Kingdom of the Golden Dragon by Isabel Allende Read Free Book Online Page A

talking about a chauffeured limousine, only a modest little convertible. . . .
    The telephone rang and Kate ignored it. She didn’t want to lose the thread of the heated arguments she was planning to use to nail Leblanc, but the ringing continued until it got under her skin. Furious, she picked up the receiver, growling about the dastardly person who was interrupting her intellectual labors.
    â€œHi, Grandmother,” came the happy voice of her oldest grandchild from California.
    â€œAlexander!” she exclaimed, enchanted to hear his voice. However, she immediately controlled her enthusiasm, as she didn’t want her grandson to suspect that she missed him. “Haven’t I told you a thousand times not to call me Grandmother?”
    â€œWe also agreed that you would call me Jaguar,” Alex replied, unfazed.
    â€œJaguar! You can’t even sprout whiskers, you’re more like a Chihuahua than a big cat.”
    â€œYou, on the other hand, are my father’s mother, so I have the legal right to call you grandmother.”
    â€œDid you get my gift?” she asked to divert him.
    â€œIt’s wonderful, Kate!”
    And in fact it was. Alexander had just turned sixteen, and through the mail he had received an enormous box from New York containing his grandmother’s present. Kate had given up one of her most precious possessions: the skin of a ten-foot-long python, the same one that had swallowed her camera in Malaysia several years before. Now the trophy was hanging in Alexander’s room, the only adornment. Months earlier, he had destroyed everything in his room in a fit of worry about his mother’s grave illness. The only things he had left were a gutted mattress to sleep on and a flashlight for reading at night.
    â€œHow are your sisters?”
    â€œAndrea won’t come into my room because she’s freaked out by the snakeskin, but Nicole is my slave if I let her touch it. She’s offered to trade me everything she has in the world for that python, but I will never give it to anyone.”
    â€œI hope not . And how’s your mother doing?”
    â€œMuch better. You can tell because she’s gone back to her painting. You know what? Walimai, the shaman, told me I have the power to heal, and that I must use it well. I’ve about decided that I’m not going to be a musician, the way I’d planned; I’m going to be a doctor instead. How does that sound to you?” Alex asked.
    â€œI suppose you think you cured your mother,” his grandmother laughed.
    â€œI didn’t do it, it was the ‘water of health’ and the medicinal plants I brought back from the Amazon.”
    â€œAnd the chemotherapy, and the radiation . . .” she interrupted.
    â€œWe won’t ever know what cured her, Kate. Other patients who received the same treatment in the same hospital have died, but my mother is in full remission. I know cancer is very treacherous, and can come back at any moment, but I think that the plants the shaman Walimai gave me, and also the miraculous water, will keep her well.”
    â€œYou paid a big price to get them,” Kate commented.
    â€œI did come close to getting killed when . . .”
    â€œOh that was nothing, I was talking about leaving your grandfather’s flute behind,” she cut in.
    â€œYour concern for me is very moving, Kate,” Alexander joked.
    â€œOh, well! Too late now. I suppose I should ask about your family.”
    â€œIt’s your family, too, and as far as I know, you don’t have any other. But if you’re interested, I ampleased to inform you that we are gradually getting back to a normal family life. Mother’s hair is growing back—curly and gray. Although she looked prettier when she was bald,” Kate’s grandson said.
    â€œI’m happy that Lisa is getting well. I like her. She’s a good painter,” Kate Cold