Though brief, this story has become a classic and is often anthologised. Quite unlike Wells's usual style, it is a gentle fantasy about childhood and the world of the imagination. A lonely young boy, wandering through the London streets, sees for the first time a door in a garden wall and goes through it. There he finds a beautiful garden, with exotic animals, other children to play with and kindly adults. When he tries to tell his family about the garden, he is beaten for telling lies. Much later, when he sees the door again, he is too busy to go in. At different times in his life, usually when he is preoccupied with worldly matters, it appears and seems to invite him; but there is always something more important. Towards the end of the story the boy, now a middle-aged, prominent politician, confides in a friend and says that he is now becoming obsessed with the door. Soon afterwards he is found dead.
