Dickon nodded.
Martha told me there was one as no one ever went inside, he answered.
Us used to wonder what it was like.
He stopped and looked round at the lovely gray tangle about him, and
his round eyes looked queerly happy.
Eh! the nests as ll be here come springtime, he said. It d be th
safest nestin place in England. No one never comin near an tangles
o trees an roses to build in. I wonder all th birds on th moor
don t build here.
Mistress Mary put her hand on his arm again without knowing it.
Will there be roses? she whispered. Can you tell? I thought perhaps
they were all dead.
Eh! No! Not them not all of em! he answered. Look here!
He stepped over to the nearest tree an old, old one with gray lichen
all over its bark, but upholding a curtain of tangled sprays and
branches. He took a thick knife out of his pocket and opened one of its
blades.
There s lots o dead wood as ought to be cut out, he said. An
there s a lot o old wood, but it made some new last year. This here s
a new bit, and he touched a shoot which looked brownish green instead
of hard, dry gray.
Mary touched it herself in an eager, reverent way.
That one? she said. Is that one quite alive quite?
Dickon curved his wide smiling mouth.
It s as wick as you or me, he said; and Mary remembered that Martha
had told her that wick meant alive or lively.
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