Chapter Three The friendly robin第三章 友好的知更鸟

江苏南菁高级中学 刘 珂

得知秘密花园的故事之后， 玛丽充满好奇地来到庄园里一座又一座的花园中寻找秘密花园，却意外邂逅了一只神秘的知更鸟，这只知更鸟会引领她找到秘密花园吗？

难词探意

1. trail /΄treɪl/ v. (尤指植物)蔓生；蔓延

2. chirrup /΄t∫ɪrəp/ v. 唧唧叫；发啁啾声

3. helping /΄helpɪŋ/ n. 一份食物

Mary couldn't stop thinking about the secret garden. “What would it look like?” she wondered.

“I think I shall go out,” she told Martha.

“Very good, Miss,” Martha said and led Mary out of the house. Martha pointed towards a pathway opposite the door. “Head that way,keep going and you'll be fine.”

Mary walked along the pathway until she came to huge gardens with wide lawns and winding walks. There was a large pool with a fountain (人工喷泉) in the middle. But the flowerbeds were bare and the fountain was not working.

Mary looked around. Where could the locked-up garden be?

At the far end of the path she noticed a wall covered in ivy. Perhaps it was there? She hurried across and saw a green door in the ivy,but it was already open.She sighed with disappointment and went in anyway.

She found herself in another garden with walls all round it. One walled garden seemed to open into another and another. It was all a bit dull really, Mary thought. She kept walking, through the next green door and the one after that until there were no more doors. How annoying!

Strangely though, she could see the tops of trees above the wall at the far end of the orchard(果园) where she stood. She frowned. How could there be trees but no door to them? Instead the ivy grew wild here, trailing like a waterfall down to the ground.

The sound of chirruping broke into her thoughts. She looked up. A robin perched (栖息)on the top branches of one of the trees. It sang so beautifully and she was sure it was looking straight at her when it did so! For the first time in months, Mary felt happy.

She stood very still, listening to its song until it finished and flew away. She gazed at the empty branch for a second and that's when she knew, just knew, that the robin had sung to her from the locked secret garden.

“It has to be,” she whispered to herself.

So Mary's days took shape. She would awake to the sound of Martha making the fire,dress herself and go outside. Every day she searched for the door to the secret garden but every day she came back disappointed.

The days when she saw or heard the robin were the best. Then she would run from one garden to the other, the wind in her face and her hair blowing everywhere. The fresh air put colour in her cheeks and she grew stronger.“You look like a proper country girl now! ”Martha would laugh as Mary asked for second helpings at lunchtimes.

Sometimes it would rain and she had to stay indoors. She hated those days. She was so bored. The only person she had to talk to was

Activity A Reading for comprehension

1. What changes in Mary can be seen in this chapter? You can choose more than one answer.

A. She learnt how to dress herself.

B. She often went outside to the gardens instead of staying indoors all day long.Martha but Martha could never stay long. Mrs Medlock was always calling her away. It was so unfair!

One morning Mary woke to find bright sunshine flooding her room. She dressed quickly and ran outside. Everything felt different. As she skipped along the paths leading to the kitchen gardens, she noticed they didn't seem so bare.Tiny green shoots were jutting (伸出) out of the soil.

“What are they?” she asked a gardener.

The gardener, who was called Ben Weatherstaff, stopped digging. “They're the spring flowers coming up.”

“When? Tomorrow?” Mary was used to the heat of India where flowers bloomed overnight.

“Tomorrow? Nay, lass! It'll be a few weeks at least. You'll have to watch and wait.”

A cheery sound distracted her. Mary looked and saw the robin flying overhead. “Bye! ” she called out to Ben and ran after the bird. It stopped by the garden at the far end of the orchard—the one with the trees over the wall. It hopped (齐足跳行) towards the wall and began pulling at a fat, juicy worm.

“What have you got there? Lunch?” she asked. Then something caught her eye. A rusty object was poking out of the soil and Mary leaned forward and tugged at it, her heart thudding.

It was a key. A long, rusty key.

C. She had a gloomier temper and felt more lonelier.

D. She grew stronger and her cheeks didn't look so pale as before.

E. She had a better appetite and was more like a country girl.

2. What happened between Mary and the robin? Fill in the flow chart below.

3. As a reader, how do you feel about the robin?What function(s) do you think it fulfills in the novel?

4. What do you predict would happen in the next chapter?

Activity B Reading for writing

Ⅰ. Useful expressions for creating a novel

1. expressions for describing feelings

sigh with disappointment 失望地叹了口气

frown 皱起眉头

come back disappointed 失望而归

one's heart thuds 心脏怦怦直跳

2. expressions for describing behaviour

hurry across 匆忙跑过去

keep walking 一直走

look straight at her 直视着她

stand very still 站着一动不动

gaze at...for a second 凝视……片刻

whisper to oneself 小声对自己说

awake to the sound of... 伴着……声醒来

skip along the paths 沿着小路蹦蹦跳跳地走

Ⅱ. Writing techniques

Correlation （前后呼应）

In a full-length novel, the writer often uses the writing technique of correlation, which means something that happens later in the novel is correlated with something mentioned in the previous part of the story. Using the technique of correlation can help to make the development of the story coherent and engage readers' attention. Can you find one thing in this chapter that is correlated with something in Chapter Two?

Ⅲ. Summary writing

Write a summary of Chapter Three with about 60 words. Leave out any unnecessary detail.