-gallery because there are some stairs. Then he must go away and
leave us alone until I send for him again."

Rainy days lost their terrors that morning. When the footman had