Enter Three Witches by Kate Gilmore Read Free Book Online Page A

does it look like I need? Help me put these unspeakable creatures back where they came from. I had no idea they could move so fast.” Bren waded cautiously over to the frog tank with his victim.
    Erika had managed to grasp the situation, if not the reason for it. She held the lid of the tank while Bren popped the first frog in and hastily closed it again.
    “That’s good,” he said. “This is definitely a two-man job. I could be here all night, and if Mrs. Packard comes back…” He rolled his eyes to heaven and went back to catching frogs. Between the two of them, the work went fairly fast. Erika, having less to do, watched with fascination. Nor did she miss the final act when Bren, turning his back to her at the farthest corner of the room, stuffed the last frog down the front of his shirt and buttoned it up to his throat. Wisely, she decided to say nothing about this curious sight.
    “Whew! What a relief. Thanks a million, Erika. I couldn’t have done it by myself.” Bren’s smile was almost back to normal, and the small, wiggling bulge just above his belt would not have been noticed by the casual observer.
    “Now are you going to tell me what this was all in aid of?” Erika asked.
    “Not until we get out of here,” Bren said. “Come on, let’s split before the dragon lady comes back. I’ll walk you home,” he added. It seemed the least he could do, though what he was going to say once they were safely out of the biology lab was at the moment beyond even his powers of invention.
    “Great, let’s go,” she said, and giving one last glance at the tank of hysterical frogs, they left. Mrs. Packard was toiling up the stairs as they came down, a stack of exam papers clutched to her bony chest, a look of generalized suspicion in her cold, blue eyes. “She’s going to wonder why her charges are so upset,” Bren said, “but what the hey, she’ll never guess.”
    Erika giggled. “Unless we forgot one,” she said. “I could swear I saw one last frog hopping away toward the corner of the room.”
    “You were seeing things,” Bren said firmly.
    “Let’s hope so,” Erika said, and treated him to the full splendor of her smile.
    They had now reached the sidewalk, and Bren stopped to look at her carefully for the first time. He saw a wonderful diversion from the subject of frogs—the spectacular mouthful of hardware that Erika had forgotten she had.
    “That’s an amazing set of braces,” he said. “When did you get those? I mean, you can’t have had them all along.”
    Erika clamped her mouth shut. “Thishafternoon,” she mumbled.
    “What? Today? That’s why I couldn’t find you at lunchtime.” She nodded mutely. “But you’ve got to talk,” he went on. “You can’t go through life with your mouth shut.”
    “Wanna bet?” Erika said, only a little more distinctly.
    “You were talking in the bio room,” Bren said. “Come on. Open up. Lots of beautiful women have braces, though I didn’t think there was anything wrong with your teeth before.”
    This comment was enough to pry open Erika’s jaws. “You’re damn right there was nothing wrong with my teeth,” she cried. “But everybody’s got to have an expensive orthodontist, didn’t you know? So I’ve got to have one too. Daddy ran out of nice things to give me, so he gave me these.”
    This was news from another world to Bren, who stood at a loss for words, looking at the furious girl. Suddenly the front of his shirt gave a convulsive jump and Erika’s eyes widened. She had forgotten for the moment a subject of even more absorbing interest than her teeth.
    “But let’s not talk about me,” she said, her eyes fixed on Bren’s middle. “I think frogs are a much more interesting topic of conversation, and I want to know
all
about them.”
    “Of course you do,” Bren said. He was playing for time while his mind scrambled after explanations, each one more improbable than the last, for the ridiculous scene in the bio lab.