and the pretty little bird hopped on the ground near them
‘He's my friend,he is,’said the old man.‘There aren't any other robins in the garden,so he's a bit lonely.’He spoke in strong Yorkshire dialect,so Mary had to listen carefully to understand him.
She looked very hard at the robin.‘I'm lonely too,’she said.She had not realized this before.
‘What's your name?’she asked the gardener.
‘Ben Weatherstaff.I'm lonely myself.The robin's my only friend,you see.’
‘I haven't got any friends at all,’said Mary.
Yorkshire people always say what they are thinking,and old Ben was a Yorkshire moor man.‘We're alike,you and me,’he told Mary.‘We're not pretty to look at,and we're both very disagreeable.’
Nobody had ever said this to Mary before.‘Am I really as ugly and disagreeable as Ben?’she wondered.
Suddenly the robin flew to a tree near Mary and started singing to her.Ben laughed loudly.
‘Well!’he said.‘He wants to be your friend!’
‘Oh!Would you please be my friend?’she whispered to the robin.She spoke in a soft,quiet voice and old Ben looked at her in surprise.
‘You said that really nicely!’he said.‘You sound like Dickon,when he talks to animals on the moor.’
‘Do you know Dickon?’asked Mary.But just then the robin flew away.‘Oh look,he's flown into the garden with no door! Please,Ben,how can I get into it?