"Ben Weatherstaff said I was like him," said
Mary. "He said he'd warrant we'd both got
the same nasty tempers. I think you are like
him too. We are all three alike -- you and I
and Ben Weatherstaff. He said we were neither
of us much to look at and we were as sour as we
looked. But I don't feel as sour as I used to before
I knew the robin and Dickon."

"Did you feel as if you hated people?"

"Yes," answered Mary without any affectation.
"I should have detested you if I had seen you before
I saw the robin and Dickon."

Colin put out his thin hand and touched her.

"Mary," he said, "I wish I hadn't said what I
did about sending Dickon away. I hated you
when you said he was like an angel and I laughed
at you but -- but perhaps he is."

"Well, it was rather funny to say it," she admitted
frankly, "because his nose does turn up and
he has a big mouth and his clothes have patches
all over them and he talks broad Yorkshire, but -- but
if an angel did come to Yorkshire and live on
the moor -- if there was a Yorkshire angel -- I
believe he'd understand the green things and know
how to make them grow and he would know how
to talk to the wild creatures as Dickon does and
they'd know he was friends for sure."

"I shouldn't mind Dickon looking at me," said
Colin; "I want to see him."

[[236]]

p235 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p236w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p237

v?